“Poorest India” Losing Out?!
I t was a month of festivals - Dusserah and Eid. It was also a month of fights – fight for enhancing Minimum support
Price for Paddy. Every body ‘wants’ it. Nobody ‘grants’ it. A news analyst confirms, if we grant it, the price of rice
crosses Rs.25 per kg. If we do not grant it, the price will be crossing Rs.40-50 as farmers get out of paddy. While all
this is going on, Andhra Pradesh announces Rs.2/kg rice through PDS for 18 Million card holders. It may needs about
of Rs.15000 million/year. The state reiterates ‘interest subsidy’ for all the loans to SHGs (Rs.1 lakh crore). This urden
is Rs.90000 million/year. India announced universalisation of NREGS in the country in all 620+ districts. It means a
whopping Rs.1.5 lakh crore/year. Manmohan Singh announced at Red Fort this year to all poor elders above 65
years to get a pension of Rs.400 per month. Tbhis would mean at least Rs.20000 crore/year. While it may take 3-4
years to reach these figures, the questions that arises are – Does Government have the money? Will these schemes
last long?
I was going through the website of Indian School of Business. One calculation shown struck me. The opportunity cost
of the MBA student from a premier institute at the entry level is just Rs.5000/day, equal to 62 times the wage
‘employment guarantee’ promises. Any senior employee of a retail chain earns any thing between Rs. 1-2 crores per
year. How can the livelihoods sector attract the best brains to work for them? Now Mukesh Ambani becomes, thanks
to the zooming share prices, the richest man in the world with more than Rs.2.5 lakh crores – this can feed the entire
poor of India for one year. In fact, richest 1000 Indians can feed all poor for their entire life time! This confirms our
worst fears – the number of poor in the country may be coming down, but the disparity between the rich and the poor
is increasing and increasing sharply!
A dedicated and active community leader in Mahabubnagar, as part of the policy of rotation, had to retire and
handover the leadership to new person. After that she has withdrawn. This is not an isolated case. How do we ensure
the tribe of active and dedicated community leaders continue to grow and be the resource persons to the community?
With the Peace prize, discussions on climate change and its impact on the livelihoods of the poor might gain pace
and find room in larger forums. Adaptation of the poor to the climate change is being talked. Global view of climate
changes and their impact are being discussed. Local view of their impact on communities and individuals, particularly
poor, has to be discussed. Different communities face different impacts and they adapt and succumb differently. Will
these be appreciated? Will the poor find their voice heard? This means the poor and the people who work with the
poor have to work on livelihoods strategies locally that integrate these climate change aspects, in a manner the poor
get immediate, continuous and long-term gains. Surely, others also have to invest in the processes of mitigating and
the infrastructures for coping with climate changes.
Recently in July 2007, the World Bank has approved additional financing for AP Rural Poverty Reduction Project to
the tune of US$ 80 Million (Rs.350 Crore). The evaluation of the Velugu/ Indira Kranthi Patham (as per the World
Bank Report in March 2007) says that incomes increased for close to 90 percent of poor rural households, including
around 8 million poor women in rural areas organized into 629,870 self-help groups and 28,282 village organizations;
per capita income increased by three-folds (this would mean most of them graduated out of poverty!); in Andhra
Pradesh. 6 million households could access credit; the increase in credit flow to poor is 20 times now, compared to
seven years ago; women, in their households, are bigger economic contributors than the men; more than 1.2 million
rural poor have death and disability insurance coverage; Some 20,600 young people were trained and offered
placement in the service and construction sectors through partnerships with private companies.
All these too good to be true results could be achieved with Rs.1200 Crore (about Rs.1500 per household) from
World Bank, as this leveraged about only Rs.15000 of cumulative investments per household in loans from
commercial financial institutions. Inspired by its success in AP, the project is being replicated in more states in India
including Bihar and outside India including China. In view of this, all of us can learn a lot from this project. We need to
appreciate its nuances, processes and results in their entirety from both bird’s view and worm’s view, preferably from
all its key stakeholders – people, staff, civil society, banks, PRIs and other concerned citizens, through an
independent assessment or otherwise.
These ‘results’ coupled with funding trends – funds move away from South India to North India, more funds available
for disasters but not for chronic poverty reduction, funding not available for human resource costs, rupee
appreciation, and venture capital in place of charity – may reduce the development funding dramatically to AP. Has
AP really reached that stage and can it cope with this dearth of funds?
At the same time, as the issue of funds is seemingly addressed by the self-help movement and micro-finance growth
effectively, two issues crop up – 1. What are the ideas to which these funds accessed are being put? 2. What are the
uses of the surpluses from micro-finance operations by the MFIs and banks? We need to explore.
Finally, as DFID points out that there are three distinct Indias - The Global India, which is the modern face of India as
a global power, and plays an important role in international affairs; Developing India, where people live on low
incomes close to or below the poverty line and access to basic services are limited; Poorest India, where the great
majority of people are living in extreme poverty, mostly migrant urban slum dwellers, marginal farmers and excluded
groups facing discrimination. How do we ensure that the Poorest India does not get lost? This is the question that is
engaging any responsible concerned citizen of India.
*Information till Nov-2007
Economic and Social Climate Change
From the month of festivals to the month of lights and darkness. The fight for enhancing Minimum Support Prices for
various produce including Paddy continued. Manmohan Singh yields a bit and offers to enhance the bonus from
Rs.50 to Rs.100 per quintal.
After the Nobel Peace prize started drawing attention to climate change and its impact on the livelihoods of the poor,
Human Development Report 2007/08 launched in November 2007 has also focused on Fighting Climate Change:
Human Solidarity in a Divided World. The report argues that there are already observable signs of threat to human
development, mainly among the poorest and most vulnerable populations. It calls for our acting together now to
protect the planet we all share. Major areas that get seriously affected by the climate change include agricultural
production and food security, water stress and water insecurity, rising sea levels and exposure to climate disasters,
declining health, collapsing ecosystems etc.
The projections for 2080 include, if we do not act, 600 million people affected by malnutrition, additional 1.8 billion
people living in water scarce environment, 330 million people displaced through flooding, large number of the poor
affected by killer diseases, including 400 million exposed to malaria, etc. The report argues for putting the climate
change adaptation at the centre of partnerships for poverty reduction everywhere. This would mean enabling
vulnerable people to adapt to climate change by building resilience through investments in social protection, health,
education and other measures; integrating adaptation into poverty reduction
strategies that address vulnerabilities linked to inequalities based on wealth, gender, location and other markers for
disadvantage, shifting the locus of support from projects to programme-based financing etc.
In addition to ecological climate changes, the economic and social climate changes have significant impact on the
people, poorest in particular. The following trends, among others, have mixed impacts on the poor:
Government is withdrawing from social sectors but growing into a large development organization for administering
schemes and mobilizing poor and women.
Government Projects, CSR Foundations, Large NGOs, CBOs etc., are edging out ‘small’ CSOs.
Declining charity, money going to Foundations/Trusts and venture capital mechanisms are gaining currency.
We are certainly on the path towards complete Globalisation and Liberalisation.
There is a huge Human Resource Gap in servicing poor.
We see booming retail, shining ICT, zooming real estate, new opportunities in the service sector, growing ‘urban’,
and SEZs on one hand, dying traditional occupations, greying population, reluctant youth to take up ‘hard’ livelihoods
options, evolving new divides, acute un/ underemployment and reduced food, assets, skills, livelihoods and life
security on the other. These trends have significantly higher impact on the poor vis-à-vis non-poor. The impact
multiplies in the case of the poor with triple and quadruple burdens (like a dalit poor woman, disabled tribal etc.).
Small livelihoods are getting ignored/lost in the process. Known coping mechanisms are not effective. The impact
increases with the absence of the security cover, as is the case with the poor. The security that comes from multiple
livelihoods deteriorates. The dynamics of livelihoods are too dynamic for the poor to realign with. The poor are
impacted more with the spurts in expenditures and exposure to idiosyncratic and covariant collective risks than the
fall in incomes. Urbanisation is fuelled by both push and pull migrations. These cause and push the urban not-sopoor
into poverty. The impact is, sometimes, intergenerational (like malnutrition). Poor have become victims of lack of
ideas for ‘realigning livelihoods’ to new realities. In the process of experimentation, they are getting into serious debttraps, some times resulting in suicides. A sort of dependency is getting created and they are not able to visualise a
way of not looking towards ‘state’ for support.
These impacts and vulnerabilities need investments to address them. However, we are increasingly expecting the
poor to invest rather than the people who in the first place generated these changes that have such adverse impacts.
Further, the only important element in the solution is solidarity, collective action and ownership of demand and supply
within the Gandhian dictum – enough for everyone’s need. There are costs in coming together, to be made available.
We need to work with them. Will we do this? But we MUST.
The poor owe their competitive edge to the diversity in their livelihoods. We need to protect this diversity. They need
metafishing/metaskills – the skills to identify the gaps and opportunities, and acquire the skills/capitals to tap them. As
a paradigm shift, we need to move from poverty reduction to prosperity of the poor. This would mean working with
notso- poor and non-poor on one hand and bestowing special attention on the marginalized and the poorest. As the
access to finance is improving, various needs of the poor have to be met on differential terms and ideas to be found
to invest the new found access to finances.
Still support will be required in ensuring rightful endowments, entitlements, rights, access etc. Further, the need is to
develop businesses for poor and by poor individually and collectively. We need to attempt both the incremental shifts
and steep shifts, as we do the oases and scalable/replicable models. We need intensive research into typically
poordominant livelihoods (including dry land agriculture) and food, employment and livelihoods security,
risks/fluctuations and institutions and the processes therein. Of course, there is also a need to collate, analyse (micromacro), and disseminate the best practices for people’s informed choices.
We need to develop livelihoods generalists at the interface with people. One major fear that is troubling all of us is
whether all this would end as a ‘rhetoric’ Sustainable livelihoods [a la a decade-ago PRA!]. We hope, no other go,
that all of us concerned for the better world and poor, go beyond the ‘rhetoric’ and make a difference! 
*Information till Dec-2007
CHANGING times...
Computerization and Iris tracking of ration cards in AP identifies about 1 million duplicate cards. ‘Pavala Vaddi’ is
extended to weavers as the opposition promises Re.0.10 paisa interest. When we all remember that Congress
Working Committee resolved in favor of small states some five years ago, the people who matter do not seem to
remember any such thing. As I write this, I hear that we are going to have a release of Citizen’s Report on the
progress of India towards Millennium Development Goals in India. One can easily guess – it is a mixed bag. Forbes
has released a global list of 50 MFIs, bringing out the importance of micro-finance on the people. We hear that steps
are being taken to form a national consortium of state-supported poverty reduction agencies/ projects, may be like
Rajiv Gandhi National Urban Renewal Mission.
Alternative Economic Survey India 2006-7 sums up the Indian Economic Situation – In the last 5 years, 60% of the
population has lost 4% of the GDP; 1% has gained 13.5%. Better-off sections are caught up in the grip of
consumerism. This threatens resource allocations for meeting basic needs of the people. Our daily per capita poverty
line is fixed sadly at a mere Rs.12 which can not even guarantee the calorie intake required for the poor. As against
this, the world talks of US$2. At least 60% of India is then have to be reckoned as poor. Traditional Livelihoods,
including Agriculture, that meet the basic needs of the people, have caught up in acute poverty phenomenon.
Incomes are inadequate. Agriculture is characterised by growth slower than the population growth. Its GDP share has
fallen to less than 25%. Reduced returns, increased input costs, cheap imports, continued subsidies in western
countries have made Indian agriculture less competitive.
The pace of life has increased manifold. A farmer from Netherlands has summed this up very succinctly – my
grandfather was taking decisions every year; my father every month; and now I take every week and more often.
Unless the unorganized small farmers and poor get organized and command at least 10-15% of the market of the
produce/service they produce/provide and sell, they will not be in a position to realise their legitimate share % of
consumer rupee. This can be enhanced with ownership on/ access to better market intelligence, holding capacity in
terms of infrastructure and financial ability, seed production and seeds and inputs and involvement in value-addition.
Organic production, reduction in marketing costs with logical logistics and production for local consumption, and risk
covers will add to this increase in % share. Capital infusion needs to be enhanced substantially from the present 2%
of GDP. More importantly, the farmers need to acquire meta skills to see gaps and opportunities and find ways and
means to utilize them. They also need to take decisions more frequently and strategically. Collectives, solidarity,
collectivisation, collective action and ownership of demand and supply pave this.
All this is true for other traditional livelihoods as well. At the same time, the farmers need to diversify first within
crops, within the farming system, beyond farming and nonfarm products and services. They need to get into the
business of offering the products and services the neomiddle class and upper class want, without foregoing their grip
on their existing farming. The country has to facilitate skilling in a variety of these vocations/trades, may be 10000
such trades. Developed countries talk of more than 3000 of them. For a country like India with high diversity and large
population, this should be substantially higher. But there are costs to achieve all the above. These have to be
made possible and available. We need to work with them. Will we do this? But we MUST.
When NT Rama Rao, who stormed AP politics 25 years ago, came up with smaller blocks, called mandals, it was
heralded as a step towards bringing the government nearer to people. A mandal has 25-30 Gram Panchayats. He,
however, stopped short. The next major administrative unit is a district. A typical district in AP has 50-60 mandals.
This is undoubtedly large. A smaller state like Tamil Nadu has 50% more districts. Many districts are like small states.
Typically a district officer should be able to visit the remotest village in the district and come back in half a day.
Therefore, AP should go in for at least 50-55 districts forthwith. This will improve the efficiency of the administration.
This will make the Government accessible to the people.
When the USA with less than 40 crore population has 50 states, with an average population of less than a crore,
India should think of 100 states/union territories. This process should be expedited. This will help the prosperity of the
area and the country. Planning processes will also become more straightforward. As and when local population
aspires for a separate state, India should grant such status on that area. The loss and the expenditure that is being
incurred by the people in the name of Telangana are huge. By granting it forthwith, this expenditure/loss can be
curtailed forthwith.
This will also pave way for building second-tier and third-tier towns and cities in the country. Along with these, if we
can achieve improved facilities in rural areas, growth in the country becomes truly inclusive. Still we need to
move into prosperity of the poor paradigm. This would mean poor, not-so-poor and non-poor working together on
one hand; this would mean special attention on the marginalized and the poorest; this would mean meeting various
needs of the poor on differential terms; and this would mean finding ideas to invest the new found access to finances
in required lots. Finally, we need to redirect all our energies in building and supporting businesses for poor
and by poor individually and collectively. For this to happen, we need to develop livelihoods generalists at the
interface with people, in terms of professionals and paraprofessionals to be the staff of CBOs and Support
organisations and build their capacities. We, concerned for the better world and poor, go forward and make a
difference! 
*Information till Jan-2008




Development Priorities!
January presents an interesting mix of events – English New Year, Pongal harvesting festival, Republic day and
Gandhi’s death anniversary. For the record, it is sixty years since Gandhi was assassinated.
