About the Foundation
Helping hands. Positive living. A trust held for the people.
Jagannath Foundation was created on 17 August 2026. It is irrevocable. Its income and property can be applied only to the objects of the trust. There is no private profit.
Statutory registrations
The Foundation is a public charitable trust, recorded on NITI Aayog DARPAN, provisionally registered for tax exemption, and approved by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs to undertake CSR activities.
- PAN
- AAFTJ8006Q
- DARPAN (NITI Aayog)
- OR/2026/1196699 · registered 02-09-2026
- Provisional registration u/s 12A
- URN AAFTJ8006QE20261
- Provisional approval u/s 80G
- URN AAFTJ8006QF20261 · Form 10G dated 07-09-2026 · valid TY 2026-27 to TY 2028-29
- MCA CSR registration
- CSR00118119 · Form CSR-1 dated 21-09-2026 · SRN AC6085516 · ROC Delhi
Quality of life that lasts
To enable communities across the country to improve quality of life — through education, healthcare, livelihoods and lasting household assets — on a sustainable and inclusive basis.
Women at the centre
We exist to serve communities across India, with partners and evidence, putting women at the centre of household economics and turning one-time assistance into a skill, a saving and a school that holds.
Public benefit only
Education, healthcare, relief of poverty, women’s and children’s welfare, environment, and community development. The Trust does not carry on any activity with the object of earning profit.
Four disciplines
Dignity first. People we work with are partners, not recipients of a spectacle.
Evidence over theatre. We design for what a family can still feel twelve months later.
Communities first. We work with existing schools, health workers, self-help groups and panchayats.
Women at the centre. Household energy, savings, nutrition and children’s schooling move when women have information, income and a seat at the table.
Dr Jagannath Patnaik, MBA, M.Law, Ph.D., D.Litt., D.Sc.
Founder, Settlor & Managing Trustee
I did not first meet social service in a conference hall. I met it as a child, in the ordinary work of standing with people who had less than they needed. Those early days taught me a sentence that has never left me: Manav seva is Ishwar seva — service to the human being is service to God. Not as a slogan, but as a discipline.
Vice Chancellor, The ICFAI University Sikkim. He has served as Vice Chancellor of Indian universities for over 16 years and is a renowned educationist and author. Recorded in the World Book of Records and recipient of the Utkal Jyoti Award of the Government for social service.
Doctorate in Political Administration (Moscow, 2000), doctorate in Life Sciences (2016), D.Litt. in Education (2019), LL.M. in Commercial and Corporate Law, MBA and B.Com, with diplomas in human rights, intellectual property and cyber law. His books and teaching treat education, the North-East, human rights and positive living as public work, not performance. He has served on university and education councils, including the Confederation of Indian Universities, and as Global Chairman of the UNACCC Governing Council.
On 17 August 2026 he settled Jagannath Foundation as an irrevocable public charitable trust so that classrooms, health camps, skills and household energy could be held for public benefit alone — across the country, without private profit.
Selected appointments & recognitions
Dr Patnaik is currently Vice Chancellor of ICFAI University Sikkim. Earlier appointments include Vice Chancellor of Kalinga University, Raipur; Pro Chancellor of Singhania University; Secretary General of the Confederation of Indian Universities; Director and Vice President of the Manipal Academy of Higher Education; Registrar and Director of Distance Education at Sikkim Manipal University; and Academic Registrar of the International Medical and Technological University, Dar es Salaam. He serves as Global Chairman of UNACCC.
He has advised institutions including the British Medical Journal, the Pharmaceutical Advisory Forum of the Government of India, Aptech Computer Education, and others. His public work sits at the junction of education, youth livelihoods, women’s agency and human rights.