Hello
10 years ago I stopped building commercial IT platforms to relocate to India and work with farmers. Lived 2 years in a village in Madhubani, Bihar, and worked hand-in-hand with local farmers. It resulted in a 4-fold increase in farmer income. In 2013 I started to build digital platforms for farmers in an attempt to recreate the impact at scale. 8 years into that journey, I am working with close to 10 lakh farmers. Alongside, I built partnerships with state governments for Indiawide adoption. The next phase of the journey is to scale the platform to 1 crore farmers, and build the necessary constructs for adoption by all of 15 crore farmers of India. I need your support to do this leg of the journey in order to keep the platform open-source and non-commercial.
10 years ago, I was building platforms for the airline industry. I loved my work, but constantly felt a void; felt my purpose lay somewhere else. In a world where the rich grow richer and the poor grow poorer, I felt I was contributing to this vicious cycle by using my skills for the corporate world, whereas I should have been working for the poor. In 2011, I gave up building tech platforms to volunteer in rural India, took a sabbatical, and relocated from London to a village in Madhubani, Bihar.
At the village, I saw that people worked very hard, but the income was difficult to come by. I saw that landowners complained about lack of labour, and the landless labour complained about lack of work. I saw fallow lands, but I also saw fields and canals that the farmers could make functional for themselves. But most importantly, I saw hard-working people and a community spirit. I saw self-belief, grit and determination.
After living in the village for 2 years, funding the setup of a farmer cooperative, and working hand-in-hand in the fields with farmers, collectively we witnessed an amazing transformation. A vibrant farming culture and a 4x increase in income. I decided not to go back to London. I knew what I was going to do for the rest of my life, and that was to work for smallholder farmers across India and help them overcome poverty. I also knew that if I want to make change at scale, I must embrace my core competence once again – build technology platforms. And this time build platforms for public good.
Introducing Platform Commons Foundation (PCF)
The thought of building platforms for public good led to the idea of Platform Commons Foundation (PCF). In 2013, I met Satyam Gambhir, and we laid out the principles and constructs as to how to make platforms benefit everyone, and not just the platform owner. We knew that something more than just open-source software was needed. We needed to establish community ownership of Platforms, and needed to define a set of operational rules to ensure that benefits from operating the platform went to the poor. This led to Satyam and I writing the Platform Commons Licence, and PCF was born.
The licence was just a start – we knew that we must build actual platforms for solving societal problems. We knew that technology has always been a differentiator in human society. Those who own cutting-edge technology have an advantage over those who don’t have access to it. Used right technology could help solve problems. Used wrong it creates concentration of power. We needed to build platforms that not only solved the most pressing problems the world is facing today, we also needed to make the platforms inclusive.
Over the next 7 years, with a team of 50 people, we built a state-of-the-art digital platform with the sole objective of reducing poverty. We did so in close collaboration with (and for) farmers, waste-pickers, artisans, volunteers, job seekers, teachers, school children, NGOs, markets, and governments.
Our platforms are presently serving 40 lakh beneficiaries spread over 16 states, and we collaborate with 22 civil society organisations to take the solutions to the end-beneficiaries.
How did we build platforms as a public good through the last 10 years?
My experiential learning in farming, expertise in technology, ability to influence and evangelize change, and the zest to work with grassroots communities, made me realise my own unique skills and gave me clarity on how to solve societal problems.
I went back to the organization I used to work for – Mindtree. In consultation with the Mindtree board, we decided to leverage Mindtree’s CSR initiative to build open-source Digital Platforms for eradicating poverty in India. Satyam and I put together the best of professionals, built a purpose-driven team, and built out 5 platforms over 7 years – platforms for smallholder farmer agriculture, waste management, education, skilling, and volunteering. Collective these became the foundation for the Commons Platform.
In September 2019, we decided to open-source the Commons Platform under Platform Commons Licence, and set the charter for PCF to take the work forward.
What do we want to achieve in the next 10 years?
Scale. Community Ownership of Platforms. Dignified Livelihood for our poor.
We are at an inflexion point where what started as a CSR initiative is fast growing towards our vision of becoming a community led technology movement. Our endeavour is to create an open-source movement where what we created is publicly available for any and everyone who wishes to contribute to help the poor. We have built a solid base of technology, and now is the time to build networks on the platform. We have built a solid base of technology, and now is the time to build networks on the platform.
Specifically, in the agriculture space, we are on our way to build an All-India Farmer Collective, a cooperative where farmers will own and operate the Platform. Think of it as a digital and distributed version of Amul. A network that comprises crores of farmers, buyers, suppliers, and service providers governed by trading rules that put higher income in the hands of farmers.
In parallel, we want to help build a culture of deep and serious volunteering in the country. Imagine what 1 crore volunteers can do if they choose to help farmers get access to markets, adopt an “each one – teach one” philosophy, or help the local waste-pickers get access to dignified livelihood.
In the next 10 years, we want to transform ourselves into a community-owned and community-run initiative. Isn’t that what “of the people, by the people, and for the people” really means 🙂
If we could do this successfully, maybe, just maybe we could create a fighting chance for rural India to overcome poverty.
How will we achieve our 10-year goals?
While are already working with close to 40 lakh beneficiaries, we need to remember that our population a 140 crore. There is much to do:
- Evangelize the power of technology and the platforms, influencing key industry leaders and build change leaders across the country
- Build deep partnerships with a larger number state and central governments than what we already have
- Add more members to our existing network of buyers, suppliers, service providers, knowledge workers, experts, volunteers, and farmers
- Enhance our existing content and build new communities across our villages to help create a culture of technology self-service
- Build a community of volunteer engineers across the globe and assist them in building platforms for societal good
- Maintain and enhance the 2.5 million lines of our existing platform codebase
- Continuously innovate so that we can outpace the problems and bring the best to our farmers, artisans, waste-pickers, volunteers, and students
Need your support
We need your support so that we can keep the Commons Platform non-commercial and open-source.
We have raised Rs. 2 crore of philanthropic funds and need to raise another 6 crore in order to become self-sustainable. Our well-wishers have supported with donations ranging from Rs. 1 lakh to Rs. 5 lakh.
We invite you to become part of our community, “Friends of the Commons”, and support us in our journey of making Platforms work for the little guy. We will share with you impact reports, host quarterly catchups, create a place on our platform for you to share your profile and suggestions, and provide you with a vehicle to contribute with your expertise.
Your donation will fuel change
In the coming years, as you get to see a technology movement of community-owned platforms unfolding in front of your eyes, you will know that you have made it happen.