As I write this, the steps to start the YES (Youth Empowerment Summit) Academy at Hyderabad, in collaboration with
Government of AP are underway. The Academy is expected to start this year. NDTV and CNN-IBN have announced
Indians of the Year in various categories. Some of these include Abul Kalam as Inspiration Leader, Manmohan Singh
as the Leader, Chidambaram as the Politician etc. Sridharan of Delhi Metro is the CNN-IBN Indian of the year,
representing discipline and values, integrity and technology savviness. Indian Soldier is the NDTV Indian of the year,
representing the deep inside of Indian heart. RK Laxman receives the Life Time Achievement from CNN-IBN, for his
sixty years of creation of ‘common man’. Our Narayan Murthy receives the highest civilian honour of France
Just before Pongal, we have visited Papikondalu (stayed at a village Kolluru, a border habitation in Khammam
district; incidentally, this borders East Godavari and West Godavari districts), expected to be drowned in the
upcoming Polavaram reservoir. The locals think it will take another 6-7 years. When it gets completed, it will take
water from Godavari River to Krishna River. And the Krishna water will flow downwards to Rayalaseema. It is also
displacing 2,00,000 tribals from the reservoir bed. The compensation is Rs.1.0 lakh for a hut, and Rs.1.5 lakh for a
pucca house. There are fishermen who have been depending on the Godavari for fish. They are not getting
compensated for the loss of livelihoods. Further the tribals are losing lot of their common resources, social resources,
familiar terrain and confidence etc. We have no idea how this loss can be compensated. The principle of rehabilitation
calls for providing irrigated fertile land on the other side of the reservoir. This is not happening. It is talked that
Bhadrachalam Rama, one of the principal deities, is going to be drowned. Do we need all this? Is Medha Patkar
wrong in Naramda’s case then? And why is this hurry?
We hear the cases of not finding cremation/ burial grounds where they have gone for rehabilitation. We hear
becoming ‘insecure’ and ‘new poor’ out of sync with the ‘new world’ they are placed in without adequate resources. In
anticipation of the disappearance of Papikondalu, there is a huge tourist turnout. At least 2000 people via
Bhadrachalam and a similar number from Rajahmundry are making quick visits. The tourist rush is high during the
weekends and holidays. On a typical tourist rush day, the tourists contribute more than Rs. 50.0 lakh a day to local
economy. At least 1000 persons are able to have decent livelihoods with decent earnings. However, unfortunately,
some of them are child labourers.
Participation in the discussion on the pilot for youth entrepreneurship in Greater Hyderabad slum areas has let off a
‘brain-storming’ within me and my team. When 50% of the active population of the country is youth, our energies
have to get directed more in this direction. All the poor youth in a slum have diverse employment or job needs. Some
are cut out for taking up production on instructions; some are cut out to be entrepreneurs; some are struggling in
becoming self-employed and building up a micro-enterprise; some are capable of highly skilled technical work; some
are good at relationships; some are valuable service providers; some need security and some can tolerate
uncertainty; some are focussed inside and some can be community leaders; some have a need to remain anchored
in the location, some can relocate and some like mobility etc. In this context, the pilot management has to zero on a
location, understand the current reality using LEAP processes in terms of its social and resource mapping, livelihoods
mapping and opportunities mapping for individuals, families and the community groups etc. This may take a solid
month of intense, deep and long interactions individually, severally and collectively in a variety of time slots.
These interactions, coupled with screening behavioural competencies, will throw up youth who are communitycentred
and who are enterprise centred, in addition to job seekers around the opportunities. These job seekers need to be
attached to the livelihoods skill providers and placed in the jobs. There are others who need to be provided vocational
training and linked to government, foundations and banks for grants and loans for self-employment. The enterprise
centred, particularly the struggling ones, need to be picked up for entrepreneurial mentoring and support in building
micro-enterprises. The community centred youth can be picked up for leadership mentoring and support. Gradually,
they can also be imparted enterprise management skills and offered support. An indicative breakup of these four
types may be 40%, 40%, 15%, 5%. It is possible that youth in category 1 and 2 can be absorbed by category 3 and 4
when the micro-enterprises and collective enterprises grow. It is also to be noted that some are educated well and
some are drop outs. In due course, some of these micro-business leaders and community leaders take the process to
other slums and expand.
Can some of us take this forward?
Further, we know if poor do not get organized and command significant bulk in supply of products and services or in
buying their needs, they will not be in a position to realize remunerative and legitimate share in the growth. More
importantly, the poor need to acquire meta skills to see gaps and opportunities on their own and find ways and means
to utilise them. Collectives, solidarity, collectivisation, collective action and ownership of demand and supply support
them in this. At the same time, the poor need to diversify into the businesses of offering the products and services the
neomiddle class and upper class want, without foregoing their grip on their existing livelihoods portfolio. For this, the
skilling in a variety of these vocations/trades, may be 10000 such trades, needs to be facilitated. Ten Technologies
that offer promise in 2008, a write-up suggests, include Grid computing (that may reduce hardware costs),
photovoltaics (that promises increased solar electricity), software as a service (that requires us to pay as per the use
rather than the licence fee), mobile-enabled solutions, mobile entertainment, radio and television, cyber crimes, ‘open
source’ software, biometrics, computer viruses, and flash memory.
The technology-business trends in managing relationships - co-creation that allows outsourcing innovation to partners
in the value-chain (as in Linux Operating System), using consumers as innovators (as in encyclopedia Wikipedia),
outsourcing to top talent (wherever it is, calls for talent management, talent aggregation and redefining tasks) and
freelancing, and value from interactions; in managing capital and assets – expanding automation frontiers, and
unbundling production from supply chain/delivery both on supply and demand side; in leveraging information in new
ways - more science and technology into management, and business from information – coupled with the above
promising technologies offer insights into opportunities for enterprising entrepreneurs and smart professionals in
which direction they have to move and acquire new knowledge and skills. According to a study conducted by KPMG
and The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE), entrepreneurs are finding it hard to earn skilled workforce for their business even
though they have identified the growth trends and building enterprises around these trends, including globalization.
Can we step up building new workforce around these trends, reorient the existing work force? Can we build
microentrepreneurs around these trends? Can we take the poor into these trends (knowing fully well, if not they will
continue to remain in the margins)?
How do we build leaders in this pursuit? When we know for sure that there are no sure steps for building them and
there are no sure steps that a leader can follow in leading. Gathering appropriate information, evaluating it
thoughtfully, and making choices that provide the best chance for success, all the while recognizing the fundamental
nature of uncertainty of outcomes is the crux of leadership. These choices (complex decisions) made without any
guarantee of success, are ultimately the main contribution of the leadership. If a set of steps that could guarantee
success did exist, and if greatness were indeed simply a matter of will, then the value of clear thinking in would be
lower, not greater.
Helen Fischer at World Economic Forum this month has articulated so well about the need for bright men and women
to work together in families, businesses, communities and governance. Because they complement each other so
well. One is long-term oriented and the other is focused on the task; one is sensitive and the other is analytical; one
considers all angles and the other offers the eagle’s eye; and so on. A perfect case for gender balance is everywhere
from SHGs to Parliaments! In this context of indicative trends, uncertainties, and need for a better world for every
one, we have to go forward and make a difference! 
*Information till Feb-2008
Engineered Livelihoods Contexts!

February has many significant dates this time around. Valentine’s day – 14 February; AP Budget –16 February;
Laloo’s Rail Budget – 26 February; Chidambaram’s Union Budget – 29 February. 93-year tireless social worker and
Gandhian, Baba Amte expired on 9th February. He will continue to inspire us! By the time we go to e-print, we will
also see Women’s Day – 8 March.
As I write this, I have piled up more than 5 weeks of 70 hours each in a row. 29 February was a bonus as we are in a
leap year. Starting with the launch workshop for developing Management Information System for various players in
the Cotton Textile Supply Chain, it was a marathon. Towards zero-waste at Pochampally. Satisficing yet grueling 15
days for inducting in program planning and evolving an exciting plan for a decile of India. Spending time at length with
a development professional discussing agenda in the livelihoods domain and loading livelihoods agenda onto MF.
Discussing the way forward about Pochampally Ikkat Cluster. Discussing MIS for MF and MIS and ICT with two
professionals visiting from Africa (Gambia, Senegal) separately. Preparing A Score of Existence – Context, Path and
Work, as reflections of a development worker. Looking at and considering some long-term partnerships. Livelihoods
Orientation Campaign. Thinking about Livelihoods Yatra. Days were packed. They were rewarding.
The compelling Vision 2013 that emerged for HelpAge Programs ‘HelpAge India develops, demonstrates and uses
expertise, experience and resources to animate the stakeholders including older persons to fulfill the needs of 10
million disadvantaged older persons, comprehensively, across the country. Of these, 200,000 would be covered
directly, and 800,000 indirectly through partners; During this process, HelpAge India transforms itself into a
predominantly rights-based organization, organizes elders and builds movement(s) to demand and exercise their
rights and entitlements.’ has excited both the teams – HelpAge and Akshara. Starting blindfolded and placing a flower
in September to the six-monthly plan for transformation and taking back a fruit in February, it was a journey of
challenge, excitement, wonder, life, learning, leadership, legacy and love.
Even as development workers we hurt the poor. We hurt them badly. It has been reinforced once again when we
subjected ourselves to the ways we subject the poor and marginalized.
Solidarity, advocacy and collectivisation seems to the mantra for the
poor and marginalized – be it women, be it tribals, be it dalits, be it
disabled, be it aged, be it farmers, be it weavers, be it garment
workers, be it sanitation workers or be it livelihoods workers
themselves. The MIS exercises, the discussions on aged and the
discussions with weavers endorse this.
Budgets make an interesting read as we started to see through
livelihoods lenses. First come first. AP Budget. As expected, a true
election budget. It talked of a growth rate in GDP beyond 10%. It is
interesting to note that more than 40% of the state GDP of 2007-8 is
the budget for the year 2008-9. It is more interesting to note that
less than 70% of the previous budget actually got used. The trend is
likely to continue this year. Budget estimates exceeded thousand
billion rupees. It is the second largest state budget in the country behind UP. The major income source is vat tax
amounting to a quarter. About 10% comes from land sales. Major allocations, apart from irrigation and Indiramma
housing, and salaries, have gone for rural and urban development, Rs.2 a kg rice (and dal and oil), rural roads,
pensions, pavala vaddi (o.25% interest) support, education institutions, ambulance and treatment (Rajiv Arogya Sri)
etc. The emphasis is on giving directly to the citizen rather investing in sustainable solutions to the problems of the
poor.
Largest Rail Budget. Turnover of Rs.81,901 crores and Rs.37,500 crores is the plan. Last year, the return on capital
was 21% with an operating ratio of 76%. Senior citizen concession enhanced to 50% (women). Token reduction in
passenger fares and freight rates. Important agenda announced include: One time exercise of appointing Railway
Porters as gang-men and to other Group D posts. Vision 2025 - roadmap for coming 17 years. IT Vision 2012 – IT
applications on a common platform. Public-Private Partnerships for attracting an investment of Rs.1,00,000 crore
over the next five years. Commercial use of Railway land. Passenger-friendly and cost-effective and noninflationary
budget from Laloo, as usual.
Largest Union Budget. GDP has risen at 8.7% with drivers being ‘services’ (10.7%) and ‘manufacturing’ (9.4%) with
inflation under 5%. 55% of GDP is services. It is interesting to note that Union Budget is about 25% of India’s GDP.
This coupled with States’ Budgets, we might have 50% of the GDP in Budgets. The size of the budget is Rs. 7500
billion (or Rs.7.5 lakh Crores). Of this 32% is planned and the balance is non-plan. The unspent amount in Union
Budgets is in the range of 7-8% only. The Government has launched Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (Rs.25,000 crore)
and National Food Security Mission (Rs.4,882 crore) in Eleventh Five-year Plan.
As is the need, the Union Budget focussed on the basic needs through Bharat Nirman – drinking water, roads,
housing etc. Education, particularly literacy, universal primary education (Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan), Mid-day Meals,
model schools, etc., have received attention. A portion of the funds also went for higher education – IIMs, IITs, central
universities etc. National Rural Health Mission got a major share of Health Budget. Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana
initiated on a pilot basis. A National Programme for the Elderly to start two National Institutes of Ageing, eight regional
centres, and a department for geriatric medical care in one medical college/tertiary level hospital in each State, is
planned. Bima Yojanas – Janashree through SHGs and Aam Admi are pursued. Gender Budgeting has been scaled
up. A massive Skill Development Mission through a non-profit corporation is proposed.
The major election agenda include roll-out of National Rural Employment Guarantee to all 596 rural districts,
Rs.60000 crore loan waiver to farmers and of course, change in the income tax rate slabs, guaranteeing Rs.4000
savings at Rs.1.5 lakh income and Rs.44000 at Rs.5.0 lakh. The small mercy to service providers is increasing the
threshold limit of exemption to Rs.10 lakh per year. These may not benefit the deserving, as the NREG could provide
only 40 days in its best implemented state, AP, as against 100 days/year; most farmers including small and marginal
farmers are more burdened with informal credit and non-agriculture loans, 2-hectare limit benefits the rich in irrigated
areas and does not provide for all the poor in dryland areas, etc., middle-class benefits from the tax proposals a year
later, not now. Therefore, I doubt whether they bring more votes.
I do hope some high ways also got some
budgetary support for their completion soon.
Otherwise, a progressive budget with focus and
emphasis on right drivers. It is amply clear now, if
poor do not get organized and command
significant bulk in supply of products and services
or in buying their needs, they will not be in a
position to realise remunerative and legitimate
share in this impressive growth trajectory. More
importantly, the poor need to acquire meta skills
to see gaps and opportunities on their own, on a
constant basis, and find ways and means to
utilise them. Otherwise, they will not be able to
compete with the rich entrepreneurs with large
financial muscle and huge clout. When we are
talking to Pochampally weavers, it is clear that they need to collectivise to survive on the Ikkat tie and dye.
They need to develop intricate designs that can not be imitated easily. They also need to seek reservation of a
category of weaving products for them, like sarees. A new handloom park that is coming up in the vicinity with 2000
looms, with weavers (existing or new) employed will take away the complacence of the weavers. They need to lose
their self-employed status and be a job holder in the park or have a slow death. The third alternative is to collectivise.
The skill development mission, I presume, will facilitate the poor to diversify into the businesses of offering the
products and services the neo-middle class and upper class want, through skilling them in a variety of these
vocations/trades, may be 10000 such trades.
We keep hearing about growing MFIs and increasing availability of bank linkages. Chidambaram mentioned that
some 30 lakh SHGs are linked to banks. Another similar number might be on their way to get linked in the coming
couple of years. May be sooner than that. Most people have now access to more than one formal loan and matching
informal loans. What they are all and we are all struggling with is how do we use this access to money for investing
on ideas that can give the poor remunerative returns. When Vikash from Benguluru came to see how livelihoods
thinking can be loaded on to the micro-finance vehicle (Grameen model), it immediately appealed to us. We need to
sit and think through on how we do it, without compromising the fundamental principles of participation and decisionmaking by the persons whose livelihoods are being discussed.
