At just six years old, Vandita Morarka boldly stood up in her classroom and declared, “I want to be a human rights lawyer”, words she barely understood at the time, yet they marked the beginning of a lifelong passion for justice that would extend far beyond courtroom battles. This childhood spark was nurtured through her exposure to thoughtful discussions at home and school, eventually flourishing in the vibrant, norm-challenging environment of Sophia College, Mumbai’s pioneering girls’ college.
In a conversation with The Logical Indian, Vandita shares, “I always knew that I wanted to work towards justice. How and what path has changed through my life.” As a teenager, she co-founded the Students for Social Reform Initiative with 120 volunteers, delivering after-school programs across the city and realizing her true calling lay in supporting communities with agency rather than mere service.
Roots of Justice
Vandita’s journey weaves through a rich journey of education and experiences, including law, development studies, and stints with the State Election Commission, Human Rights Law Network, political campaigns, and philanthropists. These roles exposed the limits of service-oriented work, pushing her toward justice as enabling people to claim what they deserve amid India’s judicial backlog of millions of pending cases. Sophia College played a pivotal role, teaching her to question entrenched beliefs and redefine justice not as charity, but as systemic equity rooted in Indian thought and action.
She says to The Logical Indian, “Justice is not just in courts, much more often outside,” highlighting how community work reshaped her from aspiring lawyer to social impact leader. International exposures, like the US racial justice program tracing the Great Migration and studies at Sussex’s Institute of Development Studies, later refined her advocacy tools without overshadowing her Indian foundations.
Founding One Future Collective
In December 2017, at just 23, Vandita launched One Future Collective (OFC) after gathering insights from 500 young Indians, assembling an initial team of 15 volunteers to tackle a pressing need: nurturing radical kindness to approach change from a place of honesty and loving care. . Born from reflections on fragmented social efforts, OFC’s core thesis emphasizes building communities that drive transformation independently of nonprofits, while creating institutions that can be held accountable to this transformation and support communities’ ability to sustain it. The organization’s infinity loop model delivers tangible impacts, including over 140+ fellows through the One Future Fellowship, legal aid for 1,000+ survivors via the FemJustice Helpline, and innovative programs like the Sanskaari Girls Book Club with 500+ members across 10+ chapters. Fun initiatives such as the Khoj city-wide treasure hunt, tracing Mumbai’s social justice history with cash prizes and a feminist afterparty with performances, make social justice conversations and activism approachable for new audiences.
Reflecting on OFC’s eight-year milestone, Vandita notes, “I’m told that after seven years, if you stick with it, then you really love it.” This endurance stems from her pre-OFC path of listening and adapting, fueling a deep commitment to radical change.
People-Institution Synergy
OFC masterfully balances grassroots empowerment with institutional reform through its signature infinity loop, equipping emerging leaders with awareness, capacity-building, and healing infrastructure like mental health and legal support, while collaborating with decision-makers in philanthropies and policy spaces. Vandita explains to The Logical Indian, “While we activate the ability of everyday people to take on change, we also work with people within influential institutions,” ensuring reforms in funding practices, internal equity, and leadership make space for change-makers.
Her legal background proves invaluable here, offering a sharp eye for systemic pressure points and pathways to embed lasting commitments via policies and written agreements, though she candidly admits its rigid rationality can sometimes clash with life’s messiness. This dual approach transforms institutions into just allies, amplifying people power in a reinforcing cycle.
Healing Amid Crises
OFC’s healing justice pillar emerged organically, most dramatically during COVID-19 when a 3 a.m. call from a distraught frontline volunteer, forced to triage hospital beds and oxygen, revealed the emotional toll on changemakers, prompting a rapid response that supported 25,000 people with therapy, psychiatry, group sessions, and peer counselor training.
This evolved into ongoing peer listening helplines and the Survivor Liberation Program, aiding 113 survivors of sexual and gender-based violence (including sex workers, queer/trans folks, and social workers) across Mumbai, Delhi, and Kolkata over four months. Integrated with core advocacy, these efforts underscore Vandita’s insight that no one can sustain change without emotional, legal, and physical safety, adapting fluidly as community needs shift from crisis response to deeper, slower healing.
Feminist Intergenerational Core
OFC defines itself as a feminist intergenerational nonprofit, applying praxis equally to processes and outcomes, ensuring programs accommodate neurodivergence, hold space for conflict, and represent served communities through proximate and survivor leadership, moving beyond age labels. Vandita elaborates, “To be feminist is to be feminist in both outcome and ways of working,” as seen in inclusive fellowships and cultural projects that blend resistance with joy. This ethos draws from team members sharing identities with those served, fostering authenticity while prioritizing political alignment and survivor voices for sustainable impact.
OFC has evolved from “youth-led” to “feminist intergenerational,” as team members often share survivor identities with those served, making burnout feel like a “luxury” amid shared struggles. This prioritizes “proximate leadership” and shared political beliefs alongside intergenerational exchange—nurturing young people’s unique challenges and styles, while ensuring leadership continues past age 30-35 through smooth role transitions.
Battling Burnout
Daily immersion in trauma, from sexual violence to societal inequities, sharpens Vandita’s empathy, often leading strangers like hotel staff to open up, but if unchecked, it has the potential to breed constant vigilance and trust issues, knowing statistics like one in three women facing harassment.
Burnout often manifests as resentment, such as impatience during survivor calls—for those working on trauma and justice themes, signaling the need for intervention. OFC combats this proactively: enforcing 8-hour workdays and weekends off, providing free therapy and psychiatry, generous leave, monthly well-being check-ins, annual team retreats, and a culture where staff can flag impending crashes amid funding pressures or crises, institutionalizing care as a daily practice.
Hope as Discipline
Challenging stereotypes, Vandita redefines activism not just as street protests or cynicism, but as “organizing around hope”, critiquing the world while vividly imagining and building its hopeful potential. She admits losing hope “three times a day,” quoting Rebecca Solnit that “hope is a discipline,” renewed by committed communities despite backlash like booing, death/rape threats, and unsolicited abuse that curtailed her social media presence. Yet, she engages the “movable middle” respectfully, turning resistance into stronger convictions and broader alliances.
The Future comes from Radical Kindness
Looking ahead three to five years, Vandita envisions OFC as a “political home” for emerging leaders, a nurturing space for work and wholeness, like returning home—while expanding fellowships, partnering with progressive institutions for accelerated change, and confronting polarization, misinformation, hatred, and apathy through unlikely allies in key areas.
She urges India’s changemakers to view their role as “an act of love,” practicing “courage, curiosity, compassion” with irreverence toward outdated authority. As a young founder, she credits sustained relevance to listening, adapting, and building supportive communities that banish isolation, ensuring lifelong commitment to justice.
The Logical Indian’s Perspective
Changemakers like Vandita Morarka who embody purpose through radical kindness and justice beyond courts—proving one person’s early dream can ignite communities, heal 25,000 lives, and redefine activism as hope-filled action. Her story aligns with our mission to amplify voices driving equitable, people-powered progress in India.
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