2021-03-31-accounts - Action With Awareness Regarding Education Foundation

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Trustees' Annual Report for the period

	Period start date	Period start date			Period end date
From	01	April	2020	To	31 March	2021

Section A Reference and administration details

Charity name[ACTION WITH AWARENESS REGARDING EDUCATION ] FOUNDATION

Other names charity is known by THE AWARE FOUNDATION (TAF, in short)

Registered charity number (if any) 1119897

Charity's principal address

“URMILA”, TESTON ROAD, OFFHAM, KENT Postcode ME19 5NB

Names of the charity trustees who manage the charity

Trustee name	Office (if any)	Dates acted if not for whole year	Name of person (or body) entitled to appoint trustee (ifany)
Jayesh R. Patel	ManagingTrustee	Whole Year	Board of Trustees(BoT)
Rajesh Bhat	Founder Trustee	Wholeyear	BoT
Prashant Patel	Treasurer	Wholeyear	BoT
Amit Patel	Trustee	Wholeyear	BoT
Rakesh Patel	Trustee	Wholeyear	BoT
Allan Blaydon	Trustee	Wholeyear	BoT

Names of the trustees for the charity, if any, (for example, any custodian trustees) Not Applicable

Name Dates acted if not for whole year

Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)

Type of adviser Name Address Name of chief executive or names of senior staff members (Optional information)

Section B Structure, governance and management

Description of the charity’s trusts

Type of governing document

TRUST DEED

(eg. trust deed, constitution)

How the charity is constituted

Charity Trust

(eg. trust, association, company)

Appointment by the Board of Trustees. Trustee selection methods

(eg. appointed by, elected by)

Additional governance issues (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant, about:

policies and procedures adopted for the induction and training of trustees;
the charity’s organisational structure and any wider network with which the charity works;
relationship with any related parties;
Trustees’ consideration of major risks and the system and procedures to manage them.
Policy to appoint trustees who commit time/ideas/skills/other resources
Policy to train/sensitize the trustees by visits to field projects and interacting with the filed staff and other local resource persons
AWARE encourages partner organisations to mobilise local and other funds, using AWARE’s funding as a leverage. Most partners have multiple funding and AWARE’s funds are used mostly on expenses on activities towards achieving the objects of the project
Internationally/ locally recognised individuals are invited to be Patrons with the aim of enhancing the credibility of the Trust in various countries and communities. Currently, Mr. John Wright (New Zealand), and Mr. Paul Kenyon (U.K.) are the Patrons of the AWARE Foundation.

Section C Objectives and activities

(1) To mobilise funds for projects related to underprivileged children in other countries, esp. India.

(2) To mobilise resources for calamities

Summary of the objects of the charity set out in its governing document

(3) To organise events to generate awareness on specific developmental issues, especially related to children
(4) To collect regular contributions by “pay roll paying” or “Direct Debit” (5) To partner with organisations for better services (6) To identify partners/projects/programmes for support (7) To build up capacities of partners
(8) To monitor/review projects, if & when required
(9) To advocate for policy changes (10) To conduct campaigns/ research etc.

(11) To organise seminars, workshops etc.

The reporting period (1/4/2020 to 31/3/2021) saw terrible times never experienced before all over the world due to the Covid-19 pandemic since December 2019. Both the countries, the UK and India, significantly responsible for The AWARE Foundation’s work, were under crippling effects of the pandemic most of the time of the reporting period. The F. Y. started under a strict lockdown in India, which continued till 30[th] May 2020. However, some partners in India did commendable work in the lockdown as well as the “unlocking” periods under difficult circumstances. It must, however, be admitted that there was a deviation from the normal work with children. The terrible condition of migrant labourers under the lockdown, due to which they lost their informal livelihoods and were stranded away from home and families, forced The AWARE Foundation (TAF) to use some of its resources for this humanitarian cause. Details follow in the following section:

Summary of the main activities undertaken for the public benefit in relation to these objects (include within this section the statutory declaration that trustees have had regard to the guidance issued by the Charity Commission on public benefit)

