Author: Smile Team

~Films from countries like Iran, Belgium, Chile, Cuba, Argentina to be highlights~
~India’s entry to Oscars ‘Village Rockstars’, Priyanka Chopra’s ‘Pahuna – The Little Visitors’ among films to be screened to inspire young minds~

New Delhi, April 14 2022: The eighth edition of the Smile International Film Festival for Children & Youth (SIFFCY), which will be held virtually from April 24-30, will screen over 100 films from more than 50 countries like Germany, Iran, Argentina, Cuba, Italy, Austria, and Switzerland, among others. The festival will feature a special curation of five Hindi and regional feature films produced by the Children’s Film Society, India, 10 films from Germany, made in collaboration with Schlingel, Chemnitz, and five Iranian films made in collaboration with the Center for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults: Kanoon, Iran.

The films being screened will include several unreleased titles and will feature a special curation of five Hindi and regional feature films produced by the Children’s Film Society India. India’s official entry to the Oscars – ‘Village Rockstars’ and Priyanka Chopra’s ‘Pahuna – The Little Visitors’ and Chuskit, a film directed by Priya Ramasubban will be screened as part of the Extra Smiles – Best of SIFFCY segment, which will also feature films like The Flying Trunk and Famous in Ahmedabad.

Some prominent films from other countries that would be screened include Birds of Passage from Belgium, Ballad from Tibet from China, King’s Day from The Netherlands, My Second Eye from Germany, Jordan and Palestine, and The Best Sound in the World from Brazil.

“SIFFCY aims to provide healthy entertainment to children. It supports good cinema for the benefit of children and youth. We are glad to have nurtured such a platform to bring quality films from across the globe. Good cinema for children and youth must be encouraged so that this medium can help us build an empathetic society and a better planet,” says Mr. Santanu Mishra, Chairman, SIFFCY, and Executive Trustee, Smile Foundation.

SIFFCY seeks to provide wholesome entertainment to children and help build their character through good cinema. The eighth edition of the film festival will also give a platform to films made by film students from India, Greece, Hungary, South Korea, and France. Films made by children from Portugal, Spain, Malaysia, and Slovenia will also to be screened.

“SIFFCY 2022, which is being organized virtually, will expose young minds to high quality cinema from across the world. It will shed light upon the way the world approaches cinema and films in general,” says Mr. Jitendra Mishra, Festival Director, SIFFCY.

Films screenings at SIFFCY 2022 have been divided into six categories namely, International Competition (Feature Films), International Competition (Shorts/documentaries), Extra Smile: Best of SIFFCY, 70 MM Smile : World Panorama, The Yellow Carpet: Indian Panorama, Next Gen: Films Made by Film Students, and Take One: Films Made by Children.

About Smile Foundation:

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 25 states.

Media Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

New Delhi, April 22: A pioneer in applying successful management practices in the social sector, Mr. Santanu Mishra, Co-Founder and Executive Trustee of Smile Foundation, was awarded with the Business World Social Impact Leader Award.

His contribution can also be described as a convergence of good governance, championing entrepreneurial spirit at the grassroots, leveraging emerging technologies, encouraging innovation, creating a high impact model, and imbibing the philosophy of real work and real change.

Mr. Mishra received the honor at the inaugural edition of the BW Disrupt Social Impact Summit & Awards 2022.

A management and legal consultant by profession, a company secretary by qualification, and an entrepreneur by passion, Mr. Santanu Mishra is also an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Born and brought up in Sambalpur, Odisha, he made his way up in the corporate sector before dedicating himself fulltime and voluntarily into nurturing Smile Foundation which he had founded along with a group of friends two decades ago.

His single-minded effort has made Smile Foundation impacting lives of 1.5 million children and their families directly across 26 states of India, every year through life-cycle approach of development.

Amalgamation of a high impact development model with the performance driven corporate world, fuelled by the selfless passion of social entrepreneurs and exemplary community connect at the grassroots have been the hallmarks of Smile Foundation.

Smile Foundation, the organization he nurtured, is known for evolving and applying various path-breaking models in the sector such as Civic Driven Change, Social Venture Philanthropy, Sensitization of Privileged Children, use of art in driving change etc. He is the producer of the path-breaking feature film I Am Kalam. Mr. Mishra is also the chairman of Smile International Film Festival for Children & Youth.

