Grants

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We offer micro-grants up to INR 12,000 (Indian rupees twelve thousand only) per year to eligible agencies and individuals in India. The India lifts India initiative of SHAPE aims to tackle the foreign contribution policies of the country. We disburse funds collected from local donors to expand our interests to different parts of the country through young and vibrant entities.

We award financial and capacity-building support to small NGOs not more than five years old. We also co-finance projects to support SDG 17. We accept applications all year long, but process them during January – March, May – June & September – November.

As we receive numerous applications, proposals even with minor non-compliances get rejected. Please go through this page thoroughly before initiating contact with the organization. We do not entertain frivolous inquiries as they reflect indolence and oversight.

Application guidelines

1. Your NGO only needs to be registered as a legal body (society/trust/section 25) in India and hold a separate organizational bank account and a PAN.
2. Your annual report should exhibit your capacity to carry out programmes with accountability and transparency.
3. You can be an individual willing to serve the underprivileged communities. You must be 18 or above to apply.
4. Your project aim should reflect our child/women project policies and function towards fulfilling one of the following SDGs: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 10, 16.
5. Your project should at least serve 50 beneficiaries per year.
6. Due to our limited funding resources, we will not be able to approve all applications. We reject applications with budgets over INR 12,000.
7. We do not fund Governmental agencies or private companies.
8. We reserve the right to reject your application with prior notice.
9. Our revenue entirely depends on philanthropists, so we may temporarily halt your funding after approval until further notice.
10. We do not fund foreign applicants.
11. Avoid multiple applications.
12. We do not offer micro-credit or revolving loans
13. We do not fund administrative/problem identification expenses.

References

1. We accept reference letters from villages heads, local administrative officials, gazetted officers, experienced NGOs, banks, religious leaders, previous donor agencies, and judges.
2. We require two references from any of the entities stated above. We reject applications without the aforementioned references.

Support documents

Submit photocopies/scanned copies of the following documents upon request (after project approval):
For organizations:
1. Registration certificate
2. Bank statement/copy of the passbook
3. Annual reports/programme reports
4. PAN card
5. Board information
6. Employee information (if any)
7. MoU

For individuals:
1. Your Aadhar ID
2. PAN card
3. Your bank statement of the previous financial year
4. MoU

For queries, contact tech@shapecharity.org

Application instructions:

The application form contains three sections.

In the first section, regardless of your applicant category, enter the following information:

Your full name with title
Your personal/work email address
Your phone number (preferably, WhatsApp number)
Select your category of application
Your date of birth
Your residential/office address
Your personal social media profile link (not mandatory)

Fill section 2 only if you represent an organization. If you are an individual applicant, skip section 2 of the form. If you represent an organization, enter the following information:

Full name of your organization – as seen on the registration certificate.
Your organizational (trust/society/section 25 company) registration number and the year of registration (separated by a vertical bar – |) – as seen on the registration certificate
Describe your organizational focus area and the related activities carried out in the last financial year.
Your organizational email address, registered physical address (include door number, street name/number, locality, district, pin code, and state), website address/social media page username (if any), and your average yearly revenue. If you are less than one year old, enter the amount of revenue generated to date.

Section 3 determines your eligibility to win our grant approval, so kindly be precise and direct. Avoid using plagiarized statements, quotes, obvious details, and aphorisms. Understand how a project gets implemented using the UN’s RBMS before you fill out section.

State the name of your project – keep it concise and understandable. We prefer descriptive English titles.
State your total project budget in Indian rupees
How much of the total budget do you expect SHAPE to cover?
State the problems/needs and your mitigation plans.
Explain in detail the causes behind your initiatives
Clearly state your project goals/objectives.
Describe the beneficiary demographics, the project area, and other related information.
Give your daily/weekly/monthly layout to carry out the activities stated in the “Project description” and “Project objectives” part of this section.
State how your activities accentuate our goals. and your strategies to ensure that.
Describe your immediate, short-term, and long-term project impacts.
State the political, social, and economic risks you anticipate during project implementation and your strategies to alleviate them.
How would you measure your project impact?
Upload two reference letters obtained from individuals/organizations as stated above.
Please describe your financial/economic/labor capacity to implement this project.
- For individual applicants: State why we should prioritize your request and what abilities you possess to complete the project.
- For organizations: State how your organization is capable of implementing the project.

28. SHAPE is a nonprofit and cannot afford to process your applications for free. We pay an external evaluator to scrutinize the applications, and for that, we need your support. All applicants should pay a nominal non-refundable fee of INR 220/USD 3 (fee+tax+platform fee) per application. To find out about our policies, visit our legal status page.

Note: Always save your answers in a separate document before submission to prevent data loss.

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