(1) With regards to the first objective of mobilising funds, The AWARE Foundation (TAF) is happy to report having mobilised £ 146,546 which after deduction of expenses (£86555) and release of grants to projects in India (£ 69,668) and adding previous bank balance as on 31/3/2020 (£ 39739), resulted in a net surplus of £ 94730 at the end of the financial year ’20-‘21 (audited a/c. submitted). The restrictions imposed by the lockdown and the prevalent infection limited the application of funds. Most activities with children were dormant in India as schools, hostels and shelter homes were shut down by government orders.
(2) TAF did take the Covid pandemic as a serious global calamity and therefore mobilised funds for it during the financial year.
(3) Again, back home in the UK, The AWARE Foundation could not organise as many fund-raising events as it did in the previous years due to the pandemic restrictions. Only one charity golf tournament in September 2020, which was quite successful an event raising about £ 19,500
(4) AF had collaborations in India with four organisations (and six projects) during the year. Of course, as mentioned earlier, due to the pandemic, the regular work was hugely affected and there was also some deviation in the type of activities undertaken. The collaborating organisations this year were four: (i) Citizen’s Alliance for Rural Development & Training Society (CARDTS), Bengaluru, which manages a shelter home for HIV affected children at a village 120 kms south-west of Bengaluru (ii) Vishwagram is a Mehsana-based Trust and manages a shelter home for Street Children (now only boys) at a village near Mehsana in North Gujarat; (iii) Swapath Trust manages two educational programmes in Gujarat for some of the most vulnerable children. Swapath Trust also monitors TAF programmes in India (iv) Shaishav Trust manages a programme called Aranyak (The Forest Dwellers) with the children of disadvantaged Tribal children.
(5) As mentioned above, during the financial year TAF directly supported six projects in India through 4 organisations. This year, however, fewer children were supported at the primary and at the university levels. Brief details follow:

▪ The first project supported by TAF was “Samaadan”- a shelter home for HIV affected children at a village called Girigowdanapalya near Kunigal about 120 kms south of Bengalur. This home used to support 49 children (22 boys & 27 girls) mostly of HIV+ parents till last year but this year, had only 9 children since April 2020 due to the restrictions. Under the government guidelines for Covid -19, the home could keep only those orphans and destitute children who had no family or relatives to rely upon. However, from September 2020, the number reached 21 as rules were relaxed somewhat. In October ’20, however, the government forced the organisation to decide either keeping only boys or only girls. After a consultative process with the team, it was decided to keep only boys. Hence, from November onwards, the home has only 23 boys staying there. ▪ The second project took care of 18 street children & orphans . This project, known as “Karuna Gram”, was managed by a charity called “Vishwagram”. These children lived at a rehab centre at village Basna near Mehsana in North Gujarat. As these children had no families to go back to, they all stayed at the shelter home and enjoyed many outdoor activities like birdwatching and forest walks in the open fields and shrub forest nearby. They also participated in various indoor activities like theatre workshops and reading aloud sessions of classics. ▪ Swapath Trust: The first of Swapath Trust’s projects was called “School Retention Programme” was completely eclipsed by the pandemic and no activity could take place. o Higher education Support Programme (HESP) of Swapath Trust supported fewer students this year as colleges were functioning erratically. Only 23 students were supported during the financial year. They were from diverse faculties (languages to education to engineering to nursing and even sports education). This included 13 female and 10 male students. A master’s degree student Dharti Rana bagged a gold medal this year, reading Hindi language. o In Dangs, one of the poorest districts in the country, Swapath used to manage seasonal hostels for close to 250 children of migrating sugarcane-cutter families but this year, no hostels were allowed by the government. o Some of the unplanned but essential humanitarian work that cropped up this year and which was supported by The AWARE Foundation: o About 750 stranded labourers in the south Gujarat districts of Tapi and Surat were helped to reach their homes in the Dangs with the help of respective DCs and the Police. On the way to home, using the contacts with the civil society, Swapath managed to feed them as many of them had been walking back on a path150-plus km long to their homes. o In Dang, 500 ration kits were distributed amongst the sugarcane cutter families who had left their worksites in a hurry without receiving payments from the sugar mills due to government orders. These dues for the entire season’s work were collected by a few group representatives who especially travelled back later after special permission was granted by the Dang District Collector

