Our Story

It all began when Pravin Bhasin and Kanchan Bhasin visited the Government Primary School, Gejha Village in Noida, in 2009, to collect their voter ID Cards. As Pravin got talking to the Head Mistress of the school, he offered to give story books and dhurries for the students. With the help of donations from family, friends and volunteers, dhurries were bought and books collected. The school offered a spare room for starting a library and on 30th January 2010 our first library was born! Volunteers started visiting the school to read stories to the children. A full time librarian was also engaged, initially paid out of the volunteers own funds. Books For All was registered as a Trust on 10th February 2011.

Books for All came into being quite by chance but the thought behind it had been churning for a long time! As Pravin Bhasin neared his retirement, the urge to do something for the society became even stronger. This thought process coincided with election time in 2009, when he and Kanchan went to collect their voter ID cards from a Government Primary School located in ‘Gejha’ village in Sector 93 NOIDA. He got talking to the teacher in-charge and she requested him to donate dhurries for students to sit on during the winter months. The urge to do something concrete for the children at the Gejha school lingered on with him even after the dhurries had been given. As luck would have it, he was fortunate to connect with like-minded people.

The initial mission of BFA was to collect children’s books from more affluent neighborhoods and make them available at a library center at the Gejha Government school which could be accessed by the children of the school. With the objective in place, one room at the Gejha school was converted into a basic library equipped with white board, soft board, chairs, durries and books. The intent was to create a space, to which the children would be attracted to come and browse and read story books.

Initially the library was run with the funds put together by the volunteers themselves. After a year of managing the library with the volunteers’ own funds, Books for All (BFA) was registered as a Public Charitable Trust on 10th February 2011. Since then, we have expanded our area of work which has been benefitting not only children but youth through 5 Impact Missions

Mission

Books For All’s mission is to give the Joy of Books to children in underprivileged localities through Libraries, Braille and Tactile Books to visually impaired students, Sponsor Bright students from socio-economically weaker sections and Make First Generation Learners Job-Ready through vocational training.

Vision

At Books For All our vision is to Ignite the Flame of Knowledge and Nurture Talent of Children in Schools in underprivileged localities and to Impart Skills in First Generation Learners to Make them Job Ready.