Nita Ambani’s address at Sports Business Summit in London

Nita Ambani addressed at Sports Business Summit in London on 8^th October. The summit is part of Leaders’ Week London 2019 event.

Key points from her speech:

* Today, women in India are breaking the glass ceiling in more and more areas of human endeavour. Indeed women all over the world are doing so in sport and science, in boardrooms and courtrooms, in Bollywood and Hollywood, in politics and philanthropy, in effect anywhere and everywhere.

* Sport is a great teacher, it is a magical equalizer and in a young country like India the aspirations are so audacious, the adrenalin so high and appetite to achieve so strong that if you can just guide and steer our in the right direction, they will script the most stunning success stories the world has ever seen.

* Transformational journey of a young boy who was discovered by Mumbai Indians (MI) from a small town of India. Today, Bumrah is an inspiration to countless young boys and girls. In the last ten years MI have discovered several young talents like Hardik Pandya, Krunal Pandya and so many more.

* One of the most heartwarming initiatives of Reliance Foundation and MI is ‘Education and Sports for All Programme’. It combines the power and pull of sports and education especially for children who are under privileged and differently abled. Under ESA initiative every year we bring 21000 of this children to watch their favourite MI team play.

* Our grassroots programme in football has so far reached out to over 1.5 million children. Our huge sports programme for schools and colleges has reached out to 9 million children. The Reliance Foundation Junior NBA Prgramme has reached out 11 million children. Overall, across all sports, Reliance Foundation has reached out to over 21.5 million children across the country.

* Ten years ago my husband Mukesh Ambani and I started the Reliance foundation to empower all Indians especially women and children. We had the privilege of touching the lives of 34 million people through our work in diverse areas in the remotest villages and towns of India.

* Jio is now building multiple digital platforms and solutions in diverse fields including sports, education and healthcare. The efforts put in by government and the private sector in grassroots and youth development have started bearing fruit. Our young Indian players have taken the world by storm. In the month of July alone, Indian athletes won over 200 medals at the international level.

* No child in India is deprived of an opportunity to experience and learn from the joy and thrill of sports. Priority is to reach out to children from poor and marginalized regions and families.

* India become a global sporting power house. There is no reason why a nation of 1.3 billion people cannot be amongst the leading medal winners on the international stage. It is my hope and my dream to see India host some of the most iconic sporting championships in the world like the Olympics and FIFA World Cup.

* Sport performs its most important global goal to promote peace, amity and understanding – to inspire, to heal and to transform.