Around the same time, SHG-Federations with corpus and own funds, are discussing with us how they can take up
significant livelihoods activities. We need to put time, energies, thoughts and have consultations in this direction. 8
March 2008 is another women’s day that reminds us that gender equity is still a long way in the absence of free
mobility and gender norms. Gender balance in decision making and access to resources is still limited. How do we
integrate gender aspects in the livelihoods agenda where micro-finance works through mostly women? All this brings
back to the issue of increasing the availability of livelihoods workers at various levels. Can we augment them? And
how? How quickly? This is troubling me. Hope we emerge out surely from this cess pool and go on to make a
difference! *Information till Mar-2008
Oppression of Our Times!
Happy Ugadi – New Year.
March symbolizes Spring and ushering in new flowering. In addition to the workshop for fine-tuning MIS
Management Information System) for various players in the Cotton Textile Supply Chain, a series of hops from one
consultation workshop to the other have marked the month that went by. All this have taught us to spend more time
on ‘new ideas’ to build arguments in favour of the poor, articulate the arguments logically, learn from the piloting of
these ideas, and finally disseminate in a variety of forms that appeals to the minds that ‘receive’.
While we have more than 80% of India oppressed broadly, some have felt multiple oppressions and some have
faced generations of oppression.
These
include
disabled poor, vulnerable women,
tribals,
dalits,
traditional service providers, artisanal
poor, bonded labor
etc. Some have acquired enough
escape velocity to
get out of the clutches of oppression
successfully. Some
others are struggling to escape out.
Many more are still
languishing. The issue is how we
could facilitate them
to have decent portfolio of livelihoods
that offers them
remunerative enough income with less
risks.
Related issue is how we could reduce
their
expenditure
without compromising the quality of
life.
The
most
important thing is how they could live
dignified lives with
confidence and selfrespect. Their
oppression and their
vulnerabilities have made them strong
in certain aspects of
life. These can be leveraged, without
compromise
and
loss of dignity. Their ‘weak points’ can
be converted into
their strong points. We need to ‘manufacture’ new lenses and offer to the mainstream society so that they see this
new picture. We need to catch them young so that using new lenses becomes a habit with them. Sure enough, like
the spectrum in non-oppressed (should I say, not-sooppressed) mainstream, there exists a spectrum in the
oppressed. Like every body else, oppressed should acquire
meta(fishing) skills so that they have insights, skills and tools
to identify the gaps and opportunities and build up one’s
capacities towards tapping them. Interestingly, historically, the
oppressed are a large number vis-à-vis the oppressors and/or
the non-oppressed.
This is a good base for further action. It is amply clear that all
oppressed are not a homogenous lot. Some carry a burden of
generations on them. They need infrastructure to unburden
themselves. They need space. They need to have some
additional capitals. Importantly, they need more equal
treatment so that they catch up. They display, it appears,
stamina and mental toughness to face difficulties and
uncertainties, better than many others. In addition to soft life
skills for leading productive lives in the quick-paced dynamic
contexts, they need to assimilate what it means to be moving
from one set of ‘oppressions’ to other. I am not able to
visualize a situation without any oppression. I wish I am proved
wrong! There was an argument in the AP Assembly whether
the previous leadership of government made more money or
this leadership of government for themselves. For a neutral
listener of the arguments, it comes across as if both leaderships have built properties. No other player could
demonstrate that meteoric rise, with such a low base with which they started off.
Government of AP suddenly woke up after more than 10 months of the High Court decision in the MACS contention
to continue as MACS. It appears seeking stay on this. Supreme Court, has maintenance of status quo before the
Government Action to bring the dairy MACS under traditional cooperatives’ Act. Let us see what becomes of it. The
draft country strategy (2009-12) of the World Bank in India has mentioned three themes – inclusive growth,
government effectiveness and responsible growth, in line with XI Five Year Plan. The key principles that govern it are:
be more strategic and selective; do fewer things better; focus on better design and implementation.
The quick pointers that come to mind are –
• Is it not time for advocating prosperity paradigm for poverty reduction – working with the poor, who are moving out
of poverty; simultaneous special focus on the destitute/last decile.
• Is it time to think about investing in generating, analysing, evaluating, testing, piloting ideas rather than focussing on
access to finance [this has become a more or less perfected art]?
• How do we ensure that poor have more choices in terms of institutions that work with them? Need to transcend
direct projects of Government and consider direct funding within the projects and direct from the donors.
• Most models are still in the realm of Civil Society. Is not that its job?
• Is it not time to ensure availability of authentic institutional framework and Acts with autonomy for building people’s
institutions? Recent controversy has ensured that no state Act guarantees that autonomy.
• Most growth is in the service sector. It has a deep effect (negative) on the traditional occupations. The time is ripe
for re-skilling and meta-skilling (the skills to identify opportunities and acquire abilities to tap the opportunities) people.
• Communities need market intelligence and information like all others who have access to it. That is the huge catch!
• Responsible growth demands responsible and concerned cutting-edge and integrating professionals to work with
the communities, their organizations and their support organizations. We also need paraprofessionals and other
service providers, and some ‘structure’ to hold them.
• We need to understand and integrate Corporate Social Responsibility Mechanisms, Public-Private Partnerships,
Civil Society Networks and CBO Federations so that the poor do not lose. This needs lots of time, energy and effort
to appreciate and build mechanisms.
• Some thinking on Food and other social securities to the poor and the growth engines helps.
• More insights into the effect of Liberalisation, Privatisation, Globalisation on livelihoods of the poor and the lower
middle class are needed. This in turn has to throw up the areas of competitive advantage for the poor.
Foundation Lecture at Kuchibhotla Vasanthi Foundation has helped me to see two decades of development with
hindsight. Livelihoods Framework indicates that Livelihoods are a Play of Six Capitals Towards Four Arrows within
Four Contexts. The spiritual capital is the most important capital and denotes the spirit to survive, improve upon the
present conditions and fight back in the case of shocks. From the framework emerges the agenda for the livelihoods
work. The poor themselves have to take informed decisions about their way forward. As this is not one time affair,
particularly in this dynamic age, they should internalize the processes themselves. At least, they should have access
to a system or an institutional mechanism that provides support in these processes. There are some elements of the
livelihoods spectrum, not attempted adequately – and some are not even considered crucial for livelihoods
development.
New initiatives in this area need to be attempted. Further more and more people have to be working on the complex
but critical issue of enhancing livelihoods of
the poor. These have to be brought in a
variety of forms including professional fulltimers,
volunteers,
staff
with
the
communities/their
organizations,
paraprofessionals, community livelihoods
resource persons and best practitioners
from community.
The self-help movement of women has
reached a stage to move on to livelihoods
from the micro- finance/microfinance+. They
are willing to experiment with various
collectives that could meet their l i v elihoods
needs. The time has come for the communit
y to move b e y o n d taking ‘fish’ to learning
‘fishing’ to learning ‘the skills to identify and
learn the skills that can fetch a livelihood
dynamically’ (meta-fishing skills). This would
require handholding support for a while.
Community would also require service
providers. They would require backward and
forward linkage providers and marketing supporters. It is amply clear now, if poor do not get organized and command
significant bulk in supply of products and services or in buying their needs, they will not be in a position to realize
remunerative and legitimate share in this impressive growth trajectory.
Therefore, we need to think about decentralized but widespread/replicable/scalable/self-replicating systems,
processes and structures so that we move beyond one more or two more additions to these sporadic examples. That
may mean a network(s) of Livelihoods Support Organizations anchored by committed, talented, bright and passionate
social/development entrepreneurs/professionals or their groups, instead of organizations with centralized pools of
professionals may be the way forward.
People - the bright and young minds - make all the difference and therefore, working on them matters. The need is
huge. Therefore focus is on identifying, inducting, training, mentoring, encouraging them to be entrepreneurs/
volunteers/ staff/ field practitioners and ensuring quality support to community. Our critical appreciation is that the
bright and young minds like to get freedom and independence, not bound by bureaucratic chains to be in
development. They need to be handled with care and mentored.
Gradually, advocacy towards mainstream institutions responding positively to support poor in their endeavors to
enhance their livelihoods in terms of policy, design (of poverty reduction/livelihoods projects), infrastructure,
regulation, market access, partnerships, financing, jobs etc., has to begin. And some organization(s) has to anchor
this agenda. Its role is facilitating individuals and organizations to take up parts of the agenda and the processes to
integrate these different parts.
With this in context, we at Akshara are after a dream. In ten years from now, we reach out to at least 50 million poor
families; 5 million with skills for productive jobs; a quarter of 500,000 volunteers mobilized provide one-day a month
towards enhancing livelihoods of the poor; 100,000 paraprofessionals/community livelihoods resource persons from
diverse livelihoods situations/backgrounds, 10,000 livelihoods professionals (created afresh and/or upgraded from the
existing development workers’ pool) service the poor directly/ indirectly through LSOs; 100 LSOs with 1000 ivelihoods
professionals service the poor in their livelihoods domain; 600 CBOs/Development Organizations/PRIs as field
partners/stations in livelihoods domain; 10 large Collaborators (Government, Corporate Bodies, Donors etc.) in
livelihoods domain. This scaling-up and replication for significance begins by the end of 2010.
Can this be a reality? Can we be able to build life-workers, mentors, anchors and core team members who pursue
this dream? Are we day-dreaming? We hear universe conspires to help the strong and good desires. Is it not? This is
driving us. Hope you & me forge ahead and make a difference! �
*Information till April-2008
Livelihoods in Tradition?
Happy Summer Holidays!
Dr BR Ambedkar Birthday, Ramanavami, May Day, and Jatras marked the month that went by. May symbolizes Hot
Summer and tests our stamina. Travel and no power during the day, the test can be grueling. Thinking about
sustainability of people’s institutions, going beyond meeting the credit needs of the poor, inducting the cutting-edge
development workers into livelihoods and finetuning Management Information System for various players in the
Cotton Textile Supply Chain, have taken the bulk of our time.
We needed to respond to the articulated need for distance education in livelihoods. Some thought, discussions and
effort have taken us to initiate Akshara Adhyayan to offer self-learning livelihoods programs.
I have spent some time in a village recently to participate in its once-in-five-year Mother Goddess Jatra/Festival. A
village of 1000 families is estimated to have about 50000 persons spending time in the village for 2-3 days. The
expenditure incurred is in more than Rs.20 million. The major expenditure is on consumption of food, meat, alcohol
and clothes. A lot of travel cost is also there. Interesting rituals are part of the festival. The main deities (in their
original form) (goddesses) move out of the temple, in a procession to the tank outside (may be for their bath), and
return to the centre of the village to a decorated pandal. Most of the families in the village offer ‘turmeric rice’ to them.
The offerings in cash, apart from Rice, Clothes, Jewellery etc., to the deities have crossed Rs.2 lakh on that occasion
alone. Then, the families of the brothers of the sisters offer ‘turmeric rice’ along with clothes. By about midnight, the
deities move to the temple. This is in sharp contrast with other temples where the main diety does not move out of the
temple at all. Most people are awake the whole night to see the kalyanam and ‘bali’ (animal sacrifice). There are
traditional cultural activities throughout the night. Interestingly, the kalyanam of the goddesses is with the Gods in
coconut form. My repeated enquiries about the ‘bride grooms’ could not get a response. When the Goddess is Adi
Parasakthi, who is her husband, remained a mystery to me. Then, the animal blood is sprinkled all across the village
boundary. Till that time, nobody is allowed to go out of the village. The celebrations Eating, Drinking, Masti - follow.
Some 3000 sheep/goats have become the meat. Lots of Alcohol and Toddy has flowed. Most of the other shops (like
bangles, sweets etc.) put up specially for the occasion are owned and manned by Muslims. The main priest to
perform the kalyanam is a dalit. The temple priest is from a backward caste. Most artisans have some role or the
other to play. The expenditures have more than doubled vis-à-vis festival five years ago.
All this tells us that the rituals do contribute to the livelihoods in both ways and we need to work on tailoring
them or evolving new ones so that the livelihoods of the poor get enhanced.
The cyclone in Myanmar has killed more than 60000 people so far and 1.5 million people have been affected badly.
The relief is coming but the ruling junta is not allowing the relief. Fortunately, they are allowing India to help. This is
considered to be the gravest
cyclone in 15 years. India boasts
of a huge coastline, more than
8000 kilometers. More than 10%
of India, say 120 million people
live on the coast (within a range
of 25km). They live myriad
livelihoods. While a majority of the
families are marginalized and
vulnerable, prosperity is not
absent. Lush green delta lands,
Coconut gardens, Plantations,
Beach Resorts, Ports, occasional
industrial belts etc., are also part
of the coastline. Three metros –
Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata - are
on the coast. Some Tier-2 cities
are also on the coast like
Visakhapatnam,
Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, etc.
But the marginalized communities
of the coast live in between.
They constitute some 30 million. The lives and livelihoods of these people on the coastline present a picture of
highest vulnerability. The fishermen, the salt workers, marginal farmers with saline lands, people on the coastline
prone to low-pressure, cyclones and tsunamis – all of them are included here. Literacy levels are low. Lower diversity
in the livelihoods portfolio of each family is the norm. Cooperatives and Panchayat Raj Institutions are not working.
Yet the presence of strong traditional institutions is there in almost all the villages. The issue is how we could facilitate
them to have decent portfolio of livelihoods that offers them remunerative enough income with less risks. Related
issue is how we could reduce their expenditure without compromising the quality of life. Their economic oppression
and their vulnerabilities have made them strong in certain aspects of life. These can be leveraged. Sure enough, like
the spectrum in mainstream, there exists a spectrum in the coastline marginalized. Like every body else, coastal
marginalized should acquire meta(fishing) skills so that they have insights, skills and tools to identify the gaps and
opportunities and build up one’s capacities towards tapping them. The numbers are large. This is a good base for
further action.
It is amply clear that all the marginalized in the coast are not a homogenous lot. Their livelihoods patterns vary. Some
carry a burden of generations on them. They need infrastructure to unburden themselves. They need security against
natural calamities. They need safety nets. They need disaster preparedness and mechanisms to cope with disasters,
before, during and after. They need space. They need to have some additional capitals. They display, it appears,
stamina and mental toughness to face difficulties and uncertainties, better than many others. One needs to leverage
this.
Climate changes affect them badly. Due to changing climate, the natural disasters have become more frequent,
and more uncertain, with more severity and intensity. The traditional safe zones are becoming disaster-prone. For the
fishermen, the catch is coming down. The markets are dynamic.
‘Everybody loves disasters’. The communities live lives disaster-to-disaster. The NGOs, Governments, Donors etc.,it
appears, look forward to disasters. We have many a sincere civil society organization, that has evolved from their
relief work in disasters.
Politically, we are seeing elections
in Karnataka and byelections in
Telangana. All of us are eagerly
awaiting the results. This will have a
bearing on the landscape of AP and
India. After presenting the election
budget, the governments have
taken a step back, faced with rising
inflation and price rise. If they crack
this, the elections will be coming.
The livelihoods the elections offer
are immense. I will delve deep into
this in my subsequent columns.
Many
people
get
lucrative
assignments including journalists,
consultants, researchers, painters,
e-communicators,
advertisers,
channels,
vote-mongers,
processionists, activists, so on and
so forth. Already our friends in
political parties have started their
campaigns for the general elections.
Chandrababu started 150-day
‘meekosam’ (for you) campaign. Rahul Gandhi – his discover India campaigns. Campaign Chariots - Chaitanya
Rathams are coming up. Chranjeevi has been planning to start the party with a clean image – many of his fans will
get political livelihoods. Lok Satta has become a party with ‘citizens are rulers’. More parties are opening shops
making the scene cluttered. Let us see what happens.
