Venture capital is being used in India to fund affordable healthcare, dairy farming, and a literacy program for poor children.

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The main purpose is social upliftment, but there is an important twist. Each project follows a "for-profit" model, is expected to show revenues and profit annually, and is backed by venture capitalists looking for decent returns.

Following the model pioneered by microfinance institutions, a group of entrepreneurs across the country are setting up firms that seek to fulfil the twin aims of making profit while providing social uplift. From being on the fringes of the consciousness of urban Indians, the "other India", which includes dairy farmers in rural Orissa, youth in Uttarakhand and fisherfolk like the Fernandez family, are taking centre stage. Investors are putting money and giving attention to what is now being referred to as the business of social good.

"We are right at the inflexion point and will see the emergence of more social ventures that will raise commercial capital to build for-profit businesses and investors willing to take the risk of investing in such enterprises," says Vineet Rai, founder and chief executive officer of Aavishkaar Venture Management Services, who pioneered the trend of making risk capital available to entrepreneurs aiming at helping society with their business.

Unlike earlier, when philanthropic capital was used solely to create livelihood and products that the poor could afford, this new wave of enterprise works like a business corporation with a profit motive, while attempting to retain the essential social purpose.

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