The $125 Million Opportunity: How Every Indian American Family Donating $100 on India  Giving Day Could Double Nonprofit Budgets

Nearly three years ago, we came together to serve as the midwives to a bold experiment: harnessing the power of the “Giving Day” fundraising model to accelerate the growth and development of American private philanthropy to India. With the third annual “India Giving Day” taking place on March 14, 2025—just one week away—we believe that the leap of faith to invest our time and expertise into this movement has proven worthwhile.

The stakes could hardly be higher. In the rapidly changing political landscape worldwide, private philanthropy is likely to play a more significant role in addressing societal ills over the next 5-10 years, and perhaps longer. India, as ever a country of contradictions, has arguably pulled more people out of poverty over the last 20 years than any other country in history, but it still has by far the largest number of poor people in the world. Or consider this: India’s is the fastest growing the world’s large economies, but 25% of its youth ages 15-24 are neither employed nor involved in any form of training or education. 

Indian Americans have an important role to play in ensuring more progress on critical issues. They are the center of gravity of U.S. philanthropy to India. According to a 2018 study by Dalberg and Indiaspora, they already volunteer their time at far higher rates than their fellow citizens and they are warming to contributing larger amounts of money to high-impact causes as their assets balloon due to the community’s business acumen and work ethic.   

As members of the India Giving Day Steering Committee, we have overseen the growth of this new annual tradition from raising $1.4 million for 25 respected nonprofits in 2023 to $5.5 million for 33 charities in 2024. We are particularly proud of the efforts of young people, who have used peer-to-peer (P2P) fundraising models to attract hundreds of first-time donors to these carefully-chosen organizations. 

This year, we expect to raise even more, while supporting nearly 100 online and in-person volunteer-led events throughout the country and hundreds of mostly youthful P2P fundraisers. All of these donations will be put to work in India to support evidence-based programs, and nearly all of them come without restrictions, which make them especially beneficial to implementing groups. 

Some among us have worked in other countries in the Global South over the course of our careers, and we have come to recognize that India is home to some of the most innovative, cost-effective, and high impact nonprofit organizations and social enterprises anywhere. Especially as we have limited our platform to 36 of the best-run charities, donors can feel confident that their dollars and other resources—such as their volunteer hours—will be well spent. 

In fact, a growing body of evidence shows that the programs that these organizations run work to reduce poverty and advance the health, education, employment, and entrepreneurship amongst disadvantaged groups. In some cases, NGOs such as the American India Foundation and Pratham have formed partnerships with research organizations such as the Society for Education, Action and Research in Community Health (SEARCH) and the Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), respectively, to document their positive impacts on health care and education (including how technology, used appropriately, can improve learning outcomes). 

Other organizations use internal monitoring and evaluation units to measure positive client outcomes and drive continuous learning and improvement. Unrestricted donations and grants that build in resources for monitoring and evaluation are essential to ensuring even greater impact and learning in the years ahead.

Some Indian American immigrants have held the view that addressing society-wide problems like poverty and illiteracy are the responsibilities of government and perhaps the super-rich. However, leading nonprofits such as those on the India Giving Day platform are showing that small donations from large numbers of people can add up to big change. In fact, this year we are encouraging every Indian American family to consider contributing at least $100 between March 1 and 14 to the organization that most aligns with their values and priorities. If each did so, it would result in $125 million in new funding, nearly doubling the annual budgets of these organizations.

Certainly, the Indian government deserves a lot of credit for the progress the nation has achieved in recent decades. But even here, the role of the nonprofit sector has been significant. Many state and district governments have sought out NGOs to pilot innovative new models and then scaled them widely after proof-of-concept was achieved. This stretches donor dollars by super-charging their impact with public sector resources. This phenomenon prompted IPA to write a paper about best practices for NGOs partnering with public sector institutions.   

We also believe that sharing one’s resources brings benefits not just to nonprofits and their clients, but also to their benefactors—representing a triple win. As experienced philanthropists Deepak Raj and Raj Gupta reminded us in advance of last year’s India Giving Day Campaign, “Research shows that people who give the most to charities are, on average, happier, healthier, and more successful than those who give less, or not at all. We can attest to the fact that our own giving has not only had a positive impact on society but made us better and more satisfied people.” Each of us plans to donate to at least one organization on the IGD platform, and several of us will donate to them all.

With government support for international humanitarian work uncertain in the years immediately ahead, we believe that doubling down on private support is essential today. We love the call to action by Accelerate Indian Philanthropy to “give more, give sooner, and give better.” Furthermore, we believe it applies to both Indian Americans and other U.S. citizens and residents who have a heart for India. (In fact, two of us have not a drop of Indian blood flowing in our veins but are nonetheless passionate about doing good there.) Our own version of AIP’s mantra is for India Giving Day to “increase the quantity, quality, and joyfulness of American private giving to India.” 

However one articulates it, there is a huge opportunity today to advance philanthropy benefitting India as well as other causes that Indian Americans and other people of goodwill care about. Let’s use March 14 as a day to focus on the goodness inside each of us and the possibilities of improving the human condition through collective action. In so doing, we can channel the wisdom of Mahatma Gandhi, who once said, “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” 

By Manisha Bharti, Roma Bose, Alex Counts, Sejal Desai, Ashish Garg, Paul Glick, Minoo Gupta, Kalpana Kanthan, Neil Mehta, Yamini Misra, and Venky Raghavendra 

About the Authors

The authors are the members of the India Giving Day (IGD) Steering Committee. IGD is a project of the India Philanthropy Alliance. Manisha Bharti is the CEO of Pratham USA; Roma Bose is the Vice-President of Development and Partnerships at the Sehgal Foundation; Alex Counts is the Executive Director of the India Philanthropy Alliance; Sejal Desai is the Executive Director of Akanksha Education Fund; Ashish Garg is a technology executive; Paul Glick is the Executive Director of the Rural India Supporting Trust (RIST); Kalpana Kanthan is the Chief Development and Marketing Officer of AIF; Neil Mehta is the Vice President of Marketing & Digital Strategy for Akshaya Patra USA; Yamini Misra is the India Country Director for the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation; and Venky Raghavendra is a development consultant. Bharti and Desai are the co-chairs of the committee.