Surely, some people have improved livelihoods although for a short period!
The exploration of MFI area and clients suggest that the Micro-finance is getting saturated with many players and
people availing credit from multiple formal sources. The need for each and every MFI to have niche in future is clearly
coming out. If one picks up livelihoods agenda for this niche, some ideas that offer potential are - businesses of
sourcing raw materials, value-addition and marketing of the products of the poor
universal interventions to market/distribute food and other essential items of the poor
businesses that supply materials to the groups of micro entrepreneurs and shop keepers and traders
encouraging entrepreneurs to start enterprises that provide products and services to the poor
linking one cluster to other cluster of producers that have dependency on each other
providing finance for jobs and credit to swap existing high-cost debts
Responsible growth demands responsible and concerned cutting-edge and integrating professionals
to work with
the communities, their organizations and their support organizations. We also need paraprofessionals and other
service providers, and some ‘structure’ to hold them.
Mechanisms for Social securities to the poor and the growth engines
Figuring out areas of competitive advantage for the poor, in the context of globalization and encouraging With this in
context, Akshara pursues its dream to reach out to at least 50 million poor families, serviced by at least 10,000
livelihoods professionals and 100,000 paraprofessionals/community facilitators. 
*Information till May-2008
Education-Life-Livelihoods
Hope you had nice time in Summer!
5th June is the World Environment Day. At least we should begin to think about environment now, given the early
warnings of climate change. Personally, I am starting on a trip to explore ways and means to enhance livelihoods of
the poor in Sunderbans.
We continued May like April, thinking about
sustainability of people’s institutions, going
beyond meeting the credit needs of the poor,
inducting-edge
development
workers
into
livelihoods
and
fine-tuning
Management
Information System for various players in the
Cotton Textile Supply Chain. We began to think
about baselines. We began to conceptualize
livelihoods enhancement in eco-fragile and
marginalized zones. We began to look at
livelihoods beyond the soil and moisture
conservation efforts in watersheds.
We have started approaching Universities and
Management Institutes seeking them to introduce
livelihoods thinking and livelihoods management
in their curriculums. Simultaneously, we began to
develop and offer self-learning livelihoods
programs from Akshara Adhyayan.
However, summer has taken its toll on all of us.
Many of us have fallen sick. The situation has
forced many of us to take off for a while. We have
also become less efficient and less effective for a
while. Amidst all this, I could manage to take a
three-day off traveling in Warangal and
Karimnagar districts. Low-end tourism invariably
boils down to visiting religious places broadly.
Summer Holidaying and Tourism, as the children
have holidays for school, is rising. I could see
thousand plus visitors in a day to Ramappa
Temple. Not even half of them visited nearby
Ramappa Lake.
A single Ramappa is providing a turnover of more
than Rs.1 million/day. Transport, Food, Water,
Soft Drinks, Priests, Photography, Security, Boat etc., are the key livelihoods that are being supported. With this
reckoning, India might be talking of a whopping Rs.30-40 thousand crore low-end domestic summer tourism
business. This would be supporting a whopping one million livelihoods in this summer.
Interestingly, Warangal and Karimnagar districts have been selling chilled Rs.1-2 per litre water (defluoridated) in
stead of bottled water. This might be true all across. This is the new trend and tourists are happy with this. I have also
seen the increase in affordable luxury hotels in second and thirdtier cities. We also see the increased availability of
air-conditioned transport. Most of the prominent temples have got face lift. And new temples are being discovered for
their ‘sacredness’. As part of our visit, we have been to Kaleswaram to see Mukteeswara, and Dharmapuri to see
Yoga Narasimha in Karimnagar, apart from Ramappa, Thousand Pillar temple and Fort in Warangal. In both the
places, we also worshipped Yama, so that he will not come in the way of our Mukti. For starters, Yoga Narasimha
and Balaji idols are from Salagrama.
Our visits to two watersheds to look at the watershed plus possibilities, from the livelihoods of the poor perspective,
have confirmed that National Rural Employment Guarantee has really made a huge difference to the poor in terms of
employment and incomes. Surely, the work is not at all qualitative. Possibilities for the poor are in collective
purchases, sales and value-addition; skills for services within the village; collectives for the market; skills for jobs
outside – these need to be explored and comprehensive village livelihoods plans need to be evolved and attempted
with linkages and convergence. Again, the confirmation is that the funds are not the real issue. Real issue is ideas
and institutions that handhold.
June is the time of admissions. We are forced to look at Education emerging as an industry and sector. This engages
more than 20 million people in the country (2 million in AP). At one end, we have the fundamental issue of illiteracy –
at least a third of the adults are illiterate. The standards of education, for a vast majority, are abysmal. Most
graduates, if we go by my experience of recruiting cutting-edge professionals, have failed to clear the 3R – Reading,
Writing and Arithmetic – Test satisfactorily. Then that larger question – is education for life or for livelihoods? It
appears that there is no doubt to say that education has failed to make a mark in life. Now, the surveys have revealed
most of our professionals are not employable. Employability index for many of them is a single digit percentage,
except for medicine.
We are facing a GIANT paradox – there are jobs that are not finding suitable candidates and there are
candidates without jobs. We have children not going to school; we have children dropping out of schools; we have
youth stuck at school education level; yet we have youth not willing to join/continue traditional livelihoods like
griculture, handlooms, etc. Of course, even if they want, these livelihoods are not able to offer decent earnings to
them. There are not enough vocations in which training is offered. There are professional graduates on the road
without satisfactory jobs.
Yet, education is a growing sector. We are talking about having a university in every district. We are also witnessing
private universities. English Medium schools are growing. School chains are burgeoning. We are seeing takeovers
and mergers. Teachers are increasing. Tutors are increasing. Coaching centers are growing. There are coaching
centers to coach students to enter coaching centers. Foundation courses start as early as Class VI. Residential
schools are growing. Concept schools are growing! In a school, we see both teachers and lowly-paid tutors. More
‘engineers’ are being produced. More ‘managers’ are being produced. More ‘computer’ boys and girls are being
produced. They are quickly learning ‘accent’. They are getting ready to join ‘call centers’. They are getting ready to
join ‘retail chains’. They are getting ready to sell cell phones, credit cards, insurance products, real estate plots/flats,
etc, and are becoming sales men and women.
We hear that the richest of the world are from India. Their tribe is increasing. We also hear that Indian middle class is
growing. They need services. They can afford services. It is clear that rest of the people have to service them and live
or else they have to be outside of the ‘economy’ leading food secure natural life in some corner. McCauley or
otherwise, our education prepares us to service the ruling elite! Middle class is taking over the slot of truly ruling elite!
For long, I thought we are an agriculture economy. Actually, it was an agri-centric economy. Guruji, Ravindra
Sharma, says we were a krushi-pradhan (industrial) nation. In due course, we are becoming a service-based
economy. More than 50% of our GDP is from services now.
A moot question is – if the crisis looms large, what matters most is the air, water, and food. Can we forego the future
food security (for all the people) in India for better economic prospects now, compromising this position? From this
perspective, we need to have standard education for life till certain age, say 16-18 years that prepares people for
better lives. The education thereafter can focus on offering education for livelihoods including wage employment, selfemployment, entrepreneurship, and providing services. Surely, the brightest minds have to be engaged for
addressing the needs of the poor and vulnerable.
We have reckoned that we are in a fast paced world. Things change fast. The education has to offer the people meta
(fishing) skills so that they have insights, skills and tools to identify the gaps and opportunities (as and when they
unfold) and build up their capacities towards tapping them. In my humble estimate, this is the true education. The
true education liberates. It makes them come together and stay together. It explains them why they are here now and
what can take them forward. It guides their way forward. After the cyclone in Myanmar killed more than a lakh people
and severely affected more than a million people, the earth quake in China did larger damage. Sad to hear a celebrity
talking about Karma of the Chinese that has brought this earthquake! If that is the case, largest polluter of the world
should face all the disasters. Unfortunately, it does not happen that way!
With this in context, Akshara continues its journey in livelihoods education. Livelihoods Education for the livelihoods
workers! Livelihoods Education for the community leaders and facilitators! Livelihoods Education for the people!
Livelihoods Education for the children! More and more people have to join in this pursuit. More and more spiritual,
human, social and financial resources are required. The scope needs to be expanded. Please join us in this
pursuit._
*Information till June-2008
Elephant and The Six ‘Blind’
Monsoon has set in. While some areas are getting more rains and some others are not getting good rains!
The month that has gone by included our trips to
explore ways and means to enhance livelihoods of
the poor in Sagar Island in Sundarbans, going
through Tushar Kanjilal’s ‘Who killed Sundarbans?’
and interactions with people who ‘know’
Sundarbans.
SHG movement and MFIs have continued to engage
us. We have moved a bit on the baselines for
various segments of the Cotton Textile Supply
Chain. We are seeking people’s reactions to the
rising food prices. We continued our engagement
with the community organizations to look at
Livelihoods interventions as their projects.
We have moved further with the Universities and
Management
Institutes.
One
University
is
considering a postgraduate diploma in livelihoods.
One institute is seeking our help in offering ‘livelihoods management’ in their flagship program. We continued to
receive demand for self-learning livelihoods programs. We began Akshara Adhyayan to specifically address this
need.
Summer, followed by sultry windless days, followed by storms – the nature has ensured that we take rest for a while.
Sagar Islanders engage in agriculture as farmers and labour. Major crops include paddy, betel vine, chillies, potato
and vegetables. Coconut, palm, date palm, and banana plantations are abundant. Marine and cultured fisheries, dry
fish, duckery, shrimp seed collection, dairying, goats and sheep rearing, bidi rolling, shell craft are the other
livelihoods, apart from transport, trade, education and related services. The scope is in increasing the crop intensity
with rain water harvesting, expanding the acreage in remunerative betel vine, fisheries etc., and collectivization (of
purchases, aggregation, storage, value-addition and sales). Vocational training will also be important.
Sagar Island exploration has culminated in figuring out a way forward for enhancing the livelihoods of the poor. Some
elements of the way forward include organizing women and youth around savings, credit and micro-insurance into
SHGs and their higher order federations; undertaking participatory livelihoods planning appreciating livelihoods
current reality, gaps and opportunities; facilitating bank linkages and convergence with other programs to realize
these plans; organizing people around livelihoods activities; organizing shops that sell essential items; building skills
of the youth for meeting the services required; exploring employment opportunities outside and providing training; and
building human resources for working in the people’s institutions.
One area that has been troubling is how
we could ensure that the people whose
lives and livelihoods are threatened and
affected are involved in planning,
managing and maintaining the plans
and planned elements. The case in
point is embankment breaches. This is
the same situation in many aspects in
many an ecologically fragile and
marginalized zone. We, the blind, are
groping
for
solutions
without
understanding the ‘elephant’. How can
we, if we don’t make all the blind to
come together and unravel the
‘elephant’ first? How can we, unless we
reach the ‘ant’ when the ‘fish’ does not
dry-up (in the seven fish and the ant
story)?
The most prominent issue is how we
could offer ‘metafishing’ skills to the
community, in addition to offering ‘fishing’ skills, in stead of offering fish. This is the need of the hour. The entire
project has to gear up for this effort. And I understand that this takes time 5-10 years. This can begin with
appreciation of current reality and pooling up knowledgeskills- resources in people’s domain with K-S-R in our domain
and outsiders’ domain. This in turn enerates a variety of informed choices for the community to choose from. The
community implements the plan so developed. In these iterative and repeated rounds, the community acquires
metafishing skills and, I guess, learns to adapt to the changing needs and changing contexts.
Visit to UP and Bihar, as usual, confirms the issue of the equity that is plaguing them. These areas have fertile lands
and water exists. Two crops are normal. But these resources are in the hands of the non-poor. Mechanization has
peaked. Except transplantation, most farm activities are mechanized. Poor are typically landless or have a fraction of
an acre. The credit access is weak. The interest rates are as high as 1000% per annum. Other terms are equally
harsh. Majority of the poor are still illiterate. Ill-health consumes the most of the family’s expenditure. Gender
disparities are huge. Migration is not uncommon. Civil Society efforts are, at best, Weak.
MFIs have started to enter these states.
SHG movement has begun. These are
facing stiff resistance from the non-poor.
Large Government Poverty Reduction
Projects, like in South, have not been
planned, except in Bihar. Under the
circumstances, efforts by NGOs are
important. I could visit an NGO which has
taken up this task on a scale. Picking up the
principles and processes from the largest
poverty reduction project of the country, AP
Rural Poverty Reduction Project, it builds
SHGs, their federations at the cluster level
and the block level. In the absence of a good
act like the Mutually-Aided Cooperative
Societies’ Act in other states, they are
contemplating Associations at cluster and
block level under Society Registration Act. Their well-orchestrated seven principles – weekly meetings, weekly
savings, credit transactions, repayment in installments, books, plans and activists - and seven steps – identifying the
poor and poverty, forming groups, building capacities, mobilizing capital, identifying appropriate livelihoods options,
identifying and taking up human and social development activities and managing risks – are allowing them to roll-out
group formation in 4-5 districts. Interestingly, they could secure cash credit limit to the SHGs from the banks, initially
Rs.25000 and after six months of further transactions, grading and planning, Rs.500000. In 2-3 years, this cash credit
limit can ensure each member an access to more than Rs.1.0 lakh for investing in livelihoods activities. Significant
amount, in deed! No other project/organization in the country could ensure access to such a high magnitude amount.
NABARD and other banks have promised this CCL and delivered. This effort is in need of funds to mobilize poor into
institutions (groups and federations) and build their capacities. I am wondering whether somebody would like to
chip in and support this initiative to go to scale.
Recognition to the effort and plan of building Pochampally Chenetha Kalanetha Collectives as the Standard hartered
Best Business Plan of Srijan 2008 has endorsed the following: one needs to work with all the poor, once enteringthe
village, even if it is a weaving village; livelihoods interventions are essentially people’s projects; the needs of the poor
extend beyond financial capital; and there is a need to bring all the blind together to unravel and address the
‘elephant’. It has also provided us to approach people for grants, debt and equity for taking this effort
forward. I am sure we will have more people interested in us now, thanks to Srijan 2008.
June brings monsoons in India. Vagaries of monsoon have big effect on the dry lands. We are forced to look at dry
land agriculture as an important sub-sector within agriculture. Dry land agriculture engages more than 30 million
families in the country (3 million in AP). On this land, the rainfall is scanty. This rain is not harvested except for some
watershed efforts, of late. The earlier tanks have been silted, breached and lost their functionality. Groundwater has
depleted. The productivity is low. The dry-land research does not attract the attention of the scientific community so
much, although ICRISAT and CRIDA are doing a bit in this regard. The minimum support prices do not generally exist
for dry-land crops. Fortunately, most of these crops are food crops.
Horticulture crops are finding some place. Since about half of the Indian families are engaged in dryland agriculture, it
needs attention. It can not be ignored. The per unit land productivity, per unit water productivity and proportion of
consumer rupee realized by the producers have to go up and the costs of cultivation vis-à-vis realization has to come
down. I hope these will be the agenda of the scientific community, civil society engaged in agriculture and NRM, and
government (s). The risks of dry-land, which are very high, with productivity ranging from 0-100%, we need to invest
in building risk reduction and diversification mechanisms. It may have to be reiterated here that the dry-land crops
contribute significantly to the food security of the poor.