Mr. Santanu Mishra dedicated the Business World Social Impact Leader Award to the 2600 people of Smile Foundation who work relentlessly on the ground round the year.

“The award will act as a motivation for me and an encouragement for our people in the endeavor to create meaningful impact in the lives of children and their families. Active participation of the civil society is imperative in the mission to create an equitable future for our children, besides building an empathetic society and a happier planet,” said Mr. Santanu Mishra.

The BW Social Impact Summit and Awards 2022 hosted social welfare professionals and organizations in the domains of education, health, women empowerment, and sustainable development.

The jury for the award comprises of industry luminaries such as former NASSCOM President Dr. Kiran Karnik, BW group editorial director Noor Fathima Warsia, Air Marshal Naresh Verma, AVSM VSM (Retd); Chairman 5F World Dr. Ganesh Natarajan, Founder Crux Management Dr. Vikas Singh, BW Chairman & Editor-in-Chief Dr. Anurag Batra, among others.

Sadhguru, founder Isha Foundation, Kunal Kapoor, actor & founder Ketto, Shekhar Mehta, President Rotary International, Atul Satija, founder & CEO the Nudge Institute, Shridhar Venkat, CEO the Akshaya Patra Foundation, Mathew Cherian, Chairperson Care India were among the speakers during the summit & awards, which also included Mr. Santanu Mishra.

About Smile Foundation

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 26 states.

New Delhi, April 27, 2022: Smile Foundation, a leading Indian development organization, is hosting the 8th edition of the Smile International Film Festival for Children and Youth (SIFFCY). SIFFCY, which is being held virtually from April 24-30, will screen over 100 films from more than 50 countries like Germany, Iran, Argentina, Cuba, Italy, Austria, and Switzerland, among others.

The film screenings will be available on the festival’s online platform, siffcy.org, for viewers on registration.

The festival features more than 50 short films and documentaries made by children from over 30 different countries. Many of them were made during and about Corona virus pandemic. Some of the films which are part of the International Competition Section include ‘The Blue Girl’ a film from Iran, Fritzi, A Revolutionary Tale from Germany, ‘The Club of Ugly Children’ from Netherlands and Indian film ‘Dostojee’.

The festival also includes a special curation of five Hindi and regional feature films produced by Children’s Film Society India, an autonomous body under the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of India that will be part of the Yellow Carpet Section.

Awarding and encouraging cinema for good, this year, SIFFCY has more than 15 awards in various categories including prestigious ‘European Children’s Film Award’, ‘CIFEJ Award’ and ‘Film Critics Circle of India Award’.

Inaugurating the Smile International Film Festival for Children & Youth, Mr. Santanu Mishra, Chairman, SIFFCY, and Co-founder & Executive Trustee, Smile Foundation said, “The very purpose of SIFFCY is to enable our young citizens to build a better society where they can dream and work towards realizing those dreams. Over the past few years, technology has changed our world having both positive and negative impacts. Our children have been the most vulnerable, having had to face the brunt of excessive use of technology. Exposure to endless streams of content through digital media has often misled and misinformed children. From the glorious days of innocence, they are now faced with issues of mental health. As an optimist, I firmly believe that the right always overcomes. Art and culture can be instrumental in helping children and the youth fight back. Art can induce new ideas and shape thought processes. Cinema is one of the most influential and creative tools that can promote positivity. We aim to empower and educate children and the youth about societal problems and about the way to resolve these through goodcinema. I hope platforms like SIFFCY become a deterrent to the negative communication that is influencing children worldwide.”

Mr. Jitendra Mishra, Festival Director, SIFFCY, said, “Several unreleased but critically acclaimed films are part of the official program of SIFFCY this year, many of them will have their international and/or India premieres at SIFFCY. We are honoured to collaborate with the Center for the Intellectual Development of Child and Adolescent KANOON, CIFEJ, and the Schlingel International film festival, Chemnitz, Germany, to bring films from across the globe to our SIFFCY platform. We are glad to provide a platform for filmmakers to screen their films and documentaries that follow the theme of ‘Cinema for Good’. Our goal is to engage young minds to learn and understand the impact that films can have and participate in conversations that drive social change.”

Some prominent films from other countries featured at the festival include Birds of Passage from Belgium, Ballad from Tibet from China, King’s Day from The Netherlands, My Second Eye from Germany, Jordan and Palestine, and The Best Sound in the World from Brazil, among others.

