New Delhi, 29 October 2020: Amazon India has partnered with multiple Indian Non-Government Organisation (NGOs) to directly donate 5,000 4G-enabled tablet computers to students in government and aided schools as well as childcare centres.
To implement this programme, the e-commerce company has partnered with 18 NGOs including Pratham Education Foundation, India Stem Foundation, Peepul.
The devices will be donated as part of Amazon India’s ‘Delivering Smiles’ program to support the education of students from marginalized communities and address the urgent need among students from low-income and under-served communities for smart devices for online education in these times of the pandemic.
According to the company officials, the ‘Delivering Smiles’ program will also help its customers across India to easily give to this cause, offering the choice to gift a device but also making it possible to make smaller contributions that would help provide for these devices by partnering through well-known NGOs.
The company will kickstart the donation campaign by directly donating more than 5,000 4G-enabled tablet computers.
This is in addition to the long-running Amazon Gift a Smile program where Customers can also create impact through contributions to 50+ NGOs that support a variety of causes, from Healthcare & Nutrition, Senior Citizens, Empowerment of women and girls, Education, Care for differently abled, to Disaster and pandemic and Skills & Livelihood.
Customers can choose a cause on the Gift a Smile page (Including the Devices Campaign), and select an NGO to see the list of items they’re in need of. They can then add one or more items to cart and place the order to be delivered to the NGO’s address (automatically available when placing the order).
Speaking about the ‘Delivering Smiles’ initiative, Manish Tiwary, VP, Amazon.in, hoped that Amazon’s contribution of 5,000 devices will grow into a national movement with the support of our customers."The education of thousands of children has been disrupted this year due to the pandemic and children from low-income communities have been very badly impacted. Less than 20% of these children have access to devices for online education, and supporting the remaining students requires the collective effort of all of us. Through this ‘Delivering Smiles’ campaign, everyone can contribute easily, and deliver impact at scale with vetted and credible organizations that are making a tangible difference," he said.
Amazon has also been supporting communities in multiple ways during the COVID-19 pandemic. The company has partnered with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to raise public awareness on the novel coronavirus and the precautionary safety measures that needed to be adopted in daily lives.
Amazon also partnered with several NGOs across the country to donate hygiene aid kits, personal protective equipment kits and groceries in support of healthcare workers and communities most affected by COVID-19. These donations were distributed across Maharashtra, Haryana, Delhi - NCR, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh through its NGO partners. Around 100,000 N95 masks were donated to hospitals who were facing acute shortage of supplies and critical ICU & hospital equipment were donated in Pune.