o The LRC team carried out a quick survey of the on-line education offered for the school children and the conclusions was that only 23% families had a smartphone and connectivity was available in less than 50% of the villages surveyed. Access to the phone was yet another issue as elders had to use them for their work. All in all, the experiment was a failure, at least for the Dangs o LRC team also went door to door meeting children and talking to them about their well- being and shared stories and puzzles through smartphones. This material was sent by the Swapath Ahmedabad office regularly o Rajesh Bhat entered the WhatsApp group of the heads of village councils (Sarpanches) of the Subir block with an intension to interact with them and respond to their queries. Also, the idea was to share information, data, notifications related to the pandemic with them for their use or for further dissemination. o During the unlocking phase, during September 2020, 250 more ration kits were distributed amongst the urban self-employed poor who had lost their jobs or had suffered big losses and were almost getting used to starvation. o Swapath also has been looking into the facts about a case in which the police had beaten up some Dang drivers who worked for the sugar mills during the lockdown period. A video that has been widely circulated shows how brutal was the atrocity by the police on these poor defenceless tribal people. ▪ TAF supported Child Rights Collective, Gujarat (CRCG) – a state level network of around 75 organisations working with / for children. CRCG works on networking and advocacy on child rights and children’s right to education. During the pandemic, however, the regular activities were all suspended but CRCG played a crucial role in reuniting stranded children with their families in the tribal districts. During the lockdown period in April 2020, 16 children stranded in Ahmedabad, at a hostel, were repatriated using the network in various parts of the state, chiefly in the tribal districts of Valsad (4 children); Tapi (5); Dang (3) and rest in Ahmedabad, Rajkot and Surendra Nagar Districts As CRCG, Swapath convened a discourse on the National Education Policy which was led by Prof Niranjanaradhya of the National Law School, Bengaluru ▪ TAF also supported Shaishav trust who distributed 550 ration kits in the tribal villages of Dediyapada with the help of local volunteers. Local staff also worked with groups of children when schools were not functioning with the activity kit developed by Shaishav Trust. (6) Mr. Rajesh Bhat guided the partners for implementing projects as per AF’s policy guidelines. He managed this by regular zoom meetings and even training sessions for the partners. (7) Regular Zoom meetings almost every week also kept the Trustees of TAF updated about the ever-changing situation

Additional details of objectives and activities (Optional information)

TAF’s policy is to select partners very carefully so that all the four basic rights (as defined by UNCRC) of the children are protected/promoted.
For educational support, a need-based approach (rather than a meritbased one) is adopted

You may choose to include further statements, where relevant, about:

policy on grant making.
TAF believes in working in partnerships and aims at evolving a network of organisations working with common objectives and converging activities.
Currently TAF plans to concentrate its partnerships in India. Unless and until a regional or global level agenda evolves on its own, it has no immediate plans to spread to other countries/regions.
policy programme related investment;
Contribution made by volunteers.

Section D Achievements and erformance p

Summary of the main achievements of the charity during the year

AWARE Foundation during 2020-21, despite the crippling effect of the Covid -19 pandemic, did its best to keep the contacts alive with children but could directly work with only 66 children. TAF partners helped 750 migrant labourers reach safety of their homes when they were stranded in the strict lockdown. TAF partners extended ration kit support to 1300 families, reaching out to an estimated 7,000 individuals. Various indoor and outdoor activities at both the shelter homes boosted the morale of the limited number of children atying at these homes.

In the UK, AWARE did extremely well to raise £ 141546 through dedicated work of its trustees and volunteers from the civil society to help raise funds. The financial year of 2020-21 closed with an unspent balance of £ 94,730 to support more children hopefully in the coming year.

Section E Financial review

Brief statement of the charity’s policy on reserves

As AF plans to raise most of its funds from donations by individuals or companies. AWARE will use funds very carefully and will generally try and utilise 80% of the funds raised in the following three years’ time. There is no corpus being accumulated by AWARE Foundation.

Details of any funds materially in deficit

None

Further financial review details (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant about:

the charity’s principal sources of funds (including any fundraising);
AF’s principal source of funding is contributions by individuals and private companies. Most donations are collected at fund-raising events inviting ongoing / new supporters, well-wishers, and corporate companies.
how expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity;
Investment policy and objectives including any ethical investment policy adopted.

