India has the solutions,

India has the solutions,

they need an enabling environment to help them scale.

Across India, non-profits are already changing lives with work rooted in their communities. But too often that work stays localised, reaching a single district when it could benefit the entire country. To scale, it needs two things: a way to integrate into the government, whose spending on social services reaches hundreds of millions, and funders willing to support this with patient capital.

That is where System Support Organisations come in, working as the ‘missing middle’ between communities and government. They have chosen pathways to create outsized impact with modest budgets by working strategically with governments.

Strengthening these organisations with catalytic philanthropic capital to work effectively with the government to create lasting impact for millions is the opportunity.

Government

The Doer and Payer at scale

The government reaches further than anyone.

Country's largest funder

Spending ₹25.7 lakh crore a year on social services, close to 8% of GDP.

(FY 2024–25)

Biggest service provider

Running more than 10 lakh schools and reaching 8.3 crore people through MGNREGA.

(FY 2024–25)

Enabler of markets

Drawing over 13,000 private hospitals into Ayushman Bharat.

(as of 2024)

No other actor comes close.

A special category of non-profits have found novel ways to partner effectively with the government that improves the effectiveness of the public system. These non-profits operate as System Support Organisations, forming the missing middle between communities and government. It is this capability that enables them to be change agents at scale.

Government
Implementation NGOs that serve beneficiaries
Funders
SSO

SCALE exists to strengthen this missing middle, and to help it attract funding and government partnerships that can carry its work to millions.

These non-profits, operating with Moderate Resources

already do very impactful work that improves hundreds of thousands of lives.

On a budget of ₹11 crore, one organisation enabled 8.5 lakh people to access ₹550 crore worth of government welfare benefits across education, livelihood and maternity schemes. Others have shaped national education and health policy on similarly modest budgets. The constraint is rarely the idea. It is the path to scale.

Budget 11 CR
850,000 People reached Accessed benefits worth ₹550 Cr

Philanthropy can be the capital that unlocks the rest.

Government spending forms the backbone of India’s social sector, with the latest estimates at ₹25.7 lakh crore. Private philanthropy contributes an estimated ₹1.43 lakh crore, including ₹40,794 crore through CSR. Used well, this capital does not compete with public spending but is strategic and complementary and makes public spending go further, backing the organisations and their work in the development phase that governments then adopt and scale.

Used well, philanthropy makes public spending go further.

₹1.43 Lakh crore,
philanthropy
₹25.7 Lakh crore,
government