How do you define long-term development when working with communities facing multiple challenges?
In our communities, where livelihoods, health and education challenges are deeply interlinked, long-term development cannot be measured only through project outputs.
In my view, when families gain control of their lives over a continuous period of time and youth see viable futures, we have made a dent in systemic change.
Over time, this stability creates space for aspirations. Children stay in school longer, families invest in health, and communities are enabled through skill – that is what we consider long-term development.
What are the most important design factors that help social programmes create lasting impact on the ground?
The first is human-centricity. It is imperative to co-create programmes with communities rather than for them. Eternally imposed solutions fail to account for local realities, thus programs must be curated accordingly.
The second factor is duration and agility. Lasting impact requires staying the course with flexibility. Institution-building, whether women’s self-help groups or village-level committees, take years, not funding cycles. Finally, ownership is the key to sustainable outcomes. Our most effective programmes are those where the foundation has gradually stepped back, allowing community leadership and local governance structures to take ownership. Through this process, regular monitoring and feedback mechanisms allow programmes to evolve and remain sustainable over time.
Why do women-focused interventions tend to deliver stronger and more sustained outcomes across sectors like health, education and livelihoods?
Women operate at the intersection of household, community and economy. In our work across Odisha, women’s collectives have consistently demonstrated a multiplier effect. When women’s incomes rise, they attain agency and spending decisions prioritise nutrition, schooling and healthcare. We have seen empowered women address sanitation, school attendance and even local service delivery gaps. This agency often translates beyond improved outcomes for children and families to reshaping priorities at the household and community level. There is also greater accountability; women question irregular anganwadi services, follow up on entitlements and ensure benefits reach households. Investing in women is strategic because it strengthens outcomes across domains.
As successful models scale across regions, what are the key challenges in maintaining local relevance and accountability?
Agencies often prioritise ‘speed’ over ‘sensitivity’. However, social norms and institutional capacity vary widely across geographies. As a result, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Scaling is essentially a prototype, and when undertaken without local adaptation, it can lose relevance.
At BIPF, our local teams are empowered to adapt interventions as per lived realities, and community institutions remain central to decision-making. Accountability weakens when programmes become overly centralised or driven only by metrics. Staying close to the ground, through field reviews, community dialogue and local leadership, is essential to ensure relevance does not get diluted at the cost of scale.
Looking ahead, where should philanthropy focus to strengthen India’s development ecosystem alongside the state and markets?
India’s development ecosystem will progress at the speed of stakeholder alignment. The strength of the this ecosystem lies in innovation, capacity building and plugging systemic gaps. Given its risk taking ability, philanthropy must play the lead in piloting successful muti-sectoral models for the government to adopt.
Further, philanthropy must adopt a long-term, trust based approach. Issues such as learning outcomes, gender equity and livelihood resilience do not conform to short timelines. Contextual understanding and partnership with the state are critical to build inclusive structures. The greatest potential for impact is for philanthropy to interconnect priorities for samaj, sarkaar and bazaar.
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