Delhi Students Installed a Pad Dispenser at Their School. Others May Be Next

Aadvik Jain, an 18-year-old from Delhi, India, is one of 198 young people from 44 countries honored with the 2026 Diana Award, announced at a virtual ceremony on Nov. 4. According to NPR, he was recognized for Team Period, a youth group he founded in 2024 to fight the stigma around menstruation and improve access to pads.²³

The Diana Award was set up in memory of Diana, Princess of Wales. It recognizes people aged 16 to 25 for social action and humanitarian work.² India accounted for nearly a quarter of this year’s recipients, with 49 honorees.²

How a school project became Team Period

Jain told NPR he started paying attention to menstrual health at 14, after a close friend had severe period pain that her parents did not take seriously. She was later diagnosed with PCOS, now referred to as PMOS, and doctors also looked into endometriosis.²

Team Period began as an entry in a school competition, through the Youth Power program at The Global Times, the student paper at Amity International School. The original team was four students, two boys and two girls. When the competition ended, Jain kept going.²

Most of what is known about the group comes from Jain’s own account in that NPR interview. In April 2025, Team Period staged a dance drama set during Durga Puja for an audience of more than 500 people. It has also held a flash mob at a mall and run menstrual-health games at a school carnival.²

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“Our goal is to end that shame, but we don’t want to do it by shaming the person herself,” Jain told NPR.²

What changed at his school

The team has gathered around 4,000 survey responses from students, parents and the wider community. After a campaign about red stains on school uniforms, many students said in a follow-up survey that they felt less shame about a visible period stain.²

The group also installed a sanitary pad dispenser at its school. It is talking with companies about supplying dispensers to other schools at nominal cost, and it is exploring a sealed-bag system for disposing of used pads.²

“We can’t change attitudes across all of India immediately, but we were able to change something in our school,” Jain said in the NPR interview.²

So far, the work has been concentrated in Delhi: government schools, orphanages, underserved neighborhoods, health camps and Jain’s own school. The team plans to start local chapters with volunteers who speak regional languages.²

No prize money, but a useful name

“The Diana Award doesn’t come with prize money,” Jain told NPR. He said the international recognition helps the group build credibility with potential sponsors and partners.²

Jain is set to begin studying medicine and public health at the University of Bologna in Italy in February.²

Other Indian honorees

NPR also highlighted several other Indian honorees. Shiv Mandlik designed a bendable pole for construction workers and a fall-detection app. Krish Aggarwal built a low-cost air filter that mounts on a fan. Kushal Sachdeva runs Protect Paws, which has reportedly helped more than 1,500 stray dogs.²