We are delighted to share that Nidhi Mittal has joined our board as a Trustee, bringing with her years of experience in the international development sector (including four spent fundraising for Kidasha!) and a passion for local, grassroots activism.
To offer you the chance to get to know Nidhi better, we sat down with her to discuss how she come to know of Kidasha, why she joined the board what she hopes to achieve in her role as a Trustee.
Hi Nidhi! How long have you been a Trustee at Kidasha?
I have been a Trustee at Kidasha since September 2019.
Why did you decide to join the board?
Given my international development background and past work with larger child-focused I-NGOs, I was seeking out a smaller UK-based charity working with children and young people particularly in the South Asia region (where I am from) which I could support on a voluntary basis. I stumbled upon Kidasha while doing some internet research and its website and profile caught my attention. I was very impressed by Kidasha’s vision and the tireless work it has been doing in Nepal, got in touch with them and have been doing some mini fundraising for them over the last four years. I was thrilled when I was offered the opportunity to join its Board, which I gladly accepted.
What are your first impressions of Kidasha and the work it does?
I believe Kidasha is a very focused, professionally run and visionary charity which is making a real difference in the lives of marginalised vulnerable and at-risk children in urban areas in Nepal.
It has an enormously experienced and passionate team (most of whom are Nepali nationals or long-term Nepali residents), and they bring incredible local experience and knowledge to the work, in partnership with some very committed local organisations, to drive real change.
The UK base and connection provides Kidasha a real advantage in terms of access to a wider range of funding sources to sustain its efforts, robust and diverse executive leadership in terms of its Chief Executive and Trustee board as well as enhanced profile and visibility amongst an international audience to help spread its message.
What do you hope to achieve in your role as a Trustee?
I hope to be able to bring my development sector and donor experience and knowledge of Nepal to bear to support or strategically advise on any emerging programmatic or operational issues as Kidasha grows and expands its work for children in Nepal. Importantly, I hope to leverage my network to help raise Kidasha’s profile and do fundraising to help sustain Kidasha’s efforts and take its successes to a new level.
Have you ever been a Trustee before?
No, this is my first time joining a charity formally as a Trustee, though I have provided more informal strategic and operational advice to several other charities previously.
What industry do you work in and how do you envisage this helping you in your role as a Trustee?
I work in the international development sector and am currently heading up a country programme portfolio in an urban policy think tank. My work involves managing a portfolio of UK government funded research programmes and engaging with national governments in low and middle-income countries to advise on urban policy making. I believe that my role as a Kidasha Trustee aligns very well to my professional pursuits, as it allows me to bring my knowledge of complex urban issues (including urban poverty), international development donors such as the Department for International Development (DFID), as well as understanding and knowledge of low-income country and government contexts, to help Kidasha enhance the scale, impact and effectiveness of its work.
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