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"Read Alert " Economic Times– September 26, 2004

Rohini Nilekani is involved in a big way with Pratham India education initiative network. She's on the board of directors of this 10 year movement that has attracted individuals and corporates to its mission of education for underprivileged children.

Of course the early start-up days at Infosys were different. "We were all involved in the idea of creating the company and worked as cooks, chauffeurs and mentors rolled in one. That phase would have lasted for at least seven years," says Nilekani who opted out of both Infosys and her own career as a journalist for the sake of her kids who are now teenagers.
"Infosys was passing through the throws of growth in those days. But I'm glad that I made that choice. I wanted to be a great mother and that came above either Infosys or being a great journalist," she says.

And now, she's very excited about Pratham Books which is an effort to create high quality, low cost books for children in India in as many languages as possible. "We started with an accelerated reading technique which is simple and child friendly using the numerous stories and community libraries across the country. With the Read India Books brand we are bringing together publishers, writers and corporate sponsors to launch high-quality and low cost books. While corporates can sponsor a series for as less as Rs 50,000, the movement will bring many good children's books into the market." she says. The hallmark of the three-pronged strategy is simplicity. In fact there's no hi-tech jargon about Pratham or Nilekani's other projects like Arghyam, a funding agency for health, education, arts and culture; Sutradhar, a children's resource centre and Akshara Foundation, aimed at sending every child in Bangalore to school to learn well, of which she is the chairperson.

Books and reading have always been her passion. "I've read to my children when they were very young," she says. Her first novel, a medical thriller Stillborn was published by Penguin Books and she's now working on her second.

And education, community action and philanthropy apart, Nilekani does her bit for Infosys too as chairperson of Unmeelan, the arts and ideas forum of the company. "We organise cultural events for Infosys engineers across the various centres to nurture their creativity and help them think out of the box," she says. The cultural platform has taken her to Infosys offices across India and she note plans to take it to offshore centres too.