An organization without members is like a body without a soul. The registered and active members are the key persons who run the organization smoothly and effectively with its mission and vision. Along with that, all the organizations want to sustain and grow further with their membership in this competitive world. For that, an organization must develop its membership recruitment and retention plan and policy, implement and follow it continuously. The organizational activities and programs must be done based on these two things. In the changing environment, membership organizations also need to undergo digital transformation and create new ways to engage and interact with the next generation. In short, they need to stay relevant to truly succeed in today’s climate.

The youth play a vital role in society as well as in an organization. They are like the backbone of the country and its future. Participation of youth in an organization has many advantages for the youth themselves and the entire community. Of course, the most obvious advantage of membership is that youth organizations provide young people a forum to effectively deal with an issue related to youth.   Like other volunteer and youth organizations, the Bharat Scouts and Guides in India also give their incredible and spontaneous contributions to the youth of the nation.

Scouting in India aims to create better citizens, a better community, and a better India through providing youth a value-based and challenging youth program, through competent leaders, effective communication, optimum use of technology, and efficient management.  The Bharat Scouts and Guides in India focuses on the 360-degree development of youth in terms of spiritual, moral, social, cultural, mental, and physical by engaging them in various programs like- social services, awareness, fitness, training, adventure, spiritual, career counseling, skill development, etc. It works to engage the youth and their talent for individual and organizational growth through qualitative youth membership, their development, and retention which will greater impact worldwide. BSG-India is involved in many aspects of youth's lives and offers opportunities for leadership development and guidance for both education and careers. Being part of this organization, youth can gain leadership skills, interpersonal skills, the ability to think critically and solve problems, the assumption of personal and group responsibility, and a close-knit peer group and it sends a positive message to youth throughout the community. Involvement with this organization will allow the participant to add the network with other scouting persons in India and across the globe with their scouting practice, voluntary activities for the society, and also individual overall development.

The Scout Guide Movement is a voluntary non-political educational youth movement, open to all without distinction of gender, origin, race, or creed. Today this is the 6th largest leading Educational Youth Movement. India is the 5th highest youth populous county where around 1.3 billion people are under 25 years of age considered as a youth. Currently, India has 36 administrative States & UTs and in Scouting, there are 54 State Scout Associations spread over 3,287,590 square kilometers with a total membership of 3.6 million Scouts in over 108253 units. The population of Young People in India is 25,76,41,834. As of 2020, we have a current male youth population of around 25 Crores and our current Scout membership is 36 Lakhs in India. Still, we have a huge potential to reach 24.64 Crores untapped male youth. Looking for this potential opportunity and the organizational development, BSG Membership Growth Plan came into the picture. Though Bharat Scouts and Guides are one of the largest NSO in the World when we look at the penetration rate of Young People Vs Scouts is 1.8%. For any youth movement to be able to cascade down to the grassroots level needs a lot of resources and time.  Thus, this strategy helps Membership Growth in India reach out to many Young People in the country. While we plan for Membership Growth, we will also address the Review of the Youth Program, Training System and Communication, Partnership, Branding, and Governance of the Bharat Scouts and Guides. Based on the WOSM and BSG Vision & Secretary-General Mr. Ahmed's appeal and the dream of our Honorable President Dr. Anil Kumar Jain and Honorable Chief National Commissioner Dr. K. K. Khandelwal to reach 1 Crore census (i.e., 60 lakhs members for Scout Wing & 40 lakhs members for Guide Wing) by 2025, the Bharat Scouts and Guides aimed to expand the number of Youth in the organization.

The total population of the Young People in India 25,76,41,834 and the present Scout Membership is 35,81,332. BSG Market Share is 1:72. Still, there are over 254 million untapped available young people who need to be attracted to Scouting. Keeping in mind this huge potential, the technical team from WOSM with the Bharat Scouts and Guides sat together from 10 to 14 November 2019 at NHQ, BSG, and had planned National Membership Growth Strategy for the Bharat Scouts and Guides. It is a dynamic 5-years project plan with a clear vision supported by APR and funded by WOSM under Messenger of Peace. The development and implementation of a National Membership Growth Strategy for the Bharat Scouts and Guides began with a request through the WOSM Services platform to receive support. Under the guidance of WOSM and along with the expertise offered by a trained WOSM Services Consultant, the BSG India (National Scout Organization) was able to turn their National Growth Strategy from an administrative document into a collective call to action with buy-in from both leadership and Scouts. Recruitment, Retention, and Organizational Development are the three main essential components of a successful Membership Growth Action Plan which had been taken into consideration while preparing it. The BSG-Membership Growth Plan has a great vision to reach at 6 million (60 lakhs) Scout Wing membership census in the Bharat Scouts and Guides by 2025. Under this main project plan, there is a short-term plan to increase Scout Wing census to 50,000 in the coming 9 months which is supplementing the next target to increase Scout Wing census to 11 lakhs by 2023.