Section F Other optional information

Section G Declaration

The trustees declare that they have approved the trustees’ report above. Signed on behalf of the charity’s trustees

Signature(s) Prashant Patel Full name(s) Position (eg Secretary, Chair, Trustee etc) Date 25/01/2022

Charity Name No (if any) Action With Awareness Regarding Education 1119897 Foundation Receipts and payments accounts For the period Period start date Period end date To from 01/04/2020 31/03/2021

CC16a

Section A Receipts and payments	Section A Receipts and payments
A1 Receipts	Unrestricted funds to the nearest £ 139,809 1,737 - - - - - 141,546 - - - 141,546 10,007 59,571 10,097 273 247 6,360 - 86,555 - - - 86,555 54,991 - 39,739 94,730	Restricted funds to the nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -	Endowment funds to the nearest £	Total funds to the nearest £ 139,809 1,737 - - - - - - 141,546 - - - 141,546 10,007 59,571 10,097 273 247 6,360 - 86,555 - - - 86,555 54,991	Last year to the nearest £
Donation Receipt includingGift Aid	139,809		- - - - - - - - -	139,809	143,861
Direrct Debit in BMM Account	1,737			1,737	5,853
				-	156
	-			-	-
	-			-	-
	-			-	-
	-			-	-
	-			-	-
*Sub total*(Gross income for AR)	141,546			141,546	149,870

A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table).
	-		- - -	-
	-			-	-
*Sub total*	-			-	-
*Total receipts* A3 Payments
			-	141,546	149,870

Cost of Fund RaisingEvents	10,007		- - - - - - - - - -	10,007	44,067
Donations Made	59,571			59,571	67,088
NGO Reimbursement	10,097			10,097	14,700
Advertising					-
Bank Charges	273			273	391
CharityInsurance	247			247	237
Administration	6,360			6,360	5,933
Other					5,000
	-			-	-
**Sub total **	86,555			86,555	137,416

A4 Asset and investment purchases, (see table)
	-		- - -	-
	-			-
**Sub total **	-			-	-
*Total payments* *Net of receipts/(payments)* A5 Transfers between funds A6 Cash funds last year end *Cash funds this year end*
			-	86,555	137,416

	54,991	-	-	54,991	12,454
	-	-	- -	-	-
	39,739	-		39,739	-
	94,730	-	-	94,730	12,454

CCXX R1 accounts (SS)

17/01/2022

Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period

Categories Signed by one or two trustees on behalf of all the trustees B1 Cash funds B2 Other monetary assets B4 Assets retained for the charity’s own use B5 Liabilities B3 Investment assets	Signature Details Details Opening Balance 01/04/2021 Details Details *Total cash funds* (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) Details	Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - 94,730 - 94,730 - OK OK Unrestricted funds Restricted funds to nearest £ to nearest £ - - - - - - - - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - Fund to which asset belongs Cost (optional) - - - - - - - - - Fund to which liability relates Amount due (optional) - - - - - Print Name Mr Prashant Patel Trustee	Endowment funds to nearest £
			-
			-
			-
			-
			OK
			Endowment funds to nearest £
			-
			-
			-
			-
			-
			-
			Current value (optional)
			-
			-
			-
			-
			-
			Current value (optional)
			-
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			When due (optional)






			Date of approval
		Mr Prashant Patel	17/01/2021
		Trustee

CCXX R2 accounts (SS)

17/01/2022

Independent examiner’s report to the trustees of AWARE Foundation

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of the AWARE Foundation for the year ended 31 March 2021.

Responsibilities and basis of report

As the charity trustees of the Trust you are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (‘the Act’).

I report in respect of my examination of the Trust’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.

Independent examiner’s statement

I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:

Accounting records were not kept in respect of the Trust as required by section 30 of the Act; or
The accounts do not accord with those records.

I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

Signed:

Name: Nirav Patel

Relevant professional qualification or membership of professional bodies (if any):

ICAEW (membership number 2260748)

Address: 3 Windmill Rise, Warlingham, Surrey, CR6 9FB Date: 17/01/2022