A child battling cancer had stopped receiving treatment because his family could no longer afford it.
Khushbu Taori Modi was still a medical student when she learnt about him. Along with a friend, she traced the child to his home, brought him back and rallied students and others to arrange funds, blood and platelet donations.
The child survived.
For Khushbu, the experience revealed something she would encounter again and again: people were willing to help, but those who needed support often struggled to find them.
Years later, as a government medical officer in Thane and a volunteer with grassroots groups, she saw the same gap. Organisations struggled for funding and volunteers, while people eager to help often did not know where to begin.
Could she bring the two together?
In February 2024, after nearly ten years in government service, Khushbu left her secure job to explore that question. She wanted to strengthen organisations already doing good work rather than start another NGO.
The idea became SewaConnect, a free platform connecting verified social organisations with volunteers, professionals, donors, CSR partners and each other.
It has supported more than 100 organisations, facilitated over 50 NGO collaborations and 50 CSR and community partnerships, mobilised over Rs 1 crore in CSR funding and connected more than 100 volunteers.
At 6, she was already stopping people from using tobacco
Khushbu, now 40, grew up in a middle-class family in Wardha, Maharashtra. A keen student, she was reading newspapers and following current affairs, history and social issues by the age of six.
She was especially troubled by tobacco and addiction. As a child, she sometimes took tobacco packets from people’s pockets and threw them away, convinced she was helping them quit.
“Looking back, it seems amusing, but perhaps that was the beginning of a lifelong commitment to tobacco and addiction prevention,” she tells The Better India.
The idea became SewaConnect, a free platform connecting verified social organisations with volunteers, professionals, donors, CSR partners and each other.
She had wanted to study law, like her father, a criminal lawyer. Encouraged by her family, she instead joined Indira Gandhi Government Medical College, Nagpur, in 2003.
She completed her MBBS in 2009, followed by an MD in community medicine at Topiwala National Medical College and BYL Nair Hospital, Mumbai, in May 2013.
Government hospitals showed her how health was connected to poverty, education, livelihoods and social support.
‘It was a pattern I kept saying’
In August 2014, Khushbu joined Thane Municipal Corporation as a Class I Government Medical Officer. She served as Medical Officer, School Health Officer, City TB Officer and COVID-19 In Charge, working across disease control, administration, training and public health programmes.
As City TB Officer, she saw how CSR partnerships could strengthen public healthcare. CSR support helped introduce advanced diagnostic equipment, improving access to faster TB diagnosis and treatment.
During the pandemic, she also helped build a bed management system in Thane that received national appreciation.
“Government can create impact at scale,” she says. “A well-planned policy or programme can benefit thousands, sometimes lakhs, of people, and continue making a difference long after the people who initiated it have moved on.”
Beyond her job, Khushbu continued volunteering and visiting grassroots organisations, something she had done since college.
In places such as Gadchiroli, she came across approaches that could be replicated elsewhere. Abhay Bang, Ashish Chaturvedi, Avinash Chowdhury and the work of Hedgewar Hospital influenced her thinking about systems and collaboration.
She repeatedly met groups lacking visibility, volunteers, professional expertise or funding, alongside people who wanted to help but did not know how.
“It wasn’t one incident,” she says. “It was a pattern I kept seeing over the years.”
Why she walked away from a job she loved
Khushbu valued her government role and its responsibilities. Her children had grown up seeing her as an officer, and many questioned her decision to resign without another job.
Her husband, Gopesh Modi, and a few close friends supported her.
At the same time, she had become deeply interested in solid waste management. She undertook residential training, visited dumping grounds and waste processing facilities, and wanted to work more closely on the problem.
Opportunities within her role were limited, prompting her to think about how else she could contribute.
“I did not leave because I was unhappy with government service. I left because I wanted to contribute differently,” she says.
She resigned in February 2024 without a fully formed plan.
Before the website, there were conversations
Khushbu spent the following months visiting organisations, listening to their teams and learning what they needed.
At first, she explored collaborating with existing platforms such as GiveIndia, iVolunteer and ConnectFor.
She saw a gap: grassroots organisations and voluntary groups needed ways to find supporters and collaborate with each other.
Around November 2024, her team began building SewaConnect through social media, gathering information and developing relationships. The website followed later.
“Sewaconnect did not begin with a website. It began with conversations,” she says.
“We already have thousands of organisations and countless individuals doing incredible work. The challenge isn’t always the lack of good work. It is that people usually work in isolation,” she says.
“Our goal isn’t to build our own projects. It is to strengthen existing good work and encourage collaboration rather than duplication.”
‘The real work lies in understanding people’
Organisations, voluntary groups, professionals, CSR teams and community groups can register.
Social organisations fill out a form, submit relevant documents and undergo verification. Area coordinators visit them, meet their teams and beneficiaries, and understand their work before they are onboarded.
It has supported more than 100 organisations, facilitated over 50 NGO collaborations and 50 CSR and community partnerships.
Once approved, organisations can update their profiles, share needs and post events or volunteering opportunities. Individuals register based on their interests and skills.
An NGO might need a psychologist, physiotherapist, lawyer, trainer, digital expert or mentor. Another may need visibility or guidance from a group that has solved a similar problem. SewaConnect works to make the appropriate introduction.
