Bhopinder Singh

Co-founder

Bhopinder Singh is the co-founder of Maitri India (2005)[1], an Indian non-profit working on women & children and elderly from New Delhi.

Lieutenant General Bhopinder Singh (born 20 March 1946) is a retired Indian Army officer who co-founded the New Delhi-based humanitarian organisation Maitri with Winnie Singh in 2005, and is its president. He served as Vice Chief of the Army Staff in 2005 and afterwards as Lieutenant Governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Maitri was started in Shillong, Meghalaya, in response to domestic violence and HIV/AIDS among members of the uniformed services and their families in north-east India. It has since expanded into work with abandoned and destitute widows in Vrindavan, with rickshaw pullers, and with women and children in vulnerable communities, and describes its purpose as securing identity, dignity and respect.

Military career

Singh was commissioned in June 1965. He later served as military, naval and air attache for East and Southern Africa, based in Addis Ababa, and as military secretary to Presidents K. R. Narayanan and A. P. J. Abdul Kalam.

He commanded II Corps and was Director General of the Assam Rifles, where he initiated programmes on tuberculosis, malaria and HIV/AIDS among troops and the surrounding population, working with UNAIDS and the Assam AIDS Prevention Society. He was Vice Chief of the Army Staff from January to September 2005.

Later career and Maitri

He founded Maitri with Winnie Singh in 2005. The organisation's early work in Shillong included a film festival and roadshows on HIV and gender-based violence and an international conference on AIDS at which A. P. J. Abdul Kalam gave the keynote address. From 2007 it broadened its range of projects, and it says it has reached more than 250,000 people over two decades.

He was Lieutenant Governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands from December 2006 to June 2013, and held additional charge as Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry from March to July 2008.

He also chairs the Aashirwad Senior Citizens Council and leads Maitri's Ageing Resource Centre, which supports elderly widows in Vrindavan and campaigns on pensions and geriatric services.

Recognition

He was awarded the Ati Vishisht Seva Medal in 2000 and the Param Vishisht Seva Medal in 2004.[2][3][4][5]

Maitri India

Maitri India is a New Delhi-based nonprofit with over two decades of social service, focused on securing fundamental rights and dignity for elderly, destitute and abandoned widows. It provides legal identity documentation assistance, healthcare and wellness programmes, and community outreach for migrant workers.

Maitri India reports the following, on its own site: