Tag: Philanthropy

HH Sheikha Arwa Al Qassimi Sponsors Photography Exhibition for the Visually Impaired Enthusiasts at Press Club, Mumbai

Sightsavers is an association that aims at preventing unnecessary blindness, restore sight, and campaign for the social inclusion and equal treatment of persons with disabilities. Recently, the organization coordinated a photography workshop for the admirers of photography done by blind persons at the Press Club in Mumbai.

The workshop, which was named ‘The Blind View’ was the pioneer in the series of Sightsavers’ advocacy events held across the country. The workshop was organized in collaboration with Beyond Sight Foundation. Her Highness Sheikha Arwa Al Qassimi also sponsored the event.

Mr. Partho Bhowmick, the founder of Beyond Sight Foundation (BSF), stated that his foundation was delighted to have conducted such a special workshop for the upcoming photographers in collaboration with Sightsavers. The workshop’s participants were given training on how to click photos depicting their everyday life. The finest of those photographs will be presented in an exhibition that is to be held later in the year. The core purpose of this creative initiative was to create a better perception of blindness and to inspire the participants to have confidence in themselves and pursue their goals.

The workshop’s participants were trained on taking great pictures by accomplished experts. In attendance was the popular blind photographer, Bhavesh Patel. Recently, Bhavesh did a photo shoot for a Lux advertisement with Katrina Kaif, a Bollywood actress.

The Senior Manager, Brand & Communications- Sightsavers, Mr. Amal Guptaacknowledged that the company’s motto in organizing the workshop was to highlight the talents of disabled persons. In addition, the company sought to create an empowering environment in which the visually impaired can work to attain economic independence instead of being dependants.

The CEO of Sightsavers (India) – Mr. RN Mohanty, was contented with the evident passion the participants had for the photography workshop. He expressed his goodwill for the participants by wishing them“the best in their future endeavors.”

HH Sheikha Arwa Al Qassimi Sponsors Photography Exhibition, The Blind View

The use of cell-phones, laptops, TVs and other electronic gadgetry are an essential part of our lives. Nowadays, people tend to spend most of their time with these visual devices. In a civilization that is as vision-centric as ours, it is usually difficult for sighted persons to comprehend a blind life. However, there is more to being blind than what we see, and our collective subconscious needs a precision surgery to alter our perspective on blindness. The Blind View is a Sightsavers’ initiative that is meant to be the precision surgery that changes our perspective on blindness. Persons that are visually impaired make use of other senses to create visions. What if sighted persons could visualize what blind persons see?

Photography serves as an extension of sight. Sighted people see photography simply as a way to capture moments and scenes. What if they realized that sight supersedesthe simple act of seeing? What if they appreciated moments, textures, and odors through photographs? What if they learnt that there is a dissimilar kind of photography that they are entirely unacquainted with- a unique form of photography that is upheld by the blind?

The Blind View aims to fascinate and astonish people with highly influential events and connections to increase understanding on the abilities of blind persons. The Blind may have deteriorating eyesight, but that is often compensated by a better understanding of their environments using other senses. The Blind View project highlights these realities and confronts the prevalent perceptions on disability.

Sightsavers, in collaboration with Beyond Sight Foundation a photography series for those living with vision impairment, will carry out two photography workshops for blind persons in Mumbai (June) and Bangalore (September). The photos taken in these workshops will be displayed soon afterwards in public exhibitions in the two cities and also in online virtual galleries- all concluding in a gala event in Delhi. Supported by strong online and offline promotional activities, voting for the best photos by the public, and numerous sensitization exercises, the movement will increase awareness about Sightsavers and the significance of the social inclusion of blind people.

A Photography Exhibition Sponsored by HH Sheikha Arwa Al Qassimi for the Visually Impaired

Mumbai, 1st August 2015: Sightsavers is an organization that works to reduce the incidence of preventable loss of sight,promote sight restoration as well assupport the social inclusion and equal rights for the disabled.The organization recently held an exhibition of pictures taken by blind photographers. The exhibition took place at the Orbit Mall (Malad), Mumbai. The collaboration of the Sightsavers alongside Beyond Sight Foundation contributed to the successful display of photography done by visually impaired photographers in a workshop supported by Her Highness SheikhaArwa Al Qassimi.
Mr. RN Mohanty CEO, Sightsavers India stated that the initiative aimed at changing the perception that the visually impaired are a liability to their families and that the society is oblivious of the challenges faced by the blind. He added that Sightsavers intended to disapprove that perception and show that the visually impaired are capable of being independent and pursuing their interests.
Mr. ParthoBhowmick, Founder, Beyond Sight Foundation (BSF) remarked that the exhibition could create a linkbetween the abled and physically challenged persons. He added that it would help people to better perceive the world from the visually disadvantaged persons’ point of view.
The photography workshop was held on June, this year. Participants received training on ideal picture clicking under the instruction of proficient experts. The famous visually impaired photographer Bhavesh Patel, who recently did a photo shoot with Katrina Kaif, a Bollywood actress,was among the experts who took part in the workshop. The photographer is well known for hisphotoshoot with Bollywood Actress Katrina Kaif.Bhavesh clarified that the visually impaired felt the need to be treated like ordinary persons in the society. Additionally, he emphasized that the disadvantaged are part of the society. Thus, they should not be sympathized with.
Upon its successfulcompletion, the workshop in Mumbai saw 20 portraitson seven different themes being shortlisted in which blind participants were clicked by their counterparts while carrying out a sequence of interesting activities. Every picture illustrates a unique story representing diverse aspects of being blind.
According to,Amal Gupta, Senior Manager,Brand and communications-Sightsavers, the exhibition served to portray the lives and abilities of blind persons; their day to day activities such as going to work, etc.
Sightsavers is a registered organization that aims at preventing the loss of sight,promote sight restoration as well assupportthe social inclusion and equivalent rights for the disabled. The organization has been operating in India since 1966, where it has reached 53.4 million people. It has carried out 36.2 million eye treatments and 4.9 million eye treatments.

