The Youth Parliament

The Youth Parliament (or "The YP Foundation") is a support organization for young people in India. It was established in July 2002 by social entrepreneur Ishita Chaudhry with support from the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. In 2007, The Youth Parliament was legally incorporated 'The YP Foundation'- a charitable trust working with the express mandate of developing innovative ventures by young minds, facilitating leadership skills and thinking power and increasing awareness on issues of global importance amongst young people. The YP is a not for profit, non political, support and learning organization, committed to developing the uninhibited expression of young people with the aim of sustaining a platform that enables young people to be effective and expressive agents of change.

The organization funds and supports innovative work by young people, by providing young people between the ages of 13 and 28 years with a resource base to conceptualize and execute their own projects and initiatives working with socio-cultural, economic, legal and environmental issues they are passionate about. It has supported work in multiple fields through varied mediums such as community initiatives, the performing and visual arts, literary and research projects, interactive workshops, policy and government interaction and research and advocacy work amongst others.

In 2006, The Youth Parliament was given the SMILE fellowship by NGO Pravah and was selected as a final affiliate for the Change Looms Award given by The Ashoka Foundation and Pravah. In November 2007 Founder and Managing Trustee Ishita Chaudhry was awarded the Karmaveer Puraskaar - the National Award for Social Justice and Action by ICONGO and the Nand and Jeet Khemka Foundation. In 2008, The YP Foundation has been awarded the Seen and Heard 2008 Award - an International UK based award given by British Telecom and The UK Youth Parliament to recognize exceptional initiatives that have created platforms for young people. Founder Ishita Chaudhry was also nominated for the MtvIndia Youth Icon in 2008.

In 2009, they held a film festival which showed many films from Afghanistan including, The Afghan Chronicles, 16 Days in Afghanistan, Afghan Star, Beyond Belief, and Beauty Academy of Kabul

The YP Foundation has supported ventures in the following fields:

• Education and development for young people in rural and urban India
• Issues and platforms for the performing arts, mainly film, photography, music and theatre.
• Substance abuse & the adolescent (India/South Asia focus)
• Gender and sexuality
• Disaster relief and rehabilitation (tsunami relief work/Kashmir earthquake relief work)
• Community initiatives for underprivileged families in New Delhi.
• The youth voter and India’s political system
• Media, its ethics and social responsibility
• Prevention and awareness/understanding the reality of HIV/AIDS
• Peer pressure and its medical/social consequences for urban young people
• Sexual reproductive health and rights awareness and advocacy
• The young citizen’s right to information and the legal system of India.