History of Snehwan
A charity built on the belief that help is owed. The story of Snehwan, as Snehwan tells it.
About the founder
Born in the Parbhani district of Marathwada, Ashok Deshmane grew up in abject poverty and hunger. He and his family endured years of uncertainty and hardship, as did the other families of a drought-ravaged farming community. It did not dampen his spirit. He got himself an education, then a job, and changed the course of his life.
Today he carries an undying desire to help others in need.
Early life
He had to work throughout his college life, because his parents could not provide the fees. He worked in a garage and slept in lorries to earn money for his education. He still remembers how the drivers from Andhra Pradesh shared their meals with him.
Determined to make a difference, Ashok set out to get an education, and after years of hard work he graduated with a master’s degree in computer science. That earned him a well-paying IT job in Pune.
An ignited mind
From a young age Ashok had channelled his thoughts into poetry, often about the troubles drought brought to farmers. He was still affected by news of the worsening conditions in his home town. The constant reports from the drought in his village, and the rising number of suicides among farmers, worried him.
He went back, only to find children abandoned on the streets, starving, and unaware of the happenings in the world. He soon realised that poetry alone could not solve the problems his community faced.
2014 and 2015 were a rough time for drought-affected families, and it was their children’s education that suffered. “When there is no food to put in the stomach, what is the point of putting anything in the brain?” — that was the attitude he met.
Ashok had to do something about it. He started teaching local children at the weekends, but their families had to move to a different town. He was heartbroken, and decided that he would create a home for these children, for their all-round development.
The beginning
With that spirit he started an NGO, Snehwan, in December 2015. As part of it he decided to educate the children of farmers who had taken their own lives. In the beginning he had eighteen children from four districts of Maharashtra.
His parents came all the way from Parbhani to support him. His father taught the children tabla, and his mother cooked meals for all of them.
The journey
In Ashok’s vision, if we want the next generation of farmers to do something substantial in the near future, it is necessary to educate them — and basic education is not enough. Subjects such as computer science, yoga, music, dance and painting are needed too, and children must be taught according to their talents.
He felt that if he had the will he would find the way, and carried on setting up Snehwan alongside night shifts at his job for nine months. He had begun by donating a part of his salary to charity, but realised that this too was not enough. He decided to give his time and effort to the children of his community, quit his high-paying IT job and devoted his whole time to educating them.
Ashok married at the age of twenty-five in November 2016, and his wife Archana, then twenty-one, was more than happy to learn about his cause and to contribute to it. She cooks regularly for the one large family they have, and is like a mother to them. They lived as one big happy family with around twenty-five young boys in a four-room home, and also began education and development programmes for twenty-seven girls from the nearest slum area.
Helping hands
Ashok and Archana were looking to increase the size of their family by bringing more and more children into their little haven near Pune. They wanted to expand, and were looking for affordable land nearby. Having known the same poverty as these children, he wanted them to learn more, and most of all to become better human beings.
In 2018, Dr Smita Kulkarni and Dr Ravindra Kulkarni donated two acres of land to Snehwan. The Late Nalini Kulkarni Dnyangram project was started on this land, with one aim: caring for and educating needy farmers’ children, with an emphasis on their holistic development. The Snehwan programme that had run at Bhosari since 2015 moved to its new location at Koyali.
The road to the future
Ashok has no plans to slow down, and is extending his efforts into other areas such as agriculture. He is worried about the decline in interest in agrarian work, and believes that if the trend continues India may soon have to import food grains. He is focused on building a school for agriculture, since most of the children come from farming backgrounds.
Today, Ashok and his wife Archana work at Snehwan to heal the scars of losing loved ones and the physical effects of extreme poverty. Alongside that, the effort to bring these children into mainstream society goes on.
We propose to help these children realise their full potential and their dreams by supporting higher education and providing professional training. But that is for the future. Today is for healing, caring, educating and nurturing.
Every dollar we raise here becomes a grant to Snehwan.
Snehwan USA Inc was incorporated in Georgia on 3 September 2026, after Ashok Deshmane’s visit to the United States. It has no employees and no paid officers. Our directors serve unpaid, and the board approves each grant before it is made.