Amitabh Shah A Yale MBA’s Inspirational Story from Wall- Street to the Real Streets of India
Who is Amitabh Shah?
Amitabh Shah is the Founder and Chief Inspiration Officer (CIO) of a Non-Government Organization (NGO) well known by the name YUVA Unstoppable, and a well-known Motivation Speaker in India.
About Yuva Unstoppable
YUVA Unstoppable motivates and fosters random acts of kindness amongst the youth towards the less privileged strata of the society under its three initiatives: School Unstoppable, College Unstoppable, and Corporate Unstoppable. It is an on-going revolution with a force of over 100,000 young people across 32 cities of India reaching out to more than 250,000 kids in slums/municipal schools across the nation through organizational partnerships with Schools, Colleges, Non-profits, Media and Corporate companies.
Early Life Of Amitabh Shah before Yuva Unstoppable
- The Ex-Executive President of the Times Foundation.
- Times Foundation is a development house set up by the Times of India Group to promote equitable,
inclusive and sustainable development, facilitating affirmative interventions for self-development, education, health, women’s empowerment, environment, and disaster management.
- Times Foundation is a development house set up by the Times of India Group to promote equitable,
- Also the Ex-Chairman of Youth Wing of the Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industries (GCCI).
- After receiving MBA in Leadership & Management from the Yale School of Management, New Haven, Connecticut in 2008, Somehow I was not convinced to work for a private firm – so I came back to India to pursue social change.
- Lead System Configuration Analyst.
- Prior to starting Yuva Unstoppable, Amitabh Shah has worked with Hewitt Associates, Atlanta as a lead system configuration analyst.
Achievements of Amitabh Shah
| Year | Award | Organization | Awarded By | Location |
| 2019 | Ellis Island Award | Ellis Island Society | Statue of Liberty, USA | |
| 2018 | Sri Lankan Peace Ambassador Award | Centre of Peace Studies | ||
| 2015 | Prince Prize for Innovative Philanthropy | Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation and the Tocqueville Foundation in Paris, France | HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco | Monaco, Europe |
Amitabh Shah is the recipient of one of the highest awards officially recognized by the House of Representatives and Senate – International Ellis Island Award at Statue of Liberty in May 2019. Previous winners have been Bill Clinton, George Bush, Muhammad Ali, Rosa Parks, Richard Nixon, Lee Iococa, Mrs. Indra Nooyi, Malala amongst other legends! He was the 2015 Winner of the Prince’s Prize for Innovative Philanthropy, conferred by HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco wherein Jack Ma of Alibaba Group was a semi-finalist. In 2018, he was conferred the title of Sri Lankan Peace Ambassador by the Center of Peace Studies. Amitabh Shah was the Executive President of the Times of India Foundation (Largest English Selling Daily Globally).
He is a celebrated inspirational speaker on kindness, Gratitude and the Power of self –belief and has been winning hearts with his presence at Ted Talks, Yale, Wharton, YPO/WPO Forums, United Way’s Million Dollar Roundtable, amongst others. He is the 2019 – Iconic Youth Award recipient by Rotary International for mobilizing youthful energy & bringing lasting change in educational institutions. Yuva Unstoppable also won coveted IBM Impact award for 2017 to improve their social media and corporate communications. Having transformed sanitation, environment, education, digital literacy in 1600 less privileged schools now, Amitabh shah is not going to stop till he transforms 10,000 schools and 6M kids by 2029 for the less privileged and provide better hope & dignity to millions.
Milestones
- In 2019, Amitabh Shah became the youngest Indian Citizen to win the International Ellis Island Award given by the International Ellis Island Society at Statue of Liberty.
- He also became the recipient of Iconic Youth Award in 2019 given by Rotary International for mobilising youth and bringing about lasting change in education institutions.
- In 2018, Amitabh Shah was conferred with the Srilankan Peace Ambassador by the Center of Peace Studies
- In 2015, he received, Prince’s Prize for Innovative Philanthropy by Prince Albert II of Monaco where Jack Ma (cofounder & former executive chairman of Alibaba Group) was one of the finalists
- Featured by leading digital and print media like Time of India, Business Standard, YourStory, ANI News, Daily Hunt, Millennium Post, New Delhi Times, Live Mint, and many more.
Yuva Unstoppable Founded by Amitabh Shah
Amitabh Shah launched Yuva Unstoppable in 2005, at a mere age of 23. After his MBA from Yale, he declined a JPMorgan Wall Street offer to work on the Real Streets of India. He decided to launch this volunteer movement after he discovered the immense suffering experienced by his elderly 82-year-old nanny, Kamlaben, when she was abandoned and abused by her son. He gathered friends and began volunteering at homes for the elderly, slums and orphanages. Amitabh shah truly believes in what Gandhi said – Be the change you wish to see in the world. There was serious resistance for the first year from his friends and family as they thought he was losing his mind, why starts serving others so early? Amitabh shah did not give up and in fact, his family is his biggest cheerleader now.
Today, Yuva Unstoppable is India’s premier nonprofit which benefits over 6,00,000 underprivileged children across 41 cities of India. It partners with 100 top institutes (UNICEF, Google, United Way, KPMG, Deloitte, IBM, Coke, Reliance, Adani, etc) and has transformed over 1600 government schools with better toilets, improved drinking water, scholarships, digital literacy, behavior change amongst others. In the past, Prime Minister of India Sh. Narendra Modiji, Late Pres. APJ Kalam, Superstar Akshay Kumar, and Mr. Amitabh Bachchan, Award-winning Directors Rakeysh Mehrta and R. Balki; Cricketers VVS Laxman and Sir Ian Botham; Global legends like Author Jeffrey Archer and Paul Polman (Global CEO Uniliver) have participated in Yuva initiatives. Actor Ashton Kutcher’s A-Plus Media, MFF and Chicken Soup for the Soul made a 4 min short film around how Yuva empowers girls across India by improving toilets and education facilities in schools. It was premiered at the Yale CEO Summit – 2017 in NYC with CEOs of Iconic companies like Merck, Wells Fargo, Dunkin Donuts, Panera Bread, IBM, amongst others. Amitabh Shah believes in “Gratitude, Self-Belief, and Compassion the 3 pillars. Let’s invoke
those in all and the world will be a better place.”