DaanUtsav, earlier called the Joy of Giving Week, is India’s ‘festival of giving’. Launched in 2009, the festival is celebrated from October 2 to 8 every year, bringing together Indians from all walks of life to celebrate ‘giving’ and experience the joy of giving. This year, Digital Empowerment Foundation has decided to celebrate DaanUtsav through its Community Information Resource Centres in rural India. DEF has a presence at 161 locations spread across 21 states of India. Through these centres, DEF staff will mobilise the local communities to celebrate DaanUtsav in whatever ways they can.
At some locations, about 20 of them, DEF would organise DaanUtsav Mela on the lines similar to the one celebrated in Badamba in Odisha, bringing together thousands of community members at one place to give and share with each other. At these mela, we will encourage the idea of crowdsourcing to set up tents, stalls and decoration, besides motivating the locals to give whatever they can. Some of the locations that have been finalised so far to host the Mela include Chanderi, Guna, Nuapatna, Tilonia, Pondicherry, Barabanki, Darbangaand Guwahati, among others.
DEF has also promised to contribute to the festival by making a few promotional videos and films on DaanUtsav activities during the week. Some of the events that we host during the week will also be broadcasted through Periscope. The organisation will also impart free digital literacy classes to a certain number of students for free during the DaanUtsav week at its CIRCs.
Across the country, DaanUtsav is celebrated with much fervor and dedication. From auto drivers to CEOs, school children to celebrities, homemakers to opinion leaders, millions of people give their time, money, resources or skills back to the society annually during this week by creating or participating in events or activities of their choice. A giving event could be as simple as a family taking out the maid’s children for an ice-cream party, or as large as Gift Compassion that had 10,000+ school children across India making and exchanging gifts with their peers from different socio-economic backgrounds. Events are organised by individuals, social groups, schools, colleges, NGOs, corporates, media houses and others. In 2013 alone, more than two million people participated in over 900 events across 80 cities in DaanUtsav, raising several tens of crores in money and resources donated, and millions of volunteer hours.