A charitable tax move that flies under the radar

Here’s a charitable tax tip from Mark Zuckerberg: When you donate stock rather than cash, you can save a lot on capital gains taxes. That’s part of what the Facebook founder and CEO did in creating an LLC to which he’s planning to donate up to 99 percent of his Facebook stock fortune. And it’s a charitable tax technique that experts say should be considered by all investors. You don’t need an LLC or a billion dollars to gift stock that you intend to sell to a charity.

Gifting “appreciated assets” — stocks, bonds or mutual fund shares that you’ve held for more than one year and that have increased in value — to charity often flies under the radar due to the popularity of cash donations.

“It’s an obscure part of the financial world,” said Eileen Heisman, president and CEO of the National Philanthropic Trust. “You almost need someone to tell you about it, like an accountant or tax lawyer.”

The tax savvy, charitable strategy is on the rise. Through the third quarter of 2015, 63 percent of donations to investment giant Fidelity Investments’ Fidelity Charitable were appreciated assets, which include publicly traded securities and non-publicly traded assets, such as private-equity interests, private business shares and real estate. This is an increase from 54 percent during the same period in 2014, according to Fidelity.

Now may be an opportune time for investors to learn how to gift appreciated assets.

With stocks having surged in the six-year bull market run, investors may need to rebalance and pare back on some holdings, said Barry Glassman, financial advisor and founder/president of Glassman Wealth Services. If that’s the case, an investor has two choices: Sell stocks and realize capital gains, or donate some of the appreciated securities to a charity, which shields the stock gains from capital gains taxes.

If an investor is set on selling a stock — and also set on making a charitable donation — it’s worth doing the math on whether gifting stock makes more sense than giving cash, based on capital gains that would be paid on a straight stock sale.

Giving by top 50 philanthropists drops 30%

Total giving by the top 50 philanthropists in America dropped 30 percent last year, totaling $7 billion, and marking the lowest amount since 2010, according to a new report.

The Philanthropy 50 list, compiled by the Chronicle of Philanthropy, said the drop was partly due to massive one-time donations in 2014, including a $1.9 billion gift by Bill and Melinda Gates to their foundation.

Stock market volatility may also be to blame, especially with wealthy donors from Silicon Valley. After several years in which tech titans dominated the Philanthropy 50 list, New York and other regions made up the bulk of giving in 2015.

“For potential tech donors, the flat market in 2015 meant that there were fewer initial public offerings, mergers and acquisitions,” Emmett Carson, CEO of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, said in the report.

The late billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife was the top charitable giver in the U.S. last year, with bequests totaling $759 million. Scaife, heir to the Mellon banking and oil fortune and a leading contributor to the Republican Party, died in 2014. His will was executed last year.

Scaife, who had lived in Pittsburgh, directed most of his fortune to two private foundations — the Allegheny Foundation, which supports charities in western Pennsylvania, and the Sarah Scaife Foundation, which funds conservative and libertarian public-policy groups. He gave each of these organizations $369.4 million.

Ranking second was the late John Santikos, who built the largest family-owned theater chain in Texas. Santikos gave $605 million from his estate to the San Antonio Area Community Foundation.

Ranking third was Michael Bloomberg, whose giving in 2015 totaled $510 million. He was followed by New York hedge-funder John Paulson, who gave $400 million to Harvard University. EBay founder Pierre Omidyar came in fifth and was the top-ranked tech giver on the list, with $327 million in giving.

Other notables included the Walton family, with founder Sam Walton’s three children giving $407 million in Wal-Mart stock. The Gateses gave $272 million to their foundation, while 48-year-old entrepreneur Jay Faison, who founded SnapAV, gave $165.6 million to promote clean energy. Warren Buffett’s sister, Roberta Buffett Elliott, gave $100.9 million to Northwestern University.

The 23 billionaires on the list gave an average of less than 1 percent of their estimated wealth. Of the 23, former hedge-fund manager John Arnold and his wife, Laura, gave the largest share of their fortune, at 5.6 percent.

The top 50 list only measures one year, so many donors, such as Gates, are giving away far more of their fortunes over longer periods of time. Whereas the Gates family donated just 0.4 percent of their $76 billion wealth last year, they’ve gifted $1 billion or more to their foundation several times.

America, New Zealand and Canada top list of world’s most generous nations

America has been named as the world’s most generous nation in the world, where its citizens give the most to charity, according to a new report.

The USA, New Zealand and Canada have the highest rate of charitable donations as a percentage gross domestic product (GDP), the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) found.

The UK had the fourth highest rate of charitable donations in a study of 24 nations and topped all other EU countries that were looked at.

CAF’s report took data from countries accounting for around 75 per cent of global GDP and 53 per cent of the world population.
Charitable giving by individuals as a percentage of GDP in America was recorded at 1.44%, in New Zealand at 0.79%, in Canada at .77% and in the UK – which came fourth globally – at 0.54%.

The report also analysed the impact of taxation and government spending and the amount given to charity and found there was “no significant correlation” except for employer social security charges, highlighting the complexity behind people’s decisions of when to give and how much.

Adam Pickering, international policy manager at CAF, said: “Across the 24 nations we studied, we found no significant link between government spending, income or corporation tax and the proportion of GDP donated by individuals.

“This suggests the relationship between the amount of taxes people pay and the amount they give to charity is not as clear cut as some may have thought.

“The factors which motivate people to give, and influence how much they give, are incredibly complex.”