BSG-India has developed a clear, actionable strategy with achievable targets that could be measured. Initially, under this BSG-Membership Growth Plan, 8 states have been declared as the Focus States from all Six Regions based upon their high potentiality which will lead us to achieve our target and other states will continue to get adding every year. Those 8 Focus States are - Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu. Membership Growth Committee was formed to look after the growth management under the Chairmanship of Shri PGR Sindhia – Secretary-General, President in Council and SCC, Karnataka State. This committee of the BSG is responsible to implement, monitor, and evaluate the achievements of the BSG Membership Growth Strategic Plan. Taking into account that the BSG has embarked on a very comprehensive Membership Growth Project and needs continuous monitoring, direction, and prompt decisions to make the swift move, the Chief National Commissioner is pleased to form a Membership Growth Core Committee from amongst the members of the National Growth Committee under the Chairman of the Growth Committee to steer the work of the Membership Growth towards achieving the set target by 2025.

To achieve the milestone of the Membership Growth target of 4.5 million male youth by 2023 and 6 million male youth by 2025 in The Bharat Scouts and Guides-India, a well-organized and independent Membership Growth Cell established and three Growth Cell personnel appointed at the National Headquarters, New Delhi, India. This department is looking towards the objectives and actions to be taken based on the National Growth Strategy to achieve the target fixed for the years 2023 and 2025. The Membership Growth Cell at NHQ has to support and coordinate with all the States for the activities, programs, and training planned under Membership Growth in BSG. The BSG-India had developed a State Growth Strategy for all the states with the help of WOSM consultants and NHQ professionals and volunteers. Further one State Growth Coordinator got appointed in each state who is responsible for the implementation of the State Growth Strategy and coordination between the National Headquarters and the State Headquarters on membership growth-related matters. To strengthen the State Coordinators, BSG has conducted Six Webinars between 20 to 30 June 2020 on topics like- Composing Smart Objectives, Youth Programme, Engaging Communication, Good Governance Strong Organization, Adult in Scouting and Partnership for Growth with our State Growth Coordinators supported by the APR experts.

Based on the National Growth Strategy, one common template for State Growth Strategy was also developed and all the 54 States under BSG India have to implement their respective State Growth Strategy approved by the National Headquarters. Along with that, each state has been directed by the NHQ to appoint Growth Facilitators as per their state requirement and Local Coordinators at the Local/District level who will work together with their respective appointed State Growth Coordinator to achieve the state target and supplement the overall BSG census. The State Growth Facilitators and Local Coordinators have to look after the Membership Growth activities at the grassroots levels and help the State Growth Coordinator to implement the State Growth Strategy and District Growth Strategy. They are responsible for conducting the Beginners course (physically/virtually), introducing Scouting in local Schools/Colleges/Universities with the support of local coordinators, build-up new Cub/Scout/Rover leaders, support them to register their units, and follow-up on their smooth running of units.

Despite the challenges of the global health crisis, our Scouts and Guides are working to engage even more young people and volunteers in Scouting by establishing a clear and actionable growth strategy for NSO with the help of WOSM. During The covid-19 pandemic situation, the BSG has conducted so many virtual programs for the youth, virtual adult leaders training courses as a membership retention strategy. It has created many activity packs with innovative Scout Guide activities to engage young people and make them active and keep them moving. Sankalp, Udaan, Tide Turners Plastic Challenge, etc. are few instances. A special Course called Beginner Course for 4 hours was developed and implemented in the online platform to complete the Beginners course for any individual. The BSG-India has organized three virtual meetings of the BSG Membership Growth Core Committee dated 11 Dec 2020, 29 Jan 2021, and 25 Feb 2021 respectively. Along with that, we have conducted virtual meetings for 8 Focus States, 16 Railway States, and Region-wise states in March and April 2021. There was a physical training program was held from 23 to 25 March 2021 at NHQ, New Delhi for the State Growth Coordinators where 19 states had participated and got all the tactics on membership growth and retention from the WOSM consultants (both physically & virtually) and NHQ professionals. On 19 April 2021, BSG Membership Growth Committee virtual meeting was held where Dr. (Mrs.) Pankaj Mittal, National Commissioner (R) & Vice-Chairperson of Growth Committee chaired the meeting and the committee discussed the National Growth Strategy, the high potential membership in Rovering & Rangering from Universities, and supports from WOSM. Recently in May and June 2021, BSG Membership Growth Cell had organized One-on-One virtual meetings with 30 states on the submitted State Growth Strategy observations and current challenges and support required.

In terms of progress report, as per the short-term project action plans and target to conduct 100 Beginners Courses, 5000 new leaders, 2500 new units, and 50,000 new members by September 2021, the BSG-India already achieved more than the target set before the timeline. Under this Membership Growth Plan, additionally, 6550 new units opened and 133140 new youth joined this Scout-Guide Movement in India as of April 2021.

 “If everyone is growing and moving to forward together, then success takes care of itself.”