Hansal Mehta asks Deval Sanghavi, What's Bad Philanthropy?

This special episode is a conversation between Deval and Hansal Mehta that took place earlier this year at Dasra Philanthropy Week. Listen in as Hansal speaks to Deval about his perspectives on philanthropy, what he believes is real impact, and his lockdown beard.

Hansal Mehta is a well-known National Award winning filmmaker, director, and writer. Some of his well-known films are Shahid, City Lights, and more recently, the web series Scam 1992. Hansal is a longtime friend of the development sector. His wife Safeena Husain is a social worker and the founder of the non-profit, Educate Girls in Mumbai.

(14:27) "I think it's really important for us not to look at a metric of I'm giving 1% or 0.1% or 0.03%. It needs to be about what is the problem in front of me that we need to solve? And I think that's critical. And so for me, I guess it really starts with that. Which is, are we trying to really move people out of poverty and enable them to thrive? Or are we complacent when they survive? And I say this because many of the metrics that globally are looked at in terms of poverty are really mortality rates - is somebody living or dying? Literacy is defined by whether you could read or write your name, not whether or not you can read and write enough to gain an education, which leads to some sort of employment or that you can sign documents that you ensure are not cheating you, or that you can read even what's available to you with various government schemes and take action. And so I think the bar unfortunately is so low in terms of survival versus thriving societies."

The interview and the Q and A that followed have been edited. For the full version you can go to Dasra’s Youtube channel. For more information on NCE go to dasra.org/nce and follow Deval on Twitter at @Deval_Sanghavi and @Dasra.