Since we do not want to forego the future food security in India, we cannot ignore dry-land agriculture any longer.
When crisis envelops us, what matters the most are air, water and food. The rest is a matter of opinion really.
With this in context, Akshara works closely with the field partners in ecologically fragile and marginalized areas. It
inducts livelihoods workers for them. It builds capacities in them. Where, there are no partners, it attempts field
stations. Importantly, it disseminates best practices to the workers, people and to children.
I invite more and more people to pursue this, wherever they are, in their own way.
*Information till July-2008
Opportunities for the Poor?!?
It is pouring all over now. It is compensating more than the drought of monsoon in South in June and July!
Another disaster struck!
The month that has gone by included our endless interactions with farmers, weavers, workers, consumers, students
and people who work with them. We continued our engagement with the community organizations to look at
livelihoods interventions as their projects.
We have begun to work with NIRD in offering their one-year program in rural development management. We are
involved in offering the course - Rural Development Management – Principles and Practices - that introduces the
entire program and the other course – Rural Organizations – so that we are able to introduce the elements, concepts,
principles, tools and practices of Livelihoods Management that are relevant to Rural Development Management, to
the new young professionals. It is heartening to note that Government of India is investing to produce development
management professionals directly. It endorses our belief that we need more and more bright minds have to come
into this development and livelihoods domain. I hope, taking the cue, more and more players enter the ground to
produce more and more professionals. Conservatively estimated, we may need 50000-60000 professionals servicing
the poor even if we provide one professional per 1000 poor families. We are no where near this figure.
We continued to receive demand for self-learning livelihoods programs. This demand can not be ignored. We need
investors; we need volunteers; we need support providers; so on so forth.
Since two years, there is an upward trend in the prices of various agricultural commodities. The increase is more
pronounced since January 2008. The spurt in food prices has the potential to precipitate into a crisis exacerbating
poverty, hunger and malnutrition. In this context, our survey in AP has revealed that there is an increase in the
income of all the households during the past two years. NREGA, that provided 100 days of employment, is the main
contributing factor to the increase in income of the poor in rural areas. The general increase in the services and the
boom in the construction sector appear to have contributed to the increase in income of the urban poor. All the
households are spending more on food now, vis-à-vis spending on food two years ago.
The acreage under paddy is decreasing. The fertile and irrigated lands are getting diverted away from paddy; and
new irrigation areas are coming under paddy. Diversion of paddy fields is towards commercial crops like tobacco in
Guntur and Prakasam, and horticultural crops across the state. Government is also discouraging water intense crops
like rice. Additionally, areas near the cities and towns are being converted into real estate. A contributing factor for
increase in food prices is the decrease in the number of farmers growing paddy for self-provisioning, which resulted in
an increase in the number of purchasers of paddy; and thus, demand.
An overwhelming majority of the respondents feel that the government has not made any serious effort to reduce the
increase in food prices. There is a popular perception that the government is giving small benefits in the form of
including Rs.2/kg rice, red gram and oil in the PDS while fleecing the people by (a) increasing the prices of other
items like diesel, fertilizers, etc., and (b) not regulating the trade that is increasing the prices of other items like seeds,
and other essential commodities.
The two shifts - a. from security in 'having a stock of grain at home' to 'having ready cash'; and b. from eating 'coarse
cereals and local varieties' to 'eating rice and processed foods' - are resulting in more farmer households having to
depend on the market for their food needs; and sub-optimal use of the dry lands that are otherwise good for the
production of coarse cereals. As the local varieties are not being consumed, the food is having to be transported over
longer distances. With an increase in the cost of transportation, the food prices are also increasing. In the quest for
cash crops, the acreage under food crops is declining.
It is heartening to note that the decisions on the food to be brought and prepared are taken by the woman in most of
the households. However, the impact of food prices is felt by the women, with cutting down on travel and other
expenditure, decrease in the intake of nutrition, decrease in consumption of alcohol, reduced expenditure on
festivals/celebrations, etc., and some women joined the workforce to earn the extra-income required to support the
family. The lower middle class is shifting from the finer varieties to normal varieties of rice. The urban poor and small
service providers, who have more or less a constant income, are badly affected by the rise in the food prices. The
worst affected appear to be the migrant labor, who have no identity of their own, at the place of migration. They do
not have access to PDS and suffer the full impact of the rise in the prices of food items.
Most of the increase in food prices is only in the marketing channels. The benefits of the price rise are not accruing to
the end channel partners – farmers or consumers.
Regulating market channels, converting indirect subsidies to direct subsidies to the farmers (like MSP), reducing the
length of the market channels by collectivising consumers (like APNA Bazar) and producers, need to be encouraged
and supported.
Amidst the international food crisis and increased food prices in the country, with inflation little over 12%, Indian
Government makes definitive steps on Nuclear Deal after winning the confidence vote. Beijing Olympics 2008 (29 th
Olympics) has begun with a most spectacular inauguration beyond nay one’s imagination on 08 August 2008 at 08.08
PM. It is estimated that more than US$ 43 billions have gone into it, three times the investment in the previous
Olympics. About 15000 performers with 6-12 months practice time have welcomed 10000+ players from 205
countries. It is any body’s guess, a million livelihoods for this year might have been made by this Olympics, with
substantial incomes. The inaugural investment alone would provide for 20 lakh poor families!
Despite economic slow down, some sectors are doing well, according to International Business Report 2008 of Grant
Thornton International. 30% of worldwide net increase in employment of 140+ million new jobs by 2020 will be in
India. These include – Retail (frontline sales staff – about a lakh per year for 3-4 years, retail management graduates
and MBAs for merchandising, supply chain management etc.); Real Estate/Infrastructure (1.5 lakh+ engineers, real
estate brokers, appraisers, managers and consultants); Healthcare/Pharma (75000+ doctors, other healthcare
professionals, scientists and pharma documentationists); Financial services (1 lakh+ portfolio managers, insurance
and retail financial services); Hospitality/Facilities management (2 lakh+ hotel-related and other hospitality jobs,
technical maintenance people for facilities); Consulting services (0.5 lakh+ HR and start-up specialists, business
strategists); Entertainment (10000+ people in channels); IT (10 lakh+ multitasking professionals per year in IT, ITES
and ITES-BPOs); Customer services (1.5 lakh+ customer service technicians/managers); and Telecom (2 lakh+
professionals). Importantly, there is an increasing demand for people who have a blend of two functional skills,
like a financial services person with business and marketing skills. Thus, middle class will continue to grow. What are
the alternatives for employment for the poor who want to or who are forced to get out of the over crowded farm and
traditional occupational sectors? How do we increase the incomes for the poor who continue in declining sectors?
What are the items that can be added in their portfolios of livelihoods?
Monsoon affects people differently. Good monsoon is what farmers look forward to. Bad monsoon can ruin their
fortune. The definition of ‘bad’ monsoon varies from place to place and time to time. Road users have difficulty when
it pours, so on so forth. The people without roof over their heads get affected badly with rains, particularly if they are
incessant. Some of these people are migrants. Some others are nomadic and semi-nomadic. They did not have the
constitutional protection available to the Scheduled Tribes; they did not have the security and access like the resident
communities. They number more than ten million families all over the country. They face extinction of their livelihoods
patterns. They need to adapt to the new opportunities and face new challenges emerging from the changing face of
the technology, entertainment, and environment. Will they? Who will help them? When we do not even know how
many are there exactly, when some of them are not in the reckoning at all, when we do not have a clear account of
the ways of their lives, how do we proceed? How do we organize them? How do we collectivize them?
Interesting issues and interesting livelihoods! There are a lot of people who make rakhis (raksha bandhans) and live.
There are some others engaged in making Ganeshas for the Ganesh festival. Some of them are made with plaster of
Paris. Can we think of them making with clay, like in the olden days? This looks feasible, and my colleagues are
making a small attempt at Pochampally. The Independence Day Celebrations offers livelihoods to significant numbers
in making flags, poles, photos, garlands, fireworks, campaigns and parades.
With incessant rains and heavy downpour, life halts. Meetings get postponed and/or cancelled. Water
logging and overflowing streams halt travel. Drinking water runs out. With water in the pits of the looms,
weavers get out of business. Farm works gets halted. Lives, Crops and Livelihoods are lost. Some in agency
areas become sick. In the ultimate analysis, what matters the most for life is air, water and food. The rest is a
matter of opinion really.
An informed debate on what matters the most for life on this planet or for that matter a human being is to be
pursued in this hour of changing times, climates and priorities. I invite more and more people to pursue this,
wherever they are, in their own way and contribute to this debate in a big way. 
*Information till Aug-2008
Poor Are Increasing!
We never seem to get out of disasters! Bihar has struck with floods, dubbed to be larger than the Tsunami! 5
million people have been displaced, displaced for days!
During the month, we have continued to interact with farmers, weavers, workers, consumers, students and people
who work with them and interpret the data from the interactions. We continued our engagement with young
professionals in appreciating poverty reduction,
development and livelihoods management effort.
Are the people below poverty line increasing? The
calorie norm for the poverty line of spending defined
in the seventies remained till today. The revision is
only for accounting for the inflation. Accordingly,
about Rs.1.63 per capita per day in seventies
translates to Rs.12 per day after three decades. 56%
were poor in India in seventies. Now
(three years ago), it is 28% according to the
Planning Commission of India.
In due course, we seem to have missed the
understanding that spending on calories was not to
be equated with entire food and non-food
expenditure for survival or decent existence. Thus,
the spending to ensure adequate nutrition, adequate shelter, adequate clothing etc., was to be added with caloriespending. This additional spending would be more or less equal to cost of calories. Thus, at Rs.12 plus 12 i.e. Rs.24
per capita per day, the poverty figures would change dramatically from 28% to 70%.
Taking purchasing power parity into account, poverty line of spending (calorie norm) today would translate, I was told,
to US$1.25 per capita per day. This is what the figures of the World Bank have kept in mind, in releasing the latest
figures. Even at this level, the World Bank figures are troubling all of us. According to them, the poor in India are now
near to 55%, making India having largest percentage of poor in South Asia, next only to Nepal. The poverty line of
expenditure would be more than US$2 per capita per day and the figure would then be close to 80%. This is in sharp
contrast to the projections of growing middle class in India.
What does it mean? Does one of them is wrong? Are the differences between the poor and the middle class rich
rising sharply? As a population, are we moving away from food security? Are we spending more on ‘other items’ at
the expense of the ‘food’? This juxtaposed with increased credit availability with large numbers of groups of women,
are the women servicing the debt, albeit cheaper debt, rather than consuming food? Where are the surpluses of the
middle class going? Are they not going to services that are provided by the poor and not-sopoor? Are they servicing
themselves and living in their own economy, different from the economy of the poor? What is happening to the jobs
created by the growth, booming sectors etc.? What is happening to the new jobs coming up at the low-end? Are they
not matching up with the pace of creation of the unemployed and the displacement in livelihoods in the traditional
sectors?
We are at a loss to explain this out! Religion is one of the greatest employers! This month we are seeing
Krishnastami, Ganesh and Ramzan. A Ganesh offers a variety of livelihoods – Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh,
where it is prevalent talk about 2-3 million small idols and 1- 1.5 lakh big idols of Ganesha. The sourcing of raw
material, transport, making the idols, purchasing the idol, transporting the idol, making the mandap, lighting the
mandap, the priest for each mandap, flowers and leaves, puja and Prasad, a group 10-12 youth servicing one
mandap, for 9 nights and 10 days, procession, Ganesh immersion in water, excavation etc. A quick estimate would
mean 25-30 million days of employment/livelihoods per year! Ganesh is a business of more than Rs.1000 Crore all
put together! Lots of it contributes to enhancing the livelihoods of the poor in a more certain manner than the new
livelihoods options. By the same token, Krishnathami might have added a business of more than half of this amount
easily as Krishnastami is celebrated all over the country.
Month-long Ramzan fasts end on Ramzan day. Ramzan would surely provide business of more than Rs.5000 Crore
of Haleem, Iftars, Festivities, Gifts etc.
Next month, we have the Durga Puja/Dusserah and Deepavali. They will be generating many more livelihoods days
for the poor.
With corporate social responsibility foundations coming up and taking up implementation role increasingly and their
operations being on a massive scale on one hand, the new generation of community-based organisations taking up
development into their hands and taking up development projects, and the governments are taking up large-scale
poverty reduction and other projects across, the traditional members of the civil society – NGOs are losing their staff,
not able to mobilize finds for their ideas, and their ‘business’ is dwindling. These organisations need to redefine their
agenda, role and methods. This is accentuated further with decreasing grants and increasing venture capital for locial
entrepreneurs with a promise of return on investments beyond the social impact. Small organisations have to give
way to the big or to the networks. They need to quickly find partners in the CSRs, CBOs and Government Projects.
They need to combine for-profit and no-for-profit business. They need to source volunteers and learn managing
volunteers from the corporate world. They need to perform ‘big’ or transform else they face the threat of loss of form
and substance.
Under the circumstances, when we see an effort in Greater Hyderabad for bringing together Civil Society
Organisations as a united forum, we get excited. Yes, we agree that more efforts, more geographic forums, more
thematic forums are required. That is the only way forward.
Should we bank more on the disasters? We seem to be moving towards ‘everybody loves good disaster’. The NGOs
and the networks around the disasters are in demand. Tsunami, Kashmir earth quake, multiple droughts and floods
have been postponing the ‘transformation’ of NGOs. Now, we have a massive disaster in Bihar in the form of floods,
affecting 5 million people for days. Manmohan Singh is quick to announce a Rs.1000 Crore immediate relief.
Railways and Bihar Government are doing well to provide more relief. CRPF and Army are assisting in the relief.
Conservatively speaking, the floods costed more than 100 million livelihood days, amounting to a staggering Rs.1000
Crore in livelihoods, in addition to the loss of lives, property, assets, crops, etc. Last month, we had floods in AP that
caused substantial loss in livelihoods and crops.
Policy making never stopped baffling us! 1991 Coastal Zone Regulation Notification is being replaced with Coastal
Management Zone Notification 2008. Nobody cared to tell why such a policy is required. The token consultations with
public are underway. The notification is expected to be effective in a month. This hurry is not ‘understood’. When 250
million people live within 50 km of the coast, is not there a need to consult a 0.1% of them, i.e. 2.5 lakh people? Is not
there a need to consult in every habitation/Gram Pamchayat of 3600+ GPs or a 10% of them? Does not the preamble
state the rights of the coastal communities on the coastal resources and the protection of traditional coastal
livelihoods upfront? And finally, the scope for multiple interpretations of the words like ‘essential development’ is the
big issue. ‘No’s need to be clearly spelt out. No ‘Yes’ should take away the rights of the coastal communities and
traditional coastal livelihoods.
Microfinance activities have become fairly
systematic and the processes have become
‘standard’ for easy replication
and scaling-up. The communities have responded
well to these processes and are endorsing them
with 99%+ repayment rates. The investors and the
bankers are responding with increased investments
for microfinance. It is
able to attract a good number of human resources
into it. The remunerations, it is able to pay, are
comparable with the corporate sector. Bright and
young minds are getting attracted to give a try.
