Charity begins at home

This post is in response to the Times life article dated Aug 29, 2010, titled ‘The wealth sharers’. Writer Indrani Rajkhowa Banerjee examines the philanthropic inclinations of the Indian wealthy and comes up with some striking revelations. The tight fisted Indian community is softly rebuked throughout with pertinent findings like ‘if India’s richest 100 donated their fortunes the way Warren Buffett and Bill Gates did – over $250billion – a quarter of the Indian GDP would be generated’. In the same breath Capt Gopinath’s quote ‘I feel the biggest philanthropy is to create jobs. Give youth a livelihood, not spurts of charity’ is also given that aptly sums up the issue. It’s in synch with the old adage ‘don’t feed them fish, teach them fishing’. Otherwise the magnanimous Ambanis and Birlas could have solved the issue in a jiffy for our languishing millions.

Santosh Desai’s observation that Indian generosity is centred only on local institutions like the temple, church, mosque and the like, and Capt Gopinath’s opinion that Indians amass wealth for family strike reality chords. The munificence shown towards religious establishments can be attributed to pure selfish gains far from community thoughts. The overt importance for family is another anathema steering one away from all the stark realities and chant only the mantra of me and myself. The same can be blamed for the lackadaisical attitude in many other fields stopping the average Indian from active indulgence in anything blaming everything on his/her family. Very rarely we come across an Indian legacy bequeathing wealth to societal welfare in contrast to the west where people don’t leave behind much to the family. As Indrani pointed out lack of trust plays an important role preventing many from channelizing their wealth as they fear it may fall in wrong hands.

Institutionalising charity is not a solution as suggested in the article even though it has its merits. Corporate charitable foundations can sure alleviate the problem to an extent but it’s finally the call of the aam admi to address the issue.

Do you have to be wealthy to donate?

A small percentage of the monthly income can be set aside for small acts of charity which can go a long way in serving the society. The changing face of the new wealthy Indian is portrayed by Indrani but we need the plebeian to wake up as they make the major size of our population and no change can be envisioned without their participation. To quote Narayana Murthy, “The power of money is to give it away”.