• Festival Dates: 24-30 April 2022
• Award Ceremony: 30th April 2022

Join the Smile International Film Festival: https://siffcy.org/siffcy-2022-online

About Smile Foundation:

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families every year through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 26 states.

Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected] | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

~ Smile Foundation only non-profit to be awarded at Healthcare Asia Awards 2022 ~

New Delhi, April 29, 2022: Smile Foundation’s extensive and multi-pronged effort during the coronavirus pandemic in India was recognized as the COVID Management Initiative of the Year at the Healthcare Asia Awards 2022. The Foundation received this prestigious recognition for COVID-impact mitigation, healthcare service delivery and relief work it did over the past two years. Smile Foundation was the only non-profit organization among healthcare organizations, hospitals and institutions from across the globe to be awarded at the prestigious Healthcare Asia Awards under various categories.

Smile Foundation, through its Health Cannot Wait initiative, reached out to the nook and corner of the country and provided doorstep delivery of healthcare services through mobile healthcare and telemedicine mechanism, tele-counseling and awareness services, providing urgent necessities like PPE kits to health workers, strengthening the existing public health infrastructure through supply of oxygen and medicines, reducing the load of primary healthcare facilities, providing hygiene kits to masses, and spreading awareness to contain the spread of the virus. The initiative covered 14 states of India and reached out to over a million beneficiaries across India.

“We are honoured and humbled to receive such an encouragement in the form this prestigious award. The pandemic has been a monumental public health challenge. During the peak of the infections, as the situation worsened with every passing day, the need of the hour was to complement the government and public effort, and support the most vulnerable people. The accolade belongs to our entire team who turned Covid warriors displaying commendable resilience and selflessness,” said Mr. Santanu Mishra, Co-Founder and Executive Trustee, Smile Foundation.

As the world begins recovering from COVID-19, the healthcare sector has proved its resilience by manifesting ability to overcome challenges and continue serving the most vulnerable sections of society. Healthcare providers have innovated to devise breakthrough products, initiatives, and robust COVID management frameworks. Swift incorporation of these breakthroughs in day-to-day operations is helping manage crises and provide quality healthcare to patients.

The Healthcare Asia Awards 2022 recognized entities that have risen above the challenges caused by the pandemic and innovated to better serve customers. This year’s nominations were chosen by an elite panel of judges consisting of Chris Hardesty, Pureland Venture Partners; Partha Basumatary, EY-Parthenon Director, Life Sciences & Healthcare, Strategy Lead; and Sarah Butler, PwC Global Health Service Leader.

About Smile Foundation:

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families ever year through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 26 states.

Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

~Project Manzil is creating a career path for adolescent girls so they can dream big and become independent~

New Delhi, May 11, 2022: Smile Foundation, under its Project Manzil initiative, has now provided employability training to around 14,000 young girls and enabled on-the-job training of another 5,000 girls to secure their future. The Foundation has encouraged the girls by enrolling them in vocational education courses.

Manzil’s girl-centered initiatives (both in-school and out-of-school) based on skills, information, stakeholder engagement aid significantly in addressing the socio-economic constraints that contribute to early marriage. For instance, evidence shows that adolescent girls with employability skills and prospects of employment are less likely to marry early. Economic empowerment of women also helps girls exercise more influence within the household and on issues like age of marriage.

Project Manzil is a five-year project funded by Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF) and is implemented by IPE Global. The in-school component of training is implemented by Smile Foundation. This initiative aims to increase retention of girls in schools and ensure effective transition from school to higher studies and/or work by making available training in vocational skills in schools, along with apprenticeships and jobs for out of school adolescent girls (15-19 years).

By imparting practical knowledge to students, over and above theoretical knowledge through Project Manzil, Smile Foundation is taking yet another step forward to provide quality education to young girls across Rajasthan.

NEP 2020 reinforces the need to address skill development through vocational training. Skill-based training is a vital component of our education system, from schools to universities. Vocational education serves as a tool to help girls who want to learn skills quickly but cannot afford a university degree. This training opens many job opportunities for girls. By introducing vocational training at the school and college levels, the project seeks to check girls’ drop-out rate.

