Pinkishe Foundation is a specialist implementation organisation for menstrual health. We deliver, reliably, in schools and communities across India.
May 2017 to September 2026
Khyati Gupta was sixteen when she noticed bloodstains on the clothes of a young girl she knew. When she gently asked, she learned the girl's family could not afford sanitary pads. Every month, the girl made do with old cloth.
Khyati at sixteen, the year she asked her question.
Khyati could not let it go. She began to read, and found that this was not one girl's story. Across India, millions of girls faced the same thing: no affordable pads, little knowledge, and a silence that made it hard even to ask for help.
So she went to her father with a simple question. Can we do something about this?
Her father, Arun Gupta, had spent more than twenty years in the corporate world. He listened, and he said yes. He left his career, and in May 2017 Pinkishe Foundation was born in New Delhi.
Nearly a decade later, her question still guides everything we do: what does every girl need, every month, to manage her period with dignity? Today we answer it with government, schools and partners, district by district.
All of this, because a sixteen-year-old refused to look away.
India has lakhs of registered NGOs. Only a small number hold every credential a careful funder looks for. Pinkishe Foundation is one of them.
Companies and foundations that have funded our work include:
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We prioritise India's aspirational districts, where the need is greatest, and we work wherever a partner wants to make a difference.
Cumulative figures cover all programmes and partners since 2017. The number of states we work in today changes from year to year.
Khyati Gupta started Pinkishe at sixteen, after seeing what period poverty meant for a girl she knew. Her question shaped the organisation from its first day, and it still shapes our work today.
In 2025, Khyati was named to Vox's Future Perfect 25. In 2024, she received the Heroes of Change Award from Republic TV.
Pinkishe Foundation is a public charitable trust, set up in New Delhi on 1 May 2017. Tap the plus sign to read each profile.
Arun Gupta is the full-time President of Pinkishe Foundation. In a career of more than 25 years, he held leadership roles at Dell Services, Perot Systems, Amdocs, IBM, HCL, InterGlobe and SGS, with deep experience in organisational development and management. An electrical engineering graduate from Aligarh Muslim University, he left his corporate career when his sixteen-year-old daughter asked him to help her work on menstrual health.
Shalini Gupta is a trustee and the General Secretary of Pinkishe Foundation, and leads its education work. An alumnus of Lady Irwin College, New Delhi, with a degree in education from Annamalai University, she has worked in education for more than 15 years and has taught children from underprivileged homes for over a decade. She joined Arun when Pinkishe was still an idea, and has given her time to it fully ever since.
Vandana Gupta is a trustee and the Treasurer of Pinkishe Foundation. She holds a Master's in Computer Applications and spent more than 15 years in software development and project management with TCS, Amdocs, Perot Systems and Dell Services. She looks after Pinkishe's accounts and its information technology.
Leaders from business, technology and public health who guide our strategy.
A leadership mentor, author and speaker, Narendra works closely with entrepreneurs to strengthen their mindset, build their teams and shape clear strategies for long-term growth.
With more than 18 years of corporate experience, Prakash is a Site Council member and CSR Community Impact champion at Adobe Noida, and has led programmes such as Pro Bono Residency, Teach India and Technovation Girls mentorship.
A consumer investor and co-founder of The Moms Co., Mohit is an alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad and an Aspen Fellow. He works closely with founders on brand strategy, fundraising and scale.
A public health specialist with more than 20 years of experience across global organisations, non-profits and companies, including research for WHO and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Mayank manages Adobe's digital learning and technical documentation products across Europe and North America, and brings experience in business growth, enterprise solutions and partnerships.
MBBS, MD in Community Medicine, and Assistant Professor at Gautam Buddha Chikitsa Mahavidyalaya, Uttarakhand. A public health professional focused on maternal and child health and health education for women.
MBBS, specialising in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at Koppal Institute of Medical Sciences, Karnataka. She has run menstrual health sessions for adolescent girls in schools across Karnataka.
MBBS, MS in Obstetrics and Gynaecology, and Senior Resident at Maulana Azad Medical College and Lok Nayak Hospital, Delhi, with experience in high-risk pregnancies and gynaecological care.
Pinkishe is based in Delhi and run as a virtual organisation, with people hired locally in the districts where we work.
And a team of around 25 people, many hired locally in the districts where we work.
Browse the moments that shaped Pinkishe, from one girl's question in 2017 to government schools across India today. Choose a year to jump to it.
In our early years, women across India came together as volunteers, handing out pads and talking openly about periods in their own neighbourhoods. Programmes from those years, such as Pink Pad, Pink Talk, Swara, Kaagaz ke Pad and Praveena, taught us what works. That movement built our knowledge of the field.
With the support of CSR partners, we became a professional organisation: trained, paid teams working in defined districts, and around 100 volunteers across India who still help when needed. In January 2026, the Supreme Court recognised menstrual health as part of every girl's right to life. Our work now is to make that right real in every government school.
Create a world where every menstruator enjoys their fundamental human right to have safe and dignified menstruation.
To build dependable menstrual health systems in India's schools and communities, so that every girl and woman can manage her period with dignity, knowledge and support.
By 2047, as India turns 100, we aim to have supported 1 crore girls and women with menstrual health, in step with the vision of a Viksit Bharat.
We work district by district, with government and school leaders, using one model: products, disposal, education, trained teachers and monitoring. We provide sanitary pads, reusable cloth pads, menstrual cups and period panties, chosen to suit each community.
A three-year district model that makes menstrual health support reliable in every government school.
See the modelMenstrual education and free sanitary pads for girls and women in communities, funded by people like you.
About PadBankSessions and campaigns for workplaces, campuses and communities, designed with each partner.
Work with usThe beliefs that guide how we work, with girls and women, with government and with every partner.
We say only what we can show, report what we find, and publish our audited accounts.
Every girl is treated with respect, privacy and care, in line with our safeguarding policies.
Our work serves India's girls and women, and strengthens the public systems meant to support them.
We are independent and non-aligned, free of political, regional or religious bias, and we work with everyone who shares the goal.
With government, schools, companies and communities, because no one can make this right real alone.
Our work contributes to six of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Menstrual health is part of WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene), and it reaches into health, education and equality too.
Target 3.7
Safe products, the knowledge to use them, and a helpline that answers at any hour, so infections and pain are not suffered in silence.
Target 4.a
Shakti Shala makes support reliable in government schools, so a period is never a reason to miss class.
Target 5.1
We break the silence around periods, and bring boys, men and teachers into the conversation.
Target 6.2
Menstrual hygiene is part of WASH: water, sanitation and hygiene. Safe disposal is built into the Shakti Shala school model.
Target 10.2
India's aspirational districts come first, and PadBank reaches communities where support is hardest to find.
Target 12.5
Reusable cloth pads, menstrual cups and period panties where they suit, and safe disposal for the rest.
We use the goals to show where our work fits. This does not imply endorsement by the United Nations.
Each honour is shown with its year and the organisation that gave it.
Use the arrows, or swipe, to see all 14 honours
Planning your CSR for this year? Here is where to find the model, the results, the governance and the paperwork.
How we make menstrual health support reliable in every government school of a district, in three years.
What we have delivered since 2017, how we count it, and how we measure outcomes in every project.
Our trustees, policies and audited accounts, with administration at 4.28 per cent of total expenses.
Registrations, audit reports and policies in one pack, sent to your CSR team on request.
Tell us your priorities and the places you care about. We will come back within one working day.
Partner with usRequest the due-diligence packOr write to info@pinkishe.org
Giving as an individual? Donate to PadBank
