Prabhakar Reddy, Member of Parliament, Gudam Mahipal Reddy, Member of Legislative Assembly, Telenaga, attended the dedication ceremony at Zilla Parishad High School, Beeramguda, Patancheru     

  • Charities Aid Foundation, Aga Khan Foundation and Plan International have been the implementing partners for the revitalized schools in Telangana
  • 43 schools have been revitalised in Telangana as part of Support My School (SMS).
  • 1000 schools will be revitalized under the campaign before 2017           

Beeramguda Patancheru, Telangana, August 8, 2017: Coca-Cola’s Support My School (SMS) campaign, an initiative to build happy, healthy and active schools for students in rural and semi-urban areas, today dedicated 850th improved school infrastructure along with dedicating 9 other schools in and around Hyderabad to the community at Zilla Parishad High School, Beeramguda, Patancheru. Charities Aid Foundation, Aga Khan Foundation and Plan International, implementing partners for SMS, worked on the ground to help revitalize facilities in 43 schools in Telangana.  The SMS program, which is closely aligned to the government’s ‘Swachh Bharat’ campaign, has renovated the infrastructure of the schools including separate toilets for boys and girls, access to clean water and better sanitation, a library and a science lab.    

Prabhakar Reddy, Member of Parliament attended the dedication ceremony as the chief guest. The attendees during the ceremony included Mr. Gudam Mahipal Reddy, MLA, E. Rajamani, Chairman of Zilla Parishad, Vijaya Kumari DEO, Mr. Umesh Malik, Vice President, Public Affairs & Communication, Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages Pvt. Ltd., Mrs. ‎Shubha Sekhar, Director and Head, CSR & Sustainability, Coca-Cola India & South West Asia, Bhagyashree Dengle, Executive Director Plan India, Tinni Sawhney, CEO, Aga Khan Foundation,.     

The dedication ceremony also saw the launch of “SMS Mission Recycling” project which aims at sensitising community and school children on waste management with a focus on proper collection and segregation of plastic waste. The pilot project of Mission Recycling, in partnership with Plan International, will be implemented in 20 Schools in four locations (Barabanki, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai) where the SMS programme is ongoing covering a total 6000 children and 20,000 community members.

Gudam Mahipal Reddy, MLA Patancheru, said “I am happy to know that many schools and communities have been selected for solid waste management and launch of programme in my constituency as continuation of the WASH programme. Also I am happy that the programme is going to orient children, teachers, and community members on solid waste management. I would provide all the necessary support in taking up the project and congratulate Association for Promoting Social Action (APSA), Plan India and Coca-Cola for this initiative.”    

Bhagyashri Dengle, Executive Director, Plan India said, “Our work on WASH aims to ensure that children and communities have access to clean water and sanitary facilities. Working with schools, our programmes engage with students, informing them about personal hygiene. Our work also includes building and renovating toilets in schools and communities with the purpose of ending open defecation. We stress upon building exclusive toilets for the girl students as lack of access to such facilities is one of the reasons behind them dropping out of schools. By providing access to WASH services, children and youth from excluded communities and urban slums are able to not only lead a healthier lifestyle but also attend school regularly.”

Tinni Sawhney, CEO, Aga Khan Foundation added, “We are indeed delighted to be a part of this very special event today. The programme has worked on ensuring access to clean and secure sanitation, drinking water and play grounds for school children to enable improvement in the overall school environment and the health and well-being of our children. The initiative has also prioritized the adoption of improved hygiene practices, supporting children to become cleanliness ambassadors in their homes and communities. We are immensely proud of our partnership that has benefited schools in our programme states of Telengana, Gujarat and Bihar, and the commendable support we have received to develop these schools as models in the region.”

Mrs. ‎Shubha Sekhar, Director and Head- CSR & Sustainability, Coca-Cola India & Southwest Asia said, “We are committed towards building holistic, happy and healthy society. Making positive interventions at schools is an important aspect of that commitment. The Support My School campaign in the last 6 years has had more than 50 partners in more than 20 states across India. We have been able to positively impact more than 2 lakh children across 850 schools and before 2017 ends, we will complete 1000 schools”. Talking about Mission Recycling, she said, "Our long-term vision is to leverage the scale and resources of our entire system to ensure that all our packaging material is reused and recycled to minimise its environmental impact, while creating livelihood opportunities for waste collection workers.”

"Our system is cognizant of the fact that while recycling rate for PET in India is higher than the rates in developed markets, there is still room for improvement. We believe that this will require a wide range of actions, and interventions at all levels including inculcating good habit amongst school children". She further added.

Umesh Malik - Vice President, Public Affairs & Communication, Hindustan Coca-Cola Beverages Pvt. Ltd. said “In Telangana, we have been able to positively impact the lives of thousands of students (majority of which comprises girls) through our interventions. This is a great example of how civil society and corporate have come together to make it happen.” He added, “To support recycling, we will kick-start the PET recycling campaign in Telangana this year with the target of recycling about 75% PET waste by 2020.”

SMS is a WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) initiative that aims to improve basic amenities in government schools like separate toilets for boys and girls and access to water. The Schools revitalized under the campaign have served as model schools in several districts and have led to enhanced community engagement and higher emphasis on attendance and enrolment. SMS is on track on its journey of touching 1000 schools by 2017 under the initiative.

Overall as part of SMS campaign, 43 schools have been revitalized in Telangana along with different implementing partners including Charities Aid Foundation and Plan India, till date which is positively impacting more than 16,000 students.  

 About Support My School Campaign:

Coca-Cola India & NDTV launched Support My School in association with the UN-Habitat, Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) in 2011. It undertakes the following activities:

  • Provision of improved access to water
  • Appropriate sanitation facility for girls and boys
  • Improvement in the overall school infrastructure and environment
  • Provision for sports and recreational facilities and
  • Recharging groundwater through rainwater harvesting

With such necessary amenities in place, schools are able to provide a cleaner and healthier environment more conducive to learning.

About Coca-Cola India:

Coca-Cola India is one of the country’s leading beverage companies offering a range of healthy, safe, high quality, refreshing beverage options to consumers. Since its re-entry in 1993, the company has been refreshing consumers with its products – Aquarius, Coca-Cola, Coca-Cola Zero, Diet Coke, Thums Up, Fanta, Fanta Green, Mango, Limca, Sprite, Sprite Zero, Maaza, VIO flavoured milk ‘Almond Delight’ and ‘Kesar Delight’, Minute Maid range of juices, FUZE Iced tea, Georgia and Georgia gold range of hot and cold tea and coffee options, Schweppes, Kinley and Bonaqua packaged drinking water and Kinley Club Soda. The Company along with its bottling partners and through a strong network of over 2.6 million retail outlets, touches the lives of millions of consumers. Its brands are some of the most preferred and most sold beverages in the country – Sprite and Thums Up – being the top two selling sparkling beverages.

The Coca-Cola India system provides direct employment to 25,000 people and indirect employment to more than 150,000 people. The Coca-Cola system in India is contributing in its own small way to building sustainable communities through community initiatives like Coca-Cola Support My School, Thums Up VEER, Coca-Cola Parivartan, Maaza Unnati and by reducing its own environmental footprint. For further information on the Company’s India operations and its products, please visit: www.coca-colaindia.com. Follow us on twitter @CocaColaIndia, or on facebook at www.facebook.com/cocacolaindia/

About Plan India:

Plan India, a member of Plan International Federation, is a nationally registered independent child development organisation committed to creating a lasting impact in the lives of vulnerable and excluded children, their families and communities

For over 35 years, Plan India and its partners have improved the lives of millions of children by providing them access to protection, basic education, proper healthcare, a healthy environment, livelihood opportunities and participation in decisions which affect their lives.

About Aga Khan Foundation:

The Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) is a non-denominational, international development agency established in 1967 in Geneva, Switzerland by His Highness the Aga Khan. Its mission is to develop and promote creative solutions to problems that impede social development, primarily in Asia and East Africa. In India, AKF focuses on a small number of specific development problems by forming intellectual and financial partnerships with organisations sharing its objectives. The Foundation’s interventions, focused on the empowerment and transformation of marginalised communities, are currently under implementation in Bihar, Delhi, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana (Hyderabad) and Uttar Pradesh. Under-pinning all its programmes is a strong emphasis on building sustainable community institutions and strengthening the capacity of these institutions to subsequently lead development processes.

Responding to the specific development needs in India, the Aga Khan Foundation has recently launched a multi-state Comprehensive Sanitation Initiative to improve the quality of life in the communities where it maintains a long-term committed presence and to support the Government’s Clean India (Swacch Bharat) programme. Over the five year period, the initiative will enhance access and use of sanitation facilities in both rural and urban areas through an integrated approach encompassing construction of household and school facilities along with the establishment of cleanliness and maintenance systems, hygiene promotion and awareness, and waste management.

Aligned with the focus on establishing open defecation villages/wards where the initiative will be implemented, the Foundation with support from Coca Cola India Pvt Ltd, under the Support my School Campaign has recently commenced refurbishment of school sanitation facilities in Gujarat. This collaboration will converge with on-going efforts to end open defecation in the target blocks/villages, and facilitate 100% coverage and use of sanitation facilities in the selected villages, contributing to an enhancement in the quality of life of intended beneficiaries.

For further information, contact:

Sandeep Singhal

Mob: +91-9926103210; Email: sandeephanmer@gmail.com