Manzil aims to improve the quality of vocational education through three approaches focused on schools, students, and industry. These approaches improve the overall effectiveness of vocational education by helping the girls make informed decisions on their careers. Manzil provides training to girls in streams like IT, healthcare, beauty & wellness, security, retail, automobile, apparel, home furnishing, agriculture, tourism & hospitality, and electrical & electronics. Project Manzil aims to empower adolescent girls to realize their career goals and aspirations.

Mr. Santanu Mishra, Co-Founder and Executive Trustee Smile Foundation said, “Academic and vocational learning are complimentary to one another. When practical industry-based skill training becomes part of schooling, especially for girl children, it empowers them to make informed choices in life. This project has been showing inspiring impact.”

Project Manzil offers student counselling and aspiration-mapping services, regularization of on-the-job training and industry exposure, industry tie-ups for schools, mapping of local industries and employers on the Manzil app, employability skills and services to improve enrollment in vocational education. Currently, the project benefits 90,000 adolescent girls between 14 and 19 years pursuing vocational education in grade 9-12 across 182 Government schools in 6 districts of Rajasthan.

About Smile Foundation:

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 25 states.

Media Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

~Smile Foundation has been recognized yet again this year for its healthcare initiative Smile on Wheels by the CSR Health Impact Awards 2022~

May 23, 2022, New Delhi:Smile Foundation received the Health CSR Project Silver Award at the CSR Health Impact Awards 2022 for its innovative mobile healthcare program Smile on Wheels. Through this initiative, Smile Foundation takes preventive, curative, and promotive healthcare services to the doorstep of less-privileged communities in remote rural areas and urban slums across India.

Currently, 45 Smile on Wheels projects are operational across 23 states of India, serving more than a million underprivileged children and families every year.

“Throughout the pandemic, our Smile on Wheels program helped us continue to provide primary and specialized healthcare services, especially among the underserved population across India. We have been integrating telemedicine, tele-counselling and technological assistance in our healthcare programs to ensure better reach and specialized care can reach the grassroots,” said Mr. Santanu Mishra, Co-Founder and Executive Trustee, Smile Foundation.

Conferred by IHW Council, the awards recognize organizations that have imbibed responsible business practices in their core philosophy by initiating the most impactful health CSR ventures that have driven change on the ground and impacted millions of lives.

The jury for the award comprised of industry luminaries such as IAS Ram Bandyopadhyay, IAS Alok Ranjan, and Dr. Chandrakant Pandav (Public Health Expert), among others.

About Smile Foundation

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families every year through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 26 states.

Media Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

New Delhi, June 06, 2022: Reiterating its commitment to creating change at the grassroots by empowering individuals and nascent organizations, Smile Foundation organized a two-day trainer refresher programme for its Change the Game Indiapool of trainers.

Built on Smile Foundation’s 20 years of experience working at the grassroots in India, Change the Game Academy brings Change the Game India programme to strengthen the capabilities of social changemakers and grassroots organizations working for better governance and self-sustainability. The programme enables such organizations to gain credibility and support. It also helps them become self-sufficient by honing their skills in identifying, accessing, and mobilizing locally available resources.

Two Master trainers along with other trainers of Change the Game India attendedthis two-day in-person refresher programme after three years. The refresher programme also served as a meeting for the trainers to catch up and share updates on the development of the programme, globally and nationally. The trainers also shared their expectations and challenges as a team. Additionally, special sessions were organized on specific topics such as digital fundraising,governance compliance,laws and regulations,and corporate social responsibility.

“The last two years of the pandemic proved the importance of having strong networks that can support and strengthen communities at the last mile. With Change the Game India Programme, we aim to train small organizations working at the grassroots to create the maximum impact and utilize resources to their potential.Followingthephilosophy of Social Venture Philanthropy, wehavebeen working to empower such organizations towards better governance and help them design their own funding strategies to advance towards sustainability,” said Vikram Singh Verma, Executive Director, Smile Foundation addressing the closing session of the programme.

Santanu Mishra, Co-Founder and Executive Trustee, Smile Foundation said, “Social entrepreneurs are the key in helping develop grassroot programmes and initiatives that make a real impact and help the country tread the path of development. Their contribution is immense. With in-depth training programmes such as these, we look at strengthening efforts of organizations working at the grassrootsto help build a sustainable and stronger India.”

