We wanted to make change affordable

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Now that Ujjaini's trust was won, the next important step for SIFE HRC volunteers was to collect funds to buy solar lamps to light up the village and seek a vendor who would provide them with these lamps at a reasonable cost.

They accidentally chanced upon a social entrepreneur, one Mr Kumar -- who is quite secretive about his identity and has requested these students not to reveal more about him -- who agreed to sell them at a nominal cost of Rs 3,650 per unit that would include one LED-powered lantern, one tubelight, one battery encased in a protective cover, two solar panels and wiring.

"To light up entire Ujjaini comprising 111 households at the cost of Rs 3,650 per unit we needed Rs 4,05,000, a rather difficult task for us college students," says Jyotirmoy.

They had never engaged in this kind of money-raising exercise, but it had to be done. Going to corporates would not have been of much help because these students only had a noble idea with no history, no record, nothing that could prove their sincerity and ability to execute a project of such enormity to corporate bigwigs.

"Why would anybody give us that kind of money?" they would often think aloud at their meetings to brainstorm over ways to raise money.

As they say, adversity is the father of all inventions, so these college kids, facing a financial crunch, started thinking about their strengths. After a few days they got their Eureka moment. They were 6,000 students in all and if each one of them contributed even Rs 10, they thought, they would have made a small beginning.

"At the very next moment we came up with a slogan: Rs 10 for light," says Abhinav.

"We could have easily gone to rich bakras in our college and they would have donated us the money we wanted. But we wanted to make change affordable," says Jyotirmoy, elaborating on the fact that they wanted their entire college to partake in this noble affair without burdening any one student.

They had heard a lot of young people in their college talking about bringing in change so they thought their idea could give the youth in their college a chance to become part of that transformation.

The idea was to make all feel proud about their little contributions. "Let's not make even a peon feel that just because s/he is a peon s/he cannot help bring about real, meaningful change in our society," says Afsheen.

"If anybody can afford to save Rs 10 every day of the year s/he could easily muster the Rs 3,650 needed to buy one unit of the solar lamp," says Prachi.

All the students from junior as well as degree colleges came together and unanimously decided to work on it. They wanted to experience the thrill and joy of getting something beyond a college award or a passing certificate.

They wanted to prove a point to all those (read: government, corporates) who always talked about improving the lives of the backward and the disadvantaged, who have the money to bring about that change but have not brought about the change they could.

"We wanted to prove a point that if students of one college can collect the money and light up a village, what kind of tremendous change can corporates and governments bring about given the resources they have," says Afsheen.

Image: Clockwise from top: SIFE HRC volunteers installing solar lamps and tubelights inside a tribal's home; Volunteers with Rs for light placards.