Internship at The Akshaya Patra Foundation – Savara Govind from SVNIT, Surat
Working in NGO is not easy as it seems, more complex it gets as more deep you go. He (first row, left most) stepped forward for the social cause and learned a lot during his internship. It was his determination and faith in the existence of better aura for everyone, that each face is smiling now.
FLIGHT-2014
A very interesting, memorable, knowledge gathering and useful internship in a NGO named The Akshaya Patra Foundation (TAPF), one of the world’s top NGO’s and ranked First in Food category, at Bangalore during summer-2014. At present TAPF is feeding about 15 Lacs of Children across 10 states in India. Its vision “No child in India shall be deprived of Education because of Hunger” and its Mission “To feed 5 million children by 2020”. The internship lasted for 5 weeks. First week was an introduction to the NGO, its different departments (HR, Finance, Accounts, PR, Innovation etc.) and its functions in social development of India. All the Head of Departments addressed us about their work, different aspects of functionality and their vision. Second week there is an opportunity to all the interns to give a presentation about “Amma Canteens” as its functionality and management similar to the TAPF. It gave us a chance to improve our analytical skills, communication skills, making of PPT, data collection and so on.
Next we have a chance to explore the first TAPF kitchen at Hare Krishna hills at Bangalore. We were very excited to know about the technology used, management, safety measurements, cooking containers (cauldrons), pre-processing of vegetables and cooking process. Also we visited the second generation kitchen at Vaikuntha hill, Vasantapura. We have seen the semi-automatic technology used for different purposes to reduce the labor cost. Third week we have a great opportunity to travel along with food delivery vehicles to visit different schools. I was astonished to see the smiles on the face of the students when they saw the Akshaya patra vehicles carrying the only food which they get throughout the whole day. I spent little time with teachers, students to know about the service provided by TAPF. I felt very happy when they all are answering with joy that they are able to get such a hygienic and tasty food everyday (except on holidays, it’s very pathetic condition, I feel when I think about the poor students of India.) Then we also went out for market survey to different companies and food outlets located in Peenya Industrial Area, Bangalore to know about recent market trends on quality, quantity of food supplied by them for the employees or customers. Next week we have a good time with professors of IIM Bangalore, who addressed us about the topic on Vehicle Routing problem Optimization. We learnt the basic Travelling Salesman Program and different algorithms used in Vehicle Routing. We were exposed to a Software Amrita (Akshaya patra Mid day meal Routing and transportation Algorithm) used by TAPF to make the routing plans for vehicles, which optimized the transportation cost. During last week, group wise we all interns had a technical project on different topics. My group’s topic was “Predictive Modelling for Boiler Efficiency”. At last the whole program of internship ended with graduation ceremony and prize distributions and all fun. All these weeks we all interns had memorable times with the employees of Akshaya patra and co-interns. During our internship period we all attended so many workshops on Innovation, Interpersonal skills & team building skills. It’s really a great moment in my life to work with TAPF and proud of being a volunteer of Akshaya patra. I think this is an opportunity given by Internshala to share my gratitude for the whole TAPF team and all other teaching assistants from different colleges who has spent lots of their valuable time with us. Thank you Internshala..!
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