How a Philanthropist Turned Business Influence into a Global Movement for Widows

Key takeaways:

• The Loomba Foundation began in 1997 and has combined direct support for widows and their children with research, advocacy and global campaigning.

• A single fundraising event organised by Lord Loomba raised £250,000 and brought together the then Prince of Wales and four UK Prime Ministers.

• The Foundation’s campaign helped establish 23 June as International Widows’ Day, unanimously adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2010.

• Its work has evolved from scholarships for children of widows to livelihood programmes, research and international advocacy on widowhood.

When business networks become a philanthropic asset

Philanthropy is often discussed in terms of capital: how much money is given, where it goes and what it achieves. Lord Loomba’s story adds another dimension. For him, the networks, credibility and relationships built through business became resources that could be put to work for a cause that had received remarkably little attention.

Speaking to EdelGive Foundation CEO Ms. Naghma Mulla on Give It A Go, Loomba reflected on how his business success eventually gave him access to people and platforms that could help amplify social causes. “You’ve really leveraged everything that you’ve earned in business to do good,” Ms. Mulla observed during the conversation.

Lord Loomba’s response is embedded in the history of his philanthropy. He arrived in England in 1962 with $100, worked in an audit firm, sold ice cream from a van and later built a fashion and import-export business. His experience of starting with very little shaped a practical approach to both business and giving: identify an opportunity, take a calculated risk and bring people together around it.

That approach became particularly visible in his fundraising. In one of the examples he recounts, Lord Loomba was approached to contribute £50,000 towards an event celebrating India’s Golden Jubilee. Rather than simply writing a cheque, he decided to organise the event himself. He created a steering committee, approached influential contacts and sought the participation of the then Prince of Wales. The result was far beyond the original ambition: the event raised £250,000 and brought together the Prince of Wales and four UK Prime Ministers.

For Lord Loomba, the value of such events was not simply the money raised. They created visibility, credibility and a wider constituency for a cause.

“I have done huge events actually,” he told Ms. Mulla. “The event cost me about, say, £50,000, but I raised quarter of a million pound there. Isn’t that a good investment? Plus the awareness also.”

That is an important distinction for contemporary philanthropy. Fundraising infrastructure, convening power and access to influential decision-makers can themselves become philanthropic assets when they are deployed with purpose.

From personal experience to a focused philanthropic institution

The cause Lord Loomba eventually chose was deeply personal. His father died when he was a child, leaving his mother, Ms. Pushpa Wati Loomba, widowed at 37 with seven children. Loomba recalls watching her circumstances change after her husband’s death, including the social restrictions imposed on her. Yet she remained determined that her children would be educated.

In 1997, Lord Loomba and Lady Veena Loomba established the Loomba Foundation in her memory. Its first major programme focused on educating children of poor widows in India. The model was deliberately direct: support went into bank accounts opened for beneficiaries, without an intermediary taking the money. The Foundation initially aimed to support 100 children in each of India’s 29 states, a target it reached within seven years.

Over time, the focus expanded from children’s education to economic empowerment. Women received vocational training and sewing machines so that support could translate into a livelihood rather than remain a recurring handout. The Foundation says its programmes have supported more than 10,000 children in India and empowered tens of thousands of women through livelihood initiatives.

The distinction matters. Widowhood is not simply an issue of bereavement. UN Women estimates that more than 258 million women worldwide are widows, with nearly one in ten living in extreme poverty. Widows can also face loss of property, inheritance, pensions, credit and employment, alongside social stigma and harmful practices.

Taking a neglected issue to the global stage

Lord Loomba eventually recognised that programmes alone could not address the scale of the problem. In 2005, the Foundation launched International Widows’ Day at the House of Lords, choosing 23 June because it was the date Lord Loomba’s mother became a widow in 1954.

What followed was a five-year advocacy campaign. The Foundation worked across governments, civil society and international institutions, supported by research documenting the scale and consequences of widowhood. On 22 December 2010, the UN General Assembly unanimously adopted 23 June as International Widows’ Day. The first UN-recognised observance took place in 2011.

The Foundation’s research agenda has also helped move widowhood from a largely invisible social concern towards a development and rights issue. Its World Widows Report estimated 258 million widows globally and 585 million children, highlighting links between widowhood, poverty, violence, child labour and economic exclusion.

For philanthropy, there is a broader lesson here. Capital can fund a programme, but influence can help change the environment in which that programme operates. A well-connected philanthropist can convene unlikely partners, bring neglected issues into rooms where decisions are made and create public attention that individual projects cannot generate on their own.

That is the particular value of Lord Loomba’s approach: he did not treat his business success and philanthropic work as separate worlds. He used what one had given him — capital, confidence, relationships and access — to strengthen the other.

And in doing so, a cause that once received little public attention became the subject of an internationally recognised day, a body of research and a global conversation about the rights and dignity of widows.

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