North Star Values: Leadership, Family, and Generosity
Anurag and Gunjan Jain are leaders in many community initiatives, one of the most recent being Get Shift Done. One of their shared passions is taking care of people who are hungry, and they’ve been supporting the North Texas Food Bank in a variety of ways for more than a decade. Anurag is a former board chair, and Gunjan has served on capital campaign committees and helped create a “Kids Against Hunger” campaign. Currently, Gunjan serves on CFT’s board of trustees and has been involved with the Global Fund for Children for many years, both locally and globally.
“Alleviating hunger is important to us. It’s not okay that people remain hungry in our society. We believe it is a matter of a distribution problem that can be solved for,” said Anurag. “We care deeply about our neighbors in need, especially the children,” added Gunjan.
“With Get Shift Done, we were looking for the right partner that could move and scale quickly. CFT helped us launch the initiative overnight,” said Anurag. He credits the experience working together on Get Shift Done as the catalyst for creating the Jain Foundation Fund in 2020, their donor-advised fund at CFT.
In addition to making grants from their fund at CFT to local organizations, they support international causes, with a focus in India. “CFT is a great partner in our international grantmaking, helping provide capacity in vetting organizations that are doing good work,” said Anurag. “We want to support organizations across the world. We have 17,000 employees in India, and many family members there. Everyone we know has been deeply impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, especially in India. Hunger needs have spiked significantly, and we knew we had to lean in during the crisis with increased giving. Our relationship with CFT goes a long way in achieving that. It’s what CFT brings to the table, not just for our community here in Dallas, but also internationally, in terms of advice and relationships that come out of that.”
Beyond supporting local and international hunger relief efforts, the Jains have helped fund the purchasing of life-saving equipment, including concentrators and ventilators, during the pandemic.
The Jains live by the tenet that most of what we have in life is meant for others, and they are looking forward to further leading by example and involving their two daughters in their philanthropy. “Our families were giving and taught us to give, and our children are growing up seeing and hearing us talk about giving,” said Gunjan.
This story was originally featured in our 2021 annual report. For additional details and content, click here.