The senior leadership, while appreciating the initiative, impressed upon the need for introspectionon how as a CtGI trainer one has benefited personally so one could convey the same to the participants.

Change the Game India has developed an innovative blended-learning programme that helps change-makers from civil society organizations and social entrepreneurs from all over the country learn and imbibe fundraising best practices.Currently,through Change the Game India initiative, Smile Foundation has supported 185 organizations in India.

About Smile Foundation:

Smile Foundation is an Indian development organization directly benefiting over 1.5 million children and families every year through more than 400 welfare projects on education, healthcare, livelihood, and women empowerment spread across 2,000 villages and urban slums in 25 states.

Change the Game India:

As a partner in co-creating Change the Game Academy, Smile Foundation has major ownership as the national partner in India, along with the responsibility as the nodal partner for Asian region. Change the Game India aims to empower the grassroots, including communities and social entrepreneurs, in India by building their capacities & mentoring them towards self-reliance & self-sustainability by helping them adapt sustainable ways of raising funds. This is done with a vision that it would enable them to address the needs of the civil society by supplementing and complementing the efforts of the government and in line with global development strategies.

Contact:

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

~athenahealth and Smile Foundation’s mobile healthcare unit, Smile on Wheels, has served more than 10,000 patients in Chennai, India, since launching last year~

Chennai, June 7, 2022: athenahealth, Inc., a leading provider of network-enabled software and services for medical groups and health systems nationwide, and Smile Foundation today announced that through their partnership in the Smile on Wheels programme, more than 10,000 patients received care in its first six months of operation. athenahealth and Smile Foundation launched their mobile medical unit in August 2021 to strengthen public health infrastructure and provide primary healthcare to Chennai residents.

Smile on Wheels is a national-level mobile healthcare programme focused on serving underprivileged children and women. Through the programme, athenahealth is providing financial support for a Smile on Wheels mobile medical unit, which offers primary healthcare services in an area of Chennai with approximately 17,600 households and 88,000 residents.

“We are proud of the significant impact that this partnership is already making by providing so many residents with access to necessary healthcare,” said Vikram Singh Verma, Executive Director, Smile Foundation. “We look forward to continuing to work with athenahealth to provide primary healthcare services to the Chennai community,” he added.

“athenahealth is proud to partner with Smile Foundation and support the Smile on Wheels programme, which is providing vital care to some of the most vulnerable communities in India,” said Sasidharan Chinnaraj, Executive Director of Engineering at athenahealth India. “Through this programme, we are already making a significant impact in Chennai, and we look forward to continuing to serve these communities with the care they need and deserve,” he added.

The Smile on Wheels programme sends well-equipped medical mobile units, along with specialized doctors, nurses, medical staff, and medicine, to villages and underserved communities to provide crucial access to healthcare services. The objective of the programme is to ensure improved healthcare services reach the doorsteps of people residing in unserved or underserved areas. Smile on Wheels provides free healthcare services to more than 1.5 million children and families every year across India.

About athenahealth, Inc.

athenahealth creates innovative healthcare technology that connects clinicians, patients, payers, and partners in differentiated ways. Our electronic health records, revenue cycle management, and patient engagement tools allow anytime, anywhere access, driving better financial outcomes for our customers and enabling our provider customers to deliver better quality care. In everything we do, we’re inspired by our vision to create a thriving ecosystem that delivers accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all. For more information, please visit: https://www.athenahealth.com/

Through athenaGives, athenahealth’s corporate social responsibility program, we have partnered with Smile Foundation to help advance our mission and create positive social impact. athenaGives’ mission is to expand access to high-quality healthcare for all today, ensure food security, and support STEM education to develop providers and technologists who will provide access to high-quality healthcare for all tomorrow. For more information, please visit https://www.athenahealth.com/about/athenagives-india.

About Smile Foundation

Smile Foundation is an NGO in India directly benefitting over 15,000,000 children and their families every year through more than 400 live welfare projects on education for poor children, healthcare, livelihood, and women’s empowerment in more than 2,000 remote villages and underserved communities across 25 states of India. Adopting a life cycle approach of development, Smile Foundation focuses its interventions on children, their families, and the community.

Media Contacts:

Smile Foundation

Sreeparna Chakrabarty: [email protected]. | 9811502059
Website: https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/

athenahealth

Rob Julavits
[email protected]
(203) 666-7687