The India International Friendship Society (IIFS) is a prominent – though not the only – voluntary organisation seeking to strengthen the ties between India and the international Indian diaspora (Non-resident Indians and Persons of Indian Origin

Non-resident Indian and Person of Indian Origin

A Non-Resident Indian is an Indian citizen who has migrated to another country, a person of Indian origin who is born outside India, or a person of Indian origin who resides permanently outside India. Other terms with the same meaning are overseas Indian and expatriate Indian...

) in the hopes of utilising their potential for the benefit of the country, and at the same to build bridges of goodwill and amity between India and the rest of the world. This is done principally by organising events in India and abroad, well attended by personages of influence both in and outside the limelight, including the yearly Global Friendship Day banquet in London. A highlight of such events is usually the presentation of awards to persons, both in India and abroad, deemed to have made an outstanding contribution to the aims for which the Society stands; chief among these awards is the Glory of India Award (Hindi: Bhārat Gaurav Sammān) an Indian non-governmental diasporic award

Indian non-governmental diasporic awards

This article refers to awards presented to members of the Indian diaspora by non-governmental organisations.-Objectives and Private Enterprise:Persons of Indian origin residing outside India are an important factor not only for the Indian economy, but also for the international political...

. Prominent persons who have been awarded by the IIFS include:

• Dev Anand
  Dev Anand
  Dharam Dev Anand , better known as Dev Anand , is an Indian Hindi Cinema actor, director and film producer. Dev is the second of three brothers who were active in Hindi Cinema. His brothers are Chetan Anand and Vijay Anand. Their sister, Sheel Kanta Kapur, is the mother of renowned Hindi and...
  
  
• Prema Cariappa
  Prema Cariappa
  Iychettira Prema Cariappa, a politician from Indian National Congress party and a former Mayor of Bangalore, is an Ex. member of the Parliament of India and was representing Karnataka in the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament. She is also the chairperson of the Central Social...
  
  
• Navnit Dholakia
• Sunil Dutt
  Sunil Dutt
  Sunil Dutt , born Sunil Balraj Dutt, was an Indian Hindi movie actor , producer, director and politician. He was the cabinet minister for Youth Affairs and Sports in the Manmohan Singh government...
  
  
• Shamim Jairajpuri
  Shamim Jairajpuri
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• Basappa Danappa Jatti
  Basappa Danappa Jatti
  Basappa Danappa Jatti was born to Kannada Lingayat family at Savalgi, Bijapur district of Karnataka state. Jatti graduated as a lawyer from Sykes Law College, Kolhapur and became a pleader in Jamakhandi...
  
  
• Rajesh Khanna
  Rajesh Khanna
  Rajesh Khanna is an Indian actor of from Hindi films, and has been Hindi film producer and an Indian politician....
  
  
• Prem Chand Pandey
  Prem Chand Pandey
  Prem Chand Pandey is an Indian scientist and academic in the fields of Satellite Oceanography, Remote Sensing, Atmospheric Science, Antarctic and Climate Change.-Education and career:...
  
  
• Kamlesh Patel
• Amichand Rajbansi
  Amichand Rajbansi
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• Diljit Rana
• Dhirubhai Shah
  Dhirubhai shah
  Dhirubhai Shah was elected Speaker of the Tenth Gujarat Legislative Assembly on 19 March 1998. He was the youngest Speaker in the history of the Gujarat Legislative Assembly....
  
  
• Chaudhary Ishwar Singh
  Chaudhary Ishwar Singh
  Chaudhary Ishwar Singh was a leader of the Congress Party and served as the speaker of Haryana Vidhan Sabha from 1991-1996. He was elected an MLA from the Pundri constituency of Haryana four times.-Background:...
  
  
• Marsha Singh
  Marsha Singh
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• Ashok Sinha
  Ashok Sinha
  Ashok Sinha is a British environmental campaigner and commentator, best known for his involvement with the Jubilee Debt Campaign, for jointly founding Make Poverty History and leading the Stop Climate Chaos coalition....
  
  
• Nirmal Chandra Suri
  Nirmal Chandra Suri
  Nirmal Chandra Suri went on to become the Chief of Air Staff of the Indian Air Force on 1 August 1991. He is an alumnus of the famous Royal Indian Military College, Dehradun. He was a part of the First course of the Joint Services Wing, the present-day National Defence Academy, Pune...
  
  
• Harinder Takhar
  Harinder Takhar
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• Mother Teresa
  Mother Teresa
  Mother Teresa , born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu , was a Roman Catholic nun of Albanian ethnicity and Indian citizenship, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950...
  
  
• Pankaj Udhas
  Pankaj Udhas
  Pankaj Udhas is an Indian singer, credited in the Indian music industry, along with other musicians like Jagjit Singh and Talat Aziz, with bringing the style to the realm of popular music. Udhas rose to fame for singing in the film Naam , in which his song Chitthi Aayee Hai became an instant hit....
  
  
• Bharati Vaishampayan
• Sandip Verma
• Drukchen Jigme Pema Wangchen

Though a private organisation, the IIFS was founded and is managed by persons prominent in Indian public, business and military life, which bestows its activities prominence and the recipients of its honours prestige. Even overseas indian, the "Official e-zine of Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs

Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs

The Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs is part of the government of India. The ministry, as of May 2008, is headed by Vayalar Ravi.Its website states:...

", has explicitly remarked on the prestigiousness of the awards of the IIFFS.

Problems of depiction

This society operates as a networking organisation without a fixed public face. This is in keeping with various important organisations in India, but problematic when it comes to depicting its workings. As is common in Indian public life, authority and import are generated to a large part by the open and public association of prominent persons of public life with the organisation. This association is clearly evident from the documentation (pictures, letters etc.) on the IIFS websites and through the mention in various fora (e.g. newspapers, communiques of official and semi-official bodes etc.), but is in many respects intransparent for persons not conversant with Indian modi operandi.

Criticism

It is not surprising that, in keeping with the above, the IIFS has also been criticised for not drawing up and publishing clear guidelines for bestowing its awards. Furthermore, its award winning ceremonies are usually combined with a common banquet also attended by prominent persons of India or the respective country; participants are expected to pay for the banquet, the proceeds also going towards the funding of the awards themselves. This has drawn criticism too.

Another criticised aspect is that the IIFS also institutes awards for Indians within India for deeds seemingly not having to do with its self-defined aims.. Chief among these awards is the Rāṣṭrīya Gaurav (Rashtriya Gaurav, i.e. National Glory) Award. However, the fact that important state officials both past and present attend and preside at the award ceremonies relativises this criticism.