Micro-finance organisations across
the country are debating mainstreaming, microfinance plus is being explored and multiple hues and colours are joining this ‘plus’.
The moot question before us livelihoods/development workers is – is mainstreaming the way forward for all
of us? Are there any alternative ways? This question is important because - livelihoods activities are too large in
number to attempt any standardization and/or systematization. For example, a small village of 100-200 families may
have a number of crops, some once a year, some twice a year and sometimes thrice a year. It may have some
plantation crops and some horticulture crops. It may have some trees and some fruit-bearing trees. It may have
fisheries and produce a variety of fishes. It may have livestock including sheep and goats, cattle, buffaloes etc. It
may have handlooms and handicrafts. It may have stone cutting, bidi rolling, and other miscellaneous activities.
There may also be some support services like transport, trade, education etc. The people may be casual labour,
skilled labour, self-employed, enterprise owners etc. Some may be full-timers and some part-timers. Some may not
be engaged in direct income generation activities.
We have very few people who can appreciate and support these livelihoods in toto. In fact, there are very
few who can appreciate and support a single valuechain in its entirety. The so-called experts master a bit of
the value-chain. Yet, the poor and their collectives cannot afford them.
All this would mean the need for multiple alternative ways. Hope we succeed in identifying and adapting some. In the
ultimate analysis, what matters the most for life is air, water and food. The rest is a matter of opinion really. An
informed debate on what matters the most for life on this planet or for that matter for a human being is to be
pursued in this hour of changing times, climates and priorities. I invite more and more people to pursue this,
wherever they are, in their own way and contribute to this debate in a big way. 
*Information till Sep-2008




Why Are We So Desperate?
We never seem to get out of disasters! World at large and USA and Europe have been struck with a huge
financial tsunami.
During the month, our interactions have been mainly with
the communities, their organizations and the organizations
that support them in Jharkhand and the Trans Himalayan
Region, apart from the interactions related to endogenous
tourism in general and in Pochampally in particular. We
continued our engagement with young professionals in
appreciating poverty
reduction, development
and
livelihoods management effort.
As I traversed from South to North, from Ganges in the East
to the Indus in the West, from the land of the highest
population density to the land of the lowest population
density, from forever marshy lands to the cold deserts, from
the philosophy of leisure maximization to the philosophy of
let us first survive, from religious tourism areas to nature
and experiential tourism areas, from plains to peaks, from
completely concretized jungles to pristine natural habitats,
from hottest areas to subzero areas and so on, it has been a study of contrasts on the surface, yet similar deep
within.
Sunderbans, hilly and mountain areas and cold deserts are telling us to appreciate the power of nature and surrender
to it. They, in fact, are urging us to appreciate and experience the bliss of being with the nature. The snow capped
mountains, the glaciers, the rivers, the hills, the lakes, the valleys, the islands and the seas are wonders of the
nature, for us to be with.
This year’s Sveriges Riksbank Prize in
Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel
is given to Paul Krugman, for his analysis of
trade patterns and location of economic activity.
His analysis concludes that economies of scale
combined with reduced transport costs help to
explain why an increasingly larger share of the
world population lives in cities and why similar
economic activities are concentrated in the same locations. Lower transport
costs can trigger a selfreinforcing process whereby a growing metropolitan
population gives rise to increased large-scale production, higher real wages
and a more diversified supply of goods. This, in turn stimulates further migration to cities. The key question then is –
can we reverse this? How can we?
My recent visits to Sunderbans, Jharkhand, Spiti Valley and Ladakh have given a glimpse of possible food security
dependent integrated organic farming. We seem to have forgotten the integrated farming system practices on the
way. Can we get back?
When the tribals in Jharkhand maximize leisure, when the spitians and ladakhis are happy with whatever little they
have– why are we after growth, profits and stress? Are we wrong?
Chewang Norphel at the ripe age of 73 is in a creative tension of building artificial ‘glaciers’ so that some lands in the
cold desert get some water during the early summer before the natural glaciers start melting a bit and give water to
these lands. Nomads in the cold desert take their livestock into the hills even at 5000 metres above mean sea level.
Ladakhis and Spitians pool up cow dung cakes, fuel wood, fodder for the cattle, provisions etc., for a long winter
exceeding six months with temperatures falling down to -30 to -35 degree Celsius with no electricity most of the time.
Still when a visitor meets them, they welcome with a greeting ‘Julley’ and offer some hot tea to drink. Even when land
is there for use, the tribals in Jharkhand and Dandakaranya are content with using a portion of it. The people in
Sunderbans are fighting the river, sea and the crabs, day in and day out. The fishermen in the coasts of India are in
the sea for days together waiting for the catch. The migrants into the cities are sleeping on the foot paths and slightly
less crowded roads and flyovers displaying enormous grit
to survive. When everyone around is so bold, generous
and happy with ‘life’, why are we so desperate to
accumulate, cheat, exploit, hide, flaunt and runaway from
our share of contributing to the life around us?
Ladakhis dream of food-security driven self-sufficient and
self-reliant economy. Strangely, the economy of Ladakh
is driven by the army, because of border with China and
Pakistan and the tourism. For example in Leh district,
army personnel outnumber the 1.2 lakh locals. In season,
70000- 80000 tourists visit Leh. While the poor are
negligible in number here, and the area has the best
equity that can be seen in the country, the harsh ecology
of cold deserts tests and tires them out with lowest
rainfall of 50-60 mm and a long and lowest temperatures.
Look at them. It beats our imagination why there are poor
in other parts of the country. Surely, the blessed non-poor should have no complaints whatsoever!
When the needs of the human beings are essentially air, water, food, clothing and shelter and most of these exist in
plenty for any one for their use and not for storing and wasting, when we did not own any resources that give us
these, when the value of each one’s time is more or less the same, the inequities are strange and appear to be
results of some ingenious engineering! It is beyond a common man’s comprehension why a young and physically
hardworking person gets Rs.50 per day of his labour and why another gets more than Rs.100,000 per day. There
appears no fair and just logic behind this. This is a cause of deep frustration to many of us. Can we do something
about this? Or should we accept and resign ourselves to this strange equation that governs us?
With the global financial crisis, it became to clear to us that we can not bank on these dynamic opportunities that
come from the liberalization, privatization and globalization processes. These LPG processes are as risky as LPG in
our houses. Its availability is not reliable. Safety is not guaranteed. Surely, prices are not going to remain low.
While the very purpose of the Non-Government
Organisations and Civil Society Organisations is to
show models for replication by the CBOs and the
Governments, and the collaboration between the
NGOs and Governments contributes to the public
good, to develop models and build communities,
NGOs seek autonomy and independence and the
arms of the Governments resist in accepting that
they are indeed independent organizations. An
angry and upset District Magistrate can stop the
funds to the NGO from foreign sources and
Government sources, as in the case of SECMOL in
Ladakh. The lesson here for the civil society is to
build local sources of funds and revenues from
activities and business. It needs to combine forprofit and not-for-profit business. It needs to source
volunteers and learn managing volunteers. It needs
to have wider base of work beyond a district or a
state. It needs to be networked for solidarity and learning.
King Nono of Spiti explains the need for integrated and holistic approach succinctly – when the farmers produce
barley, they get food for the winter and fodder for the cattle. That encourages them to have livestock. These give
manure, milk, wool, meat and all other things. The organic farming is then feasible. Micro-hydels can provide
electricity to the area. This can also reduce drudgery. Additional land can be brought under cultivation with more
snow and water harvesting. This land can be for growing vegetables, fruits and horticulture crops. The surplus can
fetch high price because of the off-season in the market. The bio-diversity conserved can give us a variety of nontimber forest produce, medicinal and aromatic plants for local use and a little additional cash. The youth can be
provided with skills to provide services that are required in the local area. The producers can be collectivized for
sourcing goods from outside, for exchange of goods between them, and surplus disposal with local value-addition.
The youth clubs can take up zero-waste management and revival and conservation of social and cultural practices,
art forms, etc. The traditional systems blended with modern technology improve the quality of life including
appropriate housing and guarantee sustainable well-being and development ……
This is just for Spiti valley in Himachal Pradesh. Each and every compact area in the country requires this
kind of integrated and holistic thinking on the livelihoods. We have very few people who can appreciate and
support this integrated and holistic way of living and livelihoods. We need to build and run campaigns for
that all over. We need volunteers and articulators.
All this would mean the need for multiple alternative ways. Hope we succeed in identifying and adapting some.
Of course, the critical element in our success is in most of us becoming less desperate to live ‘better’ than
most others at any cost to themselves, others and the world. 
*Information till Oct-2008
Change - We Must!
It is becoming clear that the financial tsunami is actually the depression.
The month that went by saw mainly the interactions with the communities, their organizations and the organizations
that support them in the Trans Himalayan Region. We continued our engagement with young professionals in
appreciating poverty reduction, development and livelihoods management effort. This time around, it is our
assessment of their performance. United States of America and the world is still celebrating the victory of Barrack
Obama.
We have a GO now – no smoking in public places. A cabinet decision – Ganga is a national river. Government of
India recognizes that Telugu and Kanada are classical languages, apart from Tamil and Sanskrit.
As we moved from Delhi into Himachal, the snow fall on the famous Rohtang Pass prevented us from traveling to
Spiti Valley through the pass. As a result, we had to take a circuitous route through the Jalori Pass - from a mere 200
kilometre drive became a long 700 kilometre sojourn, lasting a long 20 hours. The ghat road was along the course of
river Satluj. Of course, we were moving towards the source of the river. The construction of the biggest hydro-electric
power unit(s) on Satluj is going on at a brisk pace all across. Slowly we got hooked on, ‘lost’ in the power of nature.
We slipped into the bliss of being in the nature. A blessing in disguise!
Interesting it may sound, in Spiti Valley, we were put up in a hotel run by a Naga family. From the borders of
Bangladesh to the borders of China! The windows of the hotel offer a breath-taking view of snow capped Himalayas,
may be a kilometre away. Then we began to appreciate what it means to be an area of sparsest population density.
What it means to be living in sub-zero temperatures. What it means to be struggling to survive yet be happy and
generous.
The long drive back to Delhi, flight to Leh and travel on the world’s highest motorable road and hanging around for a
few minutes near Khardung Da (pass) at 5500+ metres, touching the cold waters of river Indus, seeing the yaks,
zomos (cross between yak and cow), and two-humped camels, seeing the households getting ready for five-months
for the sevenmonth long sub-zero winter, the impact of the presence of army, the ‘tourism’ and the civil society efforts
in education, building youth, and tapping solar energy etc., have reinforced our faith in the capacity of people and
their ability to surrender and live in harmony with nature.
As the financial tsunami spreads and we are more or less certain that this is economic depression, the quick
observations that help a majority of the common people are: When a bubble is building up, the debt of individual in a
country to one another is also building up. It appears that everyone in the game is making money. In this phase, it is
worthwhile to borrow money and take part in the game. The knack is to know the timing to withdraw and convert all
that into cash.
The actual worth of assets/stocks depends largely on psychology.
When the bubble bursts, the value of assets may go down below its original/initial value.
When the bubble bursts, the fellows with cash are the likely winners. The fellows having the assets, stocks, or
extended loan to others are the losers. They may go bankrupt.
At the end of the day, the non-participants in this game, may neither win nor lose. But the value of their assets
and money may go up and down like a see saw. This makes them worried and they hasten the processes of bubble
bursting out.
Let me explore a bit more on ‘finance’. There are six rates of the banks - the RBI and Government of India play with
in dealing with financial aspects. These are
Repo (repurchase) Rate (the rate at which
banks borrow from RBI), Reverse Repo Rate
(the rate RBI pays for deposits from banks),
Bank Rate (rate at which RBI lends to other
financial institutions), Call Rate (rate which
bank’s daily funds are borrowed), CRR (cash
reserve ratio – the minimum portion of the
bank’s deposits to be retained as cash) and
SLR (statutory liquidity ratio – portion of the
bank’s deposits that has to be deposited in
government securities).
By increasing/decreasing the rates and ratios,
RBI tries to decrease or increase the money
flow in the market which in turn may control the
inflation, interest rates on the loans to the
consumers/investors and on deposits to
depositors, psychology of the investors etc.
Interestingly, the common man only gets affected in all this. S/he is not aiding/contributing to any of these issues
directly. When the needs of the human beings are essentially air, water, food, clothing and shelter, the transition of
these becoming insignificant in the economy and all other aspects taking control of the economy is always intriguing.
When the food producer, when the educator, when the health care provider, when the people who help people to
meet their above basic needs do not get rewarded
adequately, but when the people who speculate, gamble,
abuse/destroy natural resources, when the people who
facilitate products and services that meet not-so-basic
demands getting rewarded exceptionally, it troubles the
common man deep within. This gets compounded as s/he is
only a mute spectator in the whole process. Further, this
process appears to be refined first with the introduction of
monetary system, later with centralized production unit(s),
subsequently with technology and of late with ‘soft’
technology and globalization.
When an item is produced locally and consumed locally, the
producer gets the most of the consumer rupee, mostly as
wages or compensation for the use of capital for the
purpose. When the distance between the production and
consumption increases, only a fraction of the consumer
rupee reaches the producer. The rest of it goes to a variety
of the players – storage providers, aggregators, transporters,
supply-chain managers, distributors, retailers, financiers, so
on and so forth. All these players hover around the
centralized production unit or a retail chain. This establishes that the control shifts away from the small producers and
small consumers.
Of late, we are hearing that the retail chains are
bleeding internally. Retail chain is a concept of the
west, where large
producers supply to the retail chain for distribution
and retailing. The management – supply chain
management – concepts are from this premise.
When the producers are small, the reality in India,
the aggregation is the first step. When a number of
retail chains compete at the aggregation stage and
each one invests in their own infrastructure, the
costs of aggregation go up. These costs are to be
borne by the chain itself or the consumer. In this
growing phase, the chains are taking it in and are
bleeding. This will trigger more processes of
mergers and acquisitions, which is the case now,
and/or common infrastructure by a group of chains. The small producers may find it useful to come together, in
this context.
Any perfect system, without consideration to its ideological background, is fine. The truth is that we never had, we will
never have a perfect system. These imperfections cause problems. The problems caused by centralizations are large
and acutely painful to the people even through they are not a party to it.
The questions before us are - How do we get back to decentralization? How do we preserve diversities? How do we
pursue/promote local production, local value-addition for local consumption? How do we get rid of the effects of
artificial demands and supplies? How do we get out of artificial psychological aberrations? Is it the literacy, is it the
communications network, is it the internet, is it the new technology, or a combination thereof – that is going to help us
in this pursuit? Do we or do all of us have to get back to fundamentals and take our governance into our hands?
It requires a lot of hard work, over long periods of time. From the lady who sat in the bus in USA almost a century
ago, to Martin Luther King Junior to say ‘shall overcome … one day’ to Barack Obama becoming the President-elect
of USA to say ‘YES, we can’ – it is a log way. When the leaderships find it difficult to be generous in handing over the
reins to more new leaders, what is the legacy of change we can talk about? Is it the structure, a piece of paper, or a
minor tinkering in the system for a little while? How do we build these first generation leaders is the ultimate question
before us who are concerned about the world and about ourselves.
