A non-governmental organization (NGO) is a legally constituted organization created by natural or legal persons that operates independently from any form of government. The term originated from the United Nations (UN), and is normally used to refer to organizations that are not a part of the government and are not conventional for-profit business. In the cases in which NGOs are funded totally or partially by governments, the NGO maintains its non-governmental status by excluding government representatives from membership in the organization. The term is usually applied only to organizations that pursue wider social aims that have political aspects, but are not openly political organizations such as political parties.

The number of internationally operating NGOs is estimated at 40,000. National numbers are even higher: Russia has 277,000 NGOs;India is estimated to have around 3.3 million NGOs in year 2009, which is one NGO per less than 400 Indians, and many times the number of primary schools and primary health centres in India.

Arundhati Roy (born 24 November 1961) is an Indian novelist. She won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her novel, The God of Small Things, and has also written two screenplays and several collections of essays. Her writings on various social, environmental and political issues have been a subject of major controversy in India.

Arundhati Roy was born in Shillong, Meghalaya, India, to Ranjit Roy, a Bengali Hindu tea planter and Mary Roy, a Malayali Syrian Christian women's rights activist.

She spent her childhood in Aymanam in Kerala, and went to school at Corpus Christi, Kottayam, followed by the Lawrence School, Lovedale, in Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu. She then studied architecture at the School of Planning and Architecture, Delhi, where she met her first husband, architect Gerard da Cunha.

Roy met her second husband, filmmaker Pradip Krishen, in 1984, and played a village girl in his award-winning movie Massey Sahib. Until made financially secure by the success of her novel The God of Small Things, she worked various jobs, including running aerobics classes at five-star hotels in New Delhi. Roy is a cousin of prominent media personality Prannoy Roy, the head of the leading Indian TV media group NDTV. She lives in New Delhi.

Arvind Kumar Kejriwal (born 16 June 1968) is a retired Indian Revenue Service officer and an Indian social activist fighting for greater transparency in Government. He was awarded Ramon Magsaysay Award for Emergent Leadership in 2006, for activating India's Right to Information movement at grassroots and social activities to empower the poorest citizens to fight corruption by holding the government answerable to the people. Kejriwal is also a Saathi (fellow) of the Association for India's Development, a Global Impact award winning NGO.

Arvind Kejriwal was born in a Marwari family in Hissar, Haryana in 1968. His father was an engineer and he spent most of his childhood living in small northern Indian towns like Sonepat, Mathura and Hissar. He did his schooling from Campus School. Kejriwal graduated from IIT Kharagpur as a Mechanical engineer in 1989.

Kejriwal joined Tata Steel right after his graduation from IIT Kharagpur. Kejriwal quit his job with Tata Steel in 1992^{[citation needed]} and spent some time working with Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, the Ramakrishna Mission in the North-East India and Nehru Yuva Kendra.

Rajiv Radheshyam Dixit was an Indian social activist. He started social movements in order to spread awareness on topics of Indian national interest through the Swadeshi Movement, Azadi Bachao Andolan, and various other works. He served as the National Secretary of Bharat Swabhiman Andolan he is the founder of bharat swabhimaan andolan ] He was a strong believer and preacher of Bharatiyata. He had also worked for spreading awareness about Indian history, issues in the Indian constitution and Indian economic policies.