Joy of Giving 5th Edition Press Meet

5th Edition of The Joy of Giving Week 2013, Hyderabad Announced

The Joy of Giving Week, India's Largest Festival of Giving, is being organized across India from October 2nd to 8th, commencing on Gandhi Jayanti

Laxmi Manchu, actress and Shilpa Reddy, former Mrs. India, today announced the Joy of Giving Week 2013, a pan India "Festival of Giving", from October 2nd to 8th. The JGW endeavors to inspire Indians across every state, city, region, class, religion and age to give back to society. It not only aims at encouraging people to give but also celebrates the notion of giving and the joy derived from it.

Launched in 2009 as a "Festival of Giving" across India, the Joy of Giving Week has brought together people from all walks of life. The Week is not organized by a specific NGO or organization and is wholly driven by a large group of volunteers from all over the country.

Speaking at the event, Lakshmi Manchu, the Actor, said, "It is indeed a great honour to be a part of Joy of Giving Week from the first year. This is a great initiative by the team to make us take time from our schedules to give it back to our universe. Our beautiful India becomes a better place with this program. Awareness is the key and Joy Of Giving Week does an excellent job at providing that, It gives us all HOPE, the key word that India needs to hear so desperately." "We're extremely happy to see the large participation in the celebration of the joy Of Giving Week. We're sure that in the coming few years this will become the largest Festival of Giving", said Jayashree Venkataraman, volunteer, Joy of Giving Week. She also elaborated on how corporate companies, 5 star hotels, apartment complexes, local businesses, government institutions and individuals have extended their support towards the Joy of Giving Week. Quoting Joy of Giving Week to be an excellent initiative that reaffirms the belief in a harmonious society, Shilpa Reddy said, "I support all acts of the Joy of Giving Week and I participate in the Joy of Giving Week to encourage it among as many. As humans we all feel joy in giving but most of us don't know how".

A giving event could be cleaning a nearby park with a group of volunteers, cooking and distributing food to the homeless, raising money or awareness for a cause, or organising a chain of events in your apartment, office, school or college added Mr. Vardhaman Jain, Volunteer, Joy of Giving Week and requested everyone to plan their event soon and Register it at www.joyofqivinqweek.orq at the earliest.
Some of the major events that are planned for the week are:

• Seva mela by Karmayog and UWH
• Gift compassion by Adhya educational society
• SitaareZamin Par- JCI Hyderabad Synergy
• Shadow a CEO- ISB
• 7days 7givings- ADP, Broadridge and several other Corporates, Aurora Degree and P.G college and Aurora Business School
• Under the stars- Svechha
• Joy of giving week music festival - music for a cause
• "Food for change" by Round Tablers and Many more More details about the above events are available at Joy of Giving Week Website with many more events happening around India. From CEOs and celebrities like Narayana Murthy, Kumar Birla,Adi Godrej, Sachin Tendulkar and Amitabh Bachchan to citizens with humble professions and school children are already a part of this festival. They have contributed through various acts of giving. Over 2 million+ Indians participated in the Week last year and this year the hope is to exceed that number.
Marriott Hotel has been the hospitality partner for the event. Joy of Giving Week volunteers also invited the public to spread the message of giving and register their acts of giving on the www.joyofgivingweek.org website or participate in www.facebook.com/jgwhyderabad

Snapshot of Joy of Giving Week 2012 JGW is the largest philanthropic event in India by far with 2012 witnessing: 2 million+ people participation from all walks of life
• 80+ cities
• 800+ events registered (from small individual events to those involving >100,000 people)
• Rs 30cr+ generated in donations of cash and materials
• Millions of volunteer hours

About Joy of Giving Week

The Joy of Giving Week is a 'festival of giving' launched in 2009. The festival is celebrated every year, in the week including Gandhi Jayanti, i.e., October 2-8, and brings together Indians from all walks of life, to celebrate "giving". From auto drivers to CEOs, school children to celebrities, homemakers to opinion leaders, millions of people give their time, money, resources or skills back to society- by creating or participating in "events" of their choice. A giving event could be as simple as a family taking out the maid's children for an ice-cream party, or as large as Gift Compassion that had 10,000+ school children across India making and exchanging gifts with their peers from different socio-economic backgrounds. Events are organised by individuals, social groups, schools, colleges, NG0s, corporate, media houses and others. 2 million+ people participated in 900+ events across 70+ cities in JGW2012, raising over Rs 30 crores in money and resources donated, and millions of volunteer hours. No one owns the Joy of Giving Week. It is designed as a festival of giving, and like Diwali or Christmas or Ramzan, the plan is for it to eventually have no owners! However, in the initial formative years, to give it a sense of shape, a group of core volunteers manages the JGW campaign, defines guidelines for participation and evangelises the effort.