Very few of us are willing to work on this process of building first generation leaders for legacy of change.
We, the ones who recognized this, need to be the first to be taking this forward – thought, conceptualization,
articulation, campaign, action, plan and follow-up.
We cannot continue to get frustrated and crib. We need to take the next steps. When we do not want to be
‘desperate’, we can plan to be joyous (if not blissful) and one with joy spreads joy around, to all beings, all life and the
world. 
*Information till Nov-2008

We Cannot Escape Change!
These are difficult times. Financial depression, expected to last a couple of years! Terrorism on its prowl
world over! Increasing corruption! Welfare schemes are not able to off-set the slipping well-being! rticulation
and organization notwithstanding, 80+% of Indians are reckoned as poor, by one calculation.
The month that went by saw mainly the interactions with the
elders, the communities in which they live, their
organizations and the organizations that support them in the
coastal areas, in the tribal areas and the areas in between.
Our engagement with young professionals in appreciating
poverty
reduction,
development
and
livelihoods
management effort continued.
Mumbai witnesses an unprecedented terror attack. This
time around, it is no longer bombs. The sixty-two hour
encounters caused more than 200 to die – mostly Indians,
some foreigners including Americans and Israelites, apart
from the 9 terrorists and 20+ security personnel. Marinos
and Commandos, South African private security agents,
unsuspecting frail ordinary men and women did their best to reduce the death toll. Only one terrorist could be caught
alive. There were angry outbursts against the politicians and the ‘neighbour’. Solidarity marches, candle light vigils,
saluting the martyrs, processions and rallies, 24x7 chats on the channels went on. Some political heads rolled.
Chidambaram took charge of internal security! Quite strangely, intelligence and bureaucratic heads remained
untouched! The USA and the world said they were with India. UN has banned some organizations. Some action to
take on the sources has begun.
Five states went to elections and the results have come. The long-drawn election process in Jammu and Kashmir is
still in progress. The voters, it appears, have not taken the ‘terror’ as an election issue. Local development and
performance, the analysts say, have been rewarded. These results keep the two main alliances for the general
elections guessing. Slogans have not worked. In fact, the third alternative has picked up quite a bit, to influence the
decisions at the local level, making the selection of the candidates, particularly genuine honest and young, important.
We need to wait and see what the J&K voters are going to tell us.
Amidst all this, Chief Election Commissioner indicates that the general elections may be in April/May 2009.
Constituencies have been re-carved out. Parties have begun to draw their election manifestos. The time has come for
setting the agenda for the next five years. We need to think about what we need.
RBI went ahead with its marginal corrections of repo rates and reverse repo rates, expecting the banks to cut interest
rates. It has provided Rs.7000 Crore and Rs.4000 Crore to SIDBI and NHB to augment the availability of funds for the
small and medium enterprises. Government of India waived central VAT on automobiles. Still, the jobs continued to
be lost in the world and by a small measure in India.
These are difficult times and fasting helps the times and the individuals. Fasting once a week for a whole day – from
after the dinner previous night till the breakfast next day – 36 hours - should be the target. We need to gradually
move into this regimen, say over 3-4 months. This helps in cleansing the system within, and the toxins, in emptying
the energy store house liver so that it wakes up from its dormancy, in being fit and of course, in helping the economy.
As I go through the trials, tribulations, conflicts, chaos and struggles, never did I realize that when the intensified
‘mathanam’ (churning) takes us through cleansing and testing processes. Then when we become ‘yukta’, the bliss
arrives to remain with you forever. Till such time, one can only intensify the explosive process of churning deep within
and around.
As part of our attempt to understand the current reality of elders, particularly the assisted/dependent elders, we are
numbed to listen to an elderly woman saying I starve so that my bowel movement is less frequent. Another elder has
to move to four houses, one after the other every 15 days or so. This ensures that the four children get the rightful
claim on her property for taking care of her now. She dreads each shift and silently and loudly she wishes her death
is sooner than later. An elderly man does not take medicines because he could not eat. He can not afford and he was
not provided for. Another man longs to live even in a far away age-care home. Aged and arthritis-driven old man has
to take care of his spouse who is bed-ridden and immobile although children are well-to-do. It became clear that the
next generation is looking at the elderly as a burden to get rid of, at a best a burden to live with. Then, our hopes
zeroed on the younger generation – children and youth. We do not know how this generation reacts. And this is the
case of a rich Godavari area of Andhra Pradesh! State Government just passes on Rs.200 per month pension from
the Central Government without adding their share of Rs.200. Will the ration suffice? How will it be cooked? What
about other needs?
Hindu Mythology talks of 84 lakh life species. Of these, the human species is bestowed with highest ability of making
choices and discretion. It can see the possibilities. It can in a sense guide future possibilities. And this person is rarely
aware of it; if aware, rarely uses it; if uses, mostly for meeting now and base level needs; and these are not to ensure
well-being of others now, but for the well-being of self. Strange! So much for our wisdom! How do we explain such
glaring differences? When we are blessed with a ‘different’ gift, knowledge, insight, skill, competence, wealth, why are
we not able to see it as a blessing by the universe to serve the universe and its human species and other life forms
now and in future?
Human Rights Day emphasizes our belief that every family has a right to live a life without poverty. The agenda for
the next five years should, therefore, include: Smaller administrative units. For example, AP may have some 50
districts. Elsewhere, blocks have to become small.
Smaller states. 1-2 Crore population states are feasible, viable and sustainable. Governance is superior.
Federal Polity with limited Union items
Regional Unions like South Asia as Confederations with common currency, free trade and free movement.
Empowered Local Governments with clear sources of funds and responsibilities
Comprehensive Livelihoods Plans in each habitation/ cluster of habitations, consolidated at the sub-district and
district levels and their implementation
Quality Education to All in Mother Tongue and Offering English Language Skills, Computing Skills etc., as part
of Education
Access to Quality Healthcare to All in their cluster of habitations/neighborhood
Schools for 3000+ vocations; paraprofessionals and community leaders – at least one per 10 families
100% Drinking Water and Sanitation
Re-organized local economy to meet local needs
Development/Livelihoods Professionals – at least one per 100 families
Adequate social security to all who need
Community Mobilisation of all poor – women and youth and support mechanisms for planning and accessing
resource support
Increased % of consumer rupee to producer/service provider – at least 60%
Increased % of government rupee to the poor – at least 75%
Universe and Nature has a way of telling us to take rest. A 10-day acute bronchitis taught me how nature works its
way. You can not push it hard. It knows how to push you back. As the vocal chords went silent for a while, as every
inch of the body cried for attention and care, and as ‘necessary breaks’ extend the period of ‘rest’, reinforced my
realization that nothing is more important to us than what universe is asking you to do. We are happy struggling to
survive. We can be generous only if we are happy. I remember the faith reinforced by the Ladakhis, the Spitians, the
Jharkhandis, the tribals in Dandakaranya, the elders in our midst - faith in the capacity of people and their ability to
surrender and live in harmony with nature. Why can’t we?
Silently, we have allowed the international volunteer day for economic and social development to let go. We know
that we get benefited by little help from others. We also know that we can help others a bit to better their situation.
How do we build platforms that bring out this mutual volunteerism – in minutes, in hours, in days or in insights,
knowledge, skills etc.?
We, as part of the common people, are at a loss. We are globalizing. We have become aware The food producer, the
educator, the health care provider, the people who help people to meet basic needs do not get rewarded adequately.
We do not seem to have a way of influencing these processes. Most of the products and services by the poor are
less competitive in the global market. We have no clue what-so-ever about the services and products in which we
have a global competitive edge. Does it not mean, as the bubble bursts/expands, most of us, the poor, continue to
poor or become poorer with no productive choices except to be a slave in a less competitive and therefore less
rewarding product or service chain? How can be the products and services that are competitive because of low
labour cost continue to fulfill the aspirations of the poor? As usual, as ever, we need the best brains cracking this nut
or these nuts! Can we hurry up, before we lose out? Of course, one option is to revert to our earlier system - produce
locally and consume locally, because this offers the most of the consumer rupee to the producer/service provider.
Can it withstand the rolling global juggernaut? Can we find ways, including ways to build coalitions,
networks, solidarity groups, collectives etc., that has inherent mechanisms of mutual support and cross
production and consumptions within? How do we decentralize further? How do we preserve diversities?
What is going to help us in this pursuit? Is it the new leadership?
Therefore, to my mind, it appears critical that we concentrate on building the first generation leaders who are
concerned about the world and about ourselves. All of us are aware – it is a lot of hard work, over long periods of
time. These leaders can talk and bring the legacy of change we are yearning for. We need to put ourselves to this
task diligently – from thought, conceptualization, articulation, campaign, action, plan and follow-up. 
*Information till Dec-2008

Leaders of Legacy of Change - Can We Build?
We were in difficult times in 2008. 2009 offers hope. Elections are round the corner. Youth are coming
forward with promise. Let us wish ourselves ‘excitement, change, peace, love and happiness’ in 2009 and
thereafter.
The month that went by saw our continued engagement with young professionals in appreciating poverty reduction,
development and livelihoods management effort. Our ‘dialogues’ on eldercare, youth empowerment and poverty
reduction have occupied most of the time. Balance of the time went into reflecting the voices of the poor and notsopoor through the lens of livelihoods and poverty reduction in People’ s manifesto for the next five years and taking
this into appropriate forums towards inclusion in the common minimum program of the next government (s).
India continued under the influence of Mumbai terror attack. Pakistan is still seeking evidence and India handed over
a dossier of evidence to them and USA, hoping that some serious action on the sources of terror soon.
The verdict of J&K voters is telling us that majority of them are interested in the democratic process and local
development issues too are bothering them. It is clear now that the elections will be, more or less, in April/May.
RBI went ahead with its some more marginal corrections of repo rates and reverse repo rates, expecting the banks to
cut interest rates. Still, the jobs continued to be lost in the world and In India. Already a million jobs are lost and we
are heading towards losing more than a ten-million jobs in India itself. The economic recession has moved from the
stage of pricking to the stage of hurting.
My move towards fasting is slow and I may take another 2 months to reach the full 36 hour fasting per week. With my
50% grade, I feel better and my physiological, emotional and spiritual systems are functioning better. You may also
like to try fasting, if you have not tried or if you are not already practicing fasting. If you taste it, you will get addicted to
it.
As I go through the trials, tribulations, conflicts, chaos, struggles, and intensified churning, the process is taking me
through cleansing and testing. This is intensifying further and becoming explosive deep within and around day-byday. I have tasted love and joy and I am sure (am I overconfident?) I am on the path towards lingering taste of love
and joy forever.
Our recent efforts to find professionals for development and/ or livelihoods for the sector are repeatedly revealing that
we do not have enough numbers available to be recruited/ inducted. The quality is mediocre and not appropriate. The
situation is slightly better at the community level. But they lack adequate skills and pay is not commensurate. When
the staff of a unit are involved in fighting with each other rather than fighting on how we can better the lives of the
lients you are working for, how do we get forward? When a professional wants to have 100 times or 1000 times the
average income of the people whose lives they are affecting, what is the way forward? The moment a community
level professional gets employed, then s/he loses the ‘empathy’ for the community, what is the way forward? When
the governance and management systems in which these professionals have to work are not willing to recognize and
not ‘able’ to manage them, what is the way forward? As a senior development practitioner has put it – “extra-ordinary
inflation in the salaries of the professionals”, particularly outside the development/livelihoods domain, makes it difficult
for the domain to attract and retain professional talent. What are the ways forward?
As part of our attempt to understand the current reality of youth, particularly in the age group of 18-25 years, a good
60-70% of them have been in school for 10 years. 3R Skills - Reading, Writing and Arithmetic – are weak for
considerable proportion of them. They are not interested to get into traditional livelihoods and they don’t seem have
the aptitude and competencies for the upcoming livelihoods. They do not have vocational skills. They like
entrepreneurship and self-employment opportunities but the capabilities need to be honed. Except for the doctors, the
employability of the graduates is low and is less than 10%.
Further, some 20 million youth are joining this flow at the leftend with this background. At the right-end, the elders are
taking more time to leave the flow. And at least half the people living on farming, artisanal livelihoods and related
labor need to be ‘rehabilitated’ in off-farm services and nonfarm services. All this makes a huge number – say 400
million – as of now and growing. Even if we take 5 years for this, we are talking 80 million per year. Added to this,
now we see people losing jobs because of recession! Then the moot question is – do we know the domains,
activities, skills etc., into which they can be taken to accommodate so many people? When liberalization, privatization
and globalization (LPG) processes are indicating to us that we are not having competitive edge in items that we need
like food etc. Our production per unit is not high. As LPG processes progress, we may realize more and more of our
products and services are not competitive and many of our farmers, artisans, etc., may not be able to get
remunerative wages for their effort and have to find alternative vocations. What are they?
Many a youth will do a service to himself or herself, if they invest in 3R skills. As the first skill of 3R is Reading. Some
quick steps in improving reading and for speed reading:
Stop reading loudly. Stop the lip movement. Stop the epiglottis movement. Stop the eye movement. Of course, this
is a gradual progression over a period of time, say one year.
Relax. If you're in the stressed mode, it would be much more difficult to concentrate.
Focus on the areas that you really need to learn.
Try not to focus too much attention on structure words like a, the, or etc.
Practice, practice, practice with setting a goal and upping it gradually. Similarly, get going on writing and on
arithmetic as you can not go far without 3Rs.
As we celebrate Christmas, New Year, Moharram and Pongal, the celebrations contribute to the livelihoods of the
people in terms of employment and incomes through the festivities, foods, greeting cards, diaries, calendars, travel,
vacations, etc. A little question then – is it ok even if it hurts other, even if it hurts you later?
Christmas reminds us of Jesus, the master leader with legacyfocus. What a legacy he has left on this planet that
lasted more than twenty centuries and likely to last many more! When you think of youth, National Youth Day and
another legacy -centered leader, Swami Vivekananda flashes before us. For him work was dearer than his life. For
him, youth were the future. For him both spirituality and reduced human suffering mattered. Therefore, Ramakrishna
Order! And Ramakrishna Mission! Amidst all these, we have allowed international migrants day, international day for
south-south cooperation and international human solidarity day, to pass by. We know migrants need identity cards,
ration in the place of migration, access to social infrastructure for their well-being, and safe remittance mechanisms.
Aajeevika Bureaus and Livelihoods Missions, can they meet all these needs? While the women in India in general
and in Andhra Pradesh in particular are demonstrating the fruits of solidarity to some extent, we still remain a divided
house. How do we come together and be together for our solidarity and our wellbeing?
This would also mean the solidarity of the development/ livelihoods workers can not be relegated to margins. This
need gets accentuated when we do not look at ‘development’ work as a mere career but as a vocation, a work for life.
The economic crisis in USA is explained well by Bruce Judson of Yale School of Management. In essence, he is
saying it is a domino effect – housing prices housing bubble housing crisis credit crisis sub-prime
borrower defaults stock market decline lower consumer spending decreased company profits lay
offs and job cuts spiraling vicious cycle. This may take anything between 3-10 years for reversing the cycle.