“The website or portal is simply a tool; the real work lies in understanding people, identifying opportunities for collaboration and helping meaningful connections happen,” Khushbu says.
The platform has two paid interns, around 15 volunteers and a five-person core team.
Snehashri Bande handles technology, Kalpita Rakesh Vazhayil manages operations and community engagement, Palak Jain oversees social media and communications, and Vinay Somani advises the team.
Volunteers Durgesh Sharma, Chetan Divekar, Vinod Shah, Jashmin Shah, Anjali Gangal and Prakash Rajan support different parts of the work.
‘Collaboration creates far greater impact’
Pagaria Welfare Foundation was developing community learning centres but needed a strong curriculum. Seva Sahayog Foundation already had one. SewaConnect brought them together.
Seva Sahayog’s curriculum was adapted for Pagaria’s centres, while Pagaria’s toy library initiative reached Seva Sahayog’s learning centres. Both could build on existing work rather than start from scratch.
CA Vaidhei Pagaria, director of Pagaria Welfare Foundation, says the connections helped the organisation implement one community learning centre, five toy libraries, five brain gym centres, one computer learning centre and three menstrual health and hygiene awareness programmes.
“Sewaconnect has affirmed our belief that collaboration creates far greater impact than working alone,” she says.
Another introduction began with a question about Nirmamala, an 18-year-old neurodivergent and speech-impaired girl who had never attended school.
SewaConnect connected her with SwayamSiddha’s Chembur centre. She began attending regularly, interacting with others, learning skills and receiving a stipend.
“Sometimes, all it takes is one person asking a question and the right network responding,” Khushbu says.
For Swati Mahendra Mohite, founder of Aai Day Care Sanstha in Pen, Maharashtra, support had been hard to find.
“Like many grassroots NGOs, our biggest challenge was raising funds and connecting with the right CSR partners and donors. Since we are based in a rural area, gaining visibility among corporate organisations and philanthropists was not easy,” she says.
Aai Day Care works with more than 70 children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, offering special education, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, vocational training and residential care.
Beyond daily sessions, its team spent hours preparing proposals, approaching companies and finding professionals and resources.
“Due to limited funding, we sometimes had to postpone improvements, delay therapy sessions or psychological support, and manage every expense very carefully,” Swati explains.
Through SewaConnect, Aai Day Care partnered with DHL Logistics on its annual operational support project. Swati says it also helped the team approach CSR partners and present its work more confidently.
Around November 2024, her team began building SewaConnect through social media, gathering information and developing relationships.
“Beyond financial assistance, the platform gave us confidence that our work is being recognised and appreciated,” she says.
‘Sharing your time & passion is enough’
Simran Sanyal, a regional head with a multinational company, heard about SewaConnect through Khushbu. She was introduced to Vidyadaan Sahayak Mandal and now mentors four children.
“SewaConnect understood my interests and connected me with the right organisation,” she says. “The introduction, coordination and trust were already in place, so I could focus on building relationships with the children instead of worrying about where or how to begin.”
Soma Chakrabarty, a managing director who also runs Udhayana Foundation, visited organisations with Khushbu and discovered work she had not previously encountered.
Through SewaConnect, she began teaching music at a school for children living on the streets and plans to organise fundraising musical programmes.
“Contributing to society doesn’t always require a huge commitment of money. Sometimes, sharing your time, skills or passion can make a lasting difference,” she says.
A platform she hopes will run without her
SewaConnect has been self-funded and free from the beginning. It does not receive or route donations: contributions from donors and CSR partners go directly to the organisations receiving support.
Khushbu wants the platform to remain a neutral bridge rather than compete for resources or run its own projects.
She also encourages organisations to plan beyond their founders through succession planning, knowledge sharing, partnerships and even mergers.
“Before beginning something new, we should ask ourselves whether an existing organisation is already doing that work and whether strengthening it might create a greater impact,” she says.
SewaConnect currently operates in Maharashtra, including Mumbai, Thane, Navi Mumbai, Raigad, Pune, Nashik, Wardha, Yavatmal, Beed and Nanded. Khushbu prioritises on-ground verification before expanding elsewhere.
She continues her anti-addiction awareness work, which began in childhood and has reached more than 70,000 children and young people. She also works on waste segregation, home composting, reducing single-use plastics and practical community waste management.
Over the next few years, she hopes to strengthen SewaConnect, plan for succession and eventually hand it over.
Organisations, voluntary groups, professionals, CSR teams and community groups can register.
“I don’t dream of building a very large organisation around SewaConnect. If, over time, it turns into a self-sustaining ecosystem that can eventually function independently of me, I would consider that a success,” she says.
Her understanding of impact has changed since her years in public health.
“Earlier I measured impact by the number of patients treated or programmes implemented. Today, I also measure it by the number of meaningful relationships created,” she says.
Years after finding help for a child whose cancer treatment had stopped, she is working to make such connections easier for others.
“India doesn’t lack people willing to help, and it certainly doesn’t lack people doing good work. What we often lack are trusted connections between the two,” Khushbu concludes
All pictures courtesy Dr Khushbu Taori Modi.
