Young Indians

The Young Indians (YI) is a fairly young organization that has, if not much else so far, obtained an excellent understanding of what it's working with. From visits to Pragati Printing Press, Boys' Town, the City Police Comissioner and the TV9 studios, to expositions on photography by famous artists, it is pretty close to having seen it all.

In the years to come, it hopes to do as much, as is evident from the byzantine structure of platforms along which it plans to execute a number of projects.

And what is all this in aid of? The YI objectives are lofty sounding: to become the voice of young Indians and involve them in shaping India. Also, they insist that they are the 'enablers' of change rather than the 'implementors' of it.

YI Connect, YI Bridge and YI Learning, the three main initiatives of YI, are platforms that target the student community, the government and corporate authorities, and knowledge pursuits for the YI members, respectively.

On the above platforms, individual projects are conceptualised. One is "Akshara", for setting up learning resource centers for schools. Another is a project to develop skills among industry workers so they can be ready for employment.

Then there are the Youth nets. Networks of students in colleges, (Bhavan's and ICFAI so far) set up by YI and guided by them to carry out projects in social responsibility. Bhavan's and ICFAI have made some staccato progress so far, but by next year, YI intends to really get them buzzing, besides starting some more.

Being an offshoot of CII, YI predictably has some big names associated with it: whether entrepreneurs themselves or even prominent page three regulars. And that makes them a rather well-connected group. Which means, in the years to come, it ought not to be too optimistic to expect some trenchant thinking and effective action from them.