About the foundation

Daya Dua Daan takes its name from three words that come from three different traditions of the subcontinent. Daya is compassion. Dua is blessing, the prayer you make for someone else. Daan is giving. We chose them deliberately, because the people we work for do not belong to one community and neither should the name above the door.

How we choose what to do

Our twenty-six programmes were not assembled to look comprehensive. Each was chosen against two questions: does this change what a family can earn, learn or survive, and is anyone else already doing it well?

That second question is why several of our programmes are unusual. Certifying the skills that informal workers already have. Recycling the clean groundwater that construction sites pump into storm drains. Taking elderly people on the pilgrimage they could never manage alone. Performing last rites for the unclaimed. These attract no photographs and few donors, which is exactly why they go undone.

Where we work

Across India. We are registered as a company whose objects extend to the whole of India, and we do not restrict ourselves to one state. Programmes are chosen for each region according to what is actually missing there — flood rescue where the rivers rise, gaushala where cattle are abandoned, assisted yatra wherever there are elderly people who will otherwise never go.

How we are governed

We are a company licensed under Section 8 of the Companies Act 2013. That has consequences we think donors should understand. No profit can be distributed to any member or director, ever. No member can draw a salary from the foundation. On dissolution, every remaining asset passes to another Section 8 non-profit with similar objects — nobody inherits anything. Accounts are audited annually by a chartered accountant and filed with the Registrar of Companies.

What we will not do

We do not function as a trade union, which a Section 8 company is prohibited from doing. We do not develop or trade property — construction is for our own programmes and community amenities only. We do not run pilgrimage or cultural programmes for profit; those run at cost and any surplus goes to the assisted yatra programme. And we do not accept foreign contributions until registration under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2010 is in place.