Since we are globally connected, many of us are affected depending on the degree of connectedness. As Bruce
says, crisis is a chance to rebuild our society in a better way. It is the time now to focus on solutions.
The crisis at Satyam is an example of, probably, this compulsion. The mortgaged shares of the promoters required to
be released. Slowly, the equity of the promoters has come down below 3.6%. It may slide further. Four directors have
quit. Registrar of Companies is digging deeper to know what went wrong. Lots of companies are waiting to take over.
Confessing the fraud in economic transactions the Chairman Ramalingaraju resigned to his post. We have to watch
how the story unfolds this month. Mean while, the role of independent directors is coming under scrutiny, here and
everywhere!
As usual, as ever, we need the best brains cracking these issues of churning. Can our governments see the people’s
issues from the lenses of the people, their livelihoods and poverty? Can we see any body really responding to
‘People’s manifesto’ evolved through this lens? And take the elements into the party manifestos now and later into
the common minimum program(s) of the government(s) they form? Then, will they deliver? Will they allocate
budgets? Will they spend the allocated budgets? Will they ensure that a 80-90% of the spending actually reaches the
targeted activity/institution/individual? So many questions.
Therefore, to my mind, it appears critical that we concentrate on building the first generation leaders who are
concerned about the world and about ourselves. All of us are aware - it is a lot of hard work, over long periods of
time. But we know these leaders can talk and bring the legacy of change we are yearning for. 
*Information till Jan-2009




Next Generation Leaders?
We are incorrigible and live on hope and optimism, as there is no other way to be. We are into 2009. Sun
turned northward. Obama took charge of USA. Prime Minister went through a successful by-pass surgery.
We have taken the progression of recession in our stride. Elections are going to be in April/May. Election
Manifestos are on the anvil. All parties want to invest in youth, women and social justice.
The month that went by saw our continued engagement with young professionals in appreciating poverty reduction,
development and livelihoods management effort. Our ‘dialogues’ on eldercare and poverty reduction occupied most
of the time. Balance of the time went into reflecting further the voices of the marginalized through the lens of
livelihoods and poverty reduction to fine-tune elements in People’ s manifesto(s) for the next five years and ushering
them towards inclusion in the common minimum program of the next government(s).
On the Republic Day, President of India touched upon poverty reduction, youth and women empowerment, equitable
growth etc., apart from terrorism and security. She says, obviously on behalf of the government: “….. The
development process itself is becoming an increasingly participatory activity. …. The richness of a few cannot be at
the cost of depriving others …..
Economic development serves a social purpose when it is for the welfare of the people. It is our effort to work
towards providing education, health and better living conditions for the poorest of the poor and the weakest of the
weak......
Economic opportunities should …be accessible … The poor and the disadvantaged people need to be drawn into
circles of growth, to avoid their alienation from the mainstream. Welfare and development schemes implemented in
earnest can bring about tangible difference to the lives of the people. … Improvement in the human development
parameters is important to create a productive work force and an enriched society. It is Gross Domestic Product
along with welfare of the people that are the twin pillars of a progressive nation.
….
Youth … Productive employment generation prospects can be created through skill development and vocational
training. …
A woman has a right to live with dignity and a right to be an equal citizen of the country…. Government has
introduced gender budgeting… Self Help Groups have proved to be effective vehicles for the economic
transformation of women. It should be our endeavor to bring every eligible woman under the cover of a Self Help
Group for her economic empowerment. …”
In stead of annual budget, only the vote-on-accounts (interim budgets till the new government(s) take over) are on the
anvil – Government of India on 16 February. Vote-on account does two things – it revises expenditure estimates for
the year; and it also provides estimates for the period till the new government takes over and gets the full budget
approved in the next year. Given that elections are around, the government will tell its achievements and announce
higher expenditures in the social sectors and some direct/ indirect sops.
RBI is also likely to announce some more changes in the rates like repo etc.
I am inching towards full 36 hour fasting per week slowly but surely. Consuming more water and fibre helps in general
and during the fasting in particular. With the grade of 60% or so itself, my physiological, emotional and spiritual
systems are functioning far better. If you are not already practicing fasting, you may like to try. I am sure, if you taste
it, you will get addicted to it.
As I continue, and I cannot help, going through the intensified churning processes, deeply explosive within and
around, I am getting cleansed and tested for the immortal touch, light and power of the universe and to ‘lose’ my
limits in joy forever. I am excited and enjoying every bit of it, in my quiet ‘progression’ in flow.
We get repeated endorsements that many of our educated youth lack employable skills - as our recent efforts to find
professionals for development and/or livelihoods for the sector are repeatedly revealing that we do not have enough
numbers available to be recruited/inducted. The quality is mediocre and not appropriate. Now a study by PurpleLeap,
a talent management institute, confirms this. Interestingly it finds more than 50% of them in the category of ‘hard-totrain’ in three employability skills – communication, problem solving and technical skills. 80% do not meet the
qualifying criteria in communications. Most of the 20% lack in problem solving and/or technical skills. Thus, only a
fraction – less than 10% are employable! Of these, how many opt to work in the development or livelihoods domain is
any body’s guess! How can we attract them? Not-so-employable may be interested to an extent but they need
extremely rigorous induction over long periods. What should be this induction? How this can be imparted to so
many? And who will invest in this? This situation gets further compounded when this not-so-competent
professional wants to have 100 times or 1000 times the average income of the people whose lives they are affecting.
Then, what is the way forward?
When the development projects of the government employ staff with an intention to make them accountable to the
community and fail to truly make them accountable to the community rather than making them accountable to the
officers in the project or government or their political masters, we see strikes and agitations for making them
government staff a la staff of Indira Kranthi Patham, the largest and model development project in the country. If they
have nurtured the communities to get organised and demand things, they would like to be role models to the
community by getting organised, and succeeding in government acceding to their demands. In the process, the
communities fail to have these staff accountable to them. Sensitivity of the staff can be a casualty! These large
projects in AP, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, Orissa etc., have to remember this. The new organization at the national level or
the nation poverty reduction mission in the pipeline has to begin its course keeping this reality in perspective!
The situation is slightly better at the
community level, with the community
leaders, activists and paraprofessionals,
service providers etc. But they lack
adequate skills and pay may not be
commensurate. Thus, skills for jobs inside
can not be neglected.
Skills for Jobs for outside employment –
what is the potential? An assessment in a
district indicated some 8 skill areas automobile mechanic, electrical motor
repair and electrical work, hospitality,
construction - masonry, nursing, cell
phone repair, IT enabled services, trade,
etc. Will they suffice to meet the numbers
in the reckoning?
This gets compounded with economic
recession and the frauds around. More
than a crore of individuals without jobs get
added to the natural supply of
unemployed annually. Then the moot question is – do we know the domains, activities, skills etc., into which they can
be taken to accommodate so many people? With liberalization, privatization and globalization (LPG) processes
progressing, we may have more and more jibs, skills and occupations getting out of the reckoning as we are not
competitive.
Warren Buffet’s suggestions to cope with recession may not be out of place here – do not bank on financial experts,
ork hard, be alert, have multiple sources of income, buy things only you need, spend what is left after saving not
otherwise, monitor expenses rather than just counting, look at and correct small leaks, do not put all eggs in one
basket, and never test the depth of the water with two feet. Can we pass on this wisdom of our elders which Warren
Buffet has managed to put together for us to all who take decisions in general and financial decisions in particular?
Then, what are the ways forward for us to influence, support, nurture and design now and in future?
This would also mean the need for increased number of people working in the development and livelihoods domain.
Even at one per 100, this would mean a crore of them. A minimum of 10% have to be professionals. One out of 10 of
them, at least, have to look at development/livelihoods work as something beyond a career, like a vocation, a work for
life with passion. Can we help increasing their numbers, their abilities and their performance? This is a task
before us, who are interested in decent livelihoods for all. Naturally, some of these have to be the best brains
immersed in cracking these issues.
When a Chief Minister recommends stoppage of live transmission of the proceedings of the legislative assembly, we
can be sure that transparency in public governance is a casualty! After five years of non-effort, a government talks
about a joint committee to look into statehood for a region, we can be sure that the political establishments do not put
the faith in the wisdom and capacity of the people, the quintessential value of any development worker. Then, it is
difficult to visualize our governments seeing the people’s issues from the lenses of the people, their livelihoods and
poverty. It is difficult to imagine any body really responding to ‘People’s manifesto’ evolved through this lens.
But, can we lose hope? As incorrigible optimists, we do not lose hope. We continue to ensure that these ideas float
around. We continue to appeal to the ‘vested’ interests why addressing these helps them. For now, let us fine-tune
the people’s manifestos further with more nuances from the specifics of a marginalized, in addition to the equity,
justice and right to life and livelihoods perspectives. Then, can we take them to appropriate and multiple fora so that
the parties, governments, bureaucracy and opinion makers agree to some of this at least? Can we pressurize them to
allocate budgets? Can we see that they spend the allocated budgets? Can we keep a watch and lend a hand in 8090% of the spending actually reaches the targeted activity/ institution/individual?
Therefore, can we concentrate on people, the new generation leaders, who reach out to these appropriate fora
and influence them in favour of the just, equitable and sustainable world in general and the poor and
marginalized in particular, now and in future. All of us are aware - it is a lot of hard work, over long periods of time.
But we know these leaders can talk, walk the talk and bring the legacy of change we are yearning for.
*Information till Feb-2009












Working with New Emerging Leaders!
We are going through a recession and the trough of the recession is still to come. Yet we have taken it in our
stride, living on hope and optimism. New possibilities - Obama took charge in USA. Prime Minister comes
back to office but may not lead from the front. Viajypayee has given way to Advani. Third front and fourth
fronts are emerging. Pakistan is in crisis. Elections are announced – five phases through 16 April to 13 May.
Social Justice, Women, Youth have come to centre-stage. Time for new phase, new lease for the people in
general and poor in particular in India!
While we have not celebrated World Day of Social Justice (20
Feb) and International Mother Language Day (21 Feb),
there has been a modest ‘toast’ for International Women’s Day
(8 Mar). With elections announced, we may ignore the World
Consumers Rights Day (15 Mar).
Certainly, recession has subdued festivities for Sivaratri,
Milad-un-Nabi and Holi to an extent, but the spirit has not been
dampened. The fasts and jaagarans of Sivaratri – the night of
celestial dance of blissful Siva and Parvathi, the rains of
colours of Holi – the play of the playful Radha and Krishna
have put aside recession, elections and exams, albeit for a
while.
March is also a month for examinations - of students going
through the exam-stress. The stress symptoms will be similar
for the stress on the projects and deadline-based
assignments. Well-researched, documented and articulated
way to cope with this stress is:
Prepare for the assignment (paraphernalia);
Schedule (regular time and place); Prioritize (list and schedule); Plan (difficult first);
Set milestones, rewards;
Take breaks;
Avoid getting stuck; Break up into smaller bits, and complete those bits one by one;
Review and re-schedule;
Say "No!" to distractions
The Election Commission has announced elections for Lok Sabha in five phases. The election code is effective from
2 March 2009 itself. Next Union Government is expected to be in place by the end of May. Andhra Pradesh and
Orissa are also having Assembly elections simultaneously. A guestimate making rounds is that Indian Elections are
going to spend more than Rs.10,000 Crore, more than Rs.100 per citizen in the country. This makes these elections
costlier than the recent elections in USA. We hear the candidates aspiring for tickets have to show more than Rs.1.0
Crore to be considered. It is anybody’s guess to understand that most of this money flows to voters. Again we hear
that the voter has become smart to take ‘gifts’ from all contestants and votes by his/her conscience.
Let us have some back of the envelope calculations. Five years ago, about 60% of the voters voted. UPA and the
present ruling coalition may have got 45% of these polled votes. NDA and the opposition may have got slightly less.
The electorate has gone up from 671 Million to 714 Million. Of the 671, about 50 Million elders/ non-youth might have
passed away. The new voters will then be about 100 Million. The people who did not vote were 250 Million. Thus, the
total number of voters who are in the realm of unknown are 350 Million, roughly 50% of all the voters in the country.
This should be the approximate trend across the country. The parties and candidates who make an impact on
this ‘new’ half can cause miracles. If they can find a way of staying together, if they can inspire ‘new’ voter
turnout, they will serve our country through the new government. Else!?!
If we have to single out 10 most significant social development sector programs of the governments, they will be:
universal compulsory education for 10-15 years; access to health care and insurance; universal pensions to elders,
disabled, widows etc.; universal subsidized public distribution system; universal self-help groups and their higher
order organizations to meet their credit and other livelihoods needs; universal access for 100-150 days of
employment/ year; minimum wages and minimum support prices to produce; cash transfer to families; skill
development for jobs, employment, self-employment and collectives; smaller administrative and governance units
(panchayat, block, district, state…) and devolution of powers, budgets and responsibilities to them. No party, no
coalition or no government can ignore these 10 items.
While elections may be over just 75 days in the country, when Rs.10,000 Crore flow into the system, they are bound
to create/enhance the livelihoods (let me call them Election Livelihoods). These include participation in rallies and
meetings, mobilisers, organizers and platform builders, posters/banners, advertisers, transport and public address
systems, security for the leaders, writers, cultural troupes, door-to-door canvassers, voter guides, ushers, hire
bicycles drivers, logo-makers, flag makers, cap makers, dressmakers, colouring agents etc. At least 50% of the
projected expenditure, I can safely assume, will flow to about a Crore poor individuals through these Election
Livelihoods activities, amounting to more than Rs.5000. Not a small amount! As poor, we look forward to more
elections! It is again, any body’s guess, how much of this will be actually accounted!
Apart from the thinking on elections, our now-regular engagement with elder care, with young development/
livelihoods professionals continued. I am almost there on the full 36 hour fasting per week now. All my physiological,
intellectual, emotional and spiritual systems are functioning far better. As I am getting cleansed and tested with
deeply explosive churning processes within, I remain excited and enjoying every bit of it, in my deep drenching in the
rain and quiet ‘progression’ in the flow of the nectar of the universe.
In stead of annual budget, Union Government has presented its interim budget on 16 February for 2009-10
amounting to Rs.9.5 Lakh Crore. It includes allocations, among other things, for:
I. National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in all the districts of the country;
II. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (access to and infrastructure for elementary education);
III. The national programme of Mid-day Meals in schools;
IV. Integrated Child Development Scheme in the country;
V. Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (urban infrastructure and services);
VI. Rajiv Gandhi Rural Drinking Water Mission (safe drinking water);
VII. Total Rural Sanitation Programme;
VIII. National Rural Health Mission (preventive and curative healthcare);
IX. Bharat Nirman (rural roads, telephony, irrigation, drinking water supply, housing and electrification);
X. Unique Identity for the resident population of the country; and
XI. Remote and interior Area Development Fund RBI has also announced reductions in the rates like repo etc.,
making the loans cheaper and money to circulate more. Let us see what happens. This can be felt only after the
elections.
ILO projects 50 Million unemployed; if we add partially employed – we may touch 150 Million in the world who are
unemployed due to recession. India alone may add 10 million jobless.
Is recession an opportunity to transform the financial, economic and monetary structures in this world? Then, what
our current leaders, including Obama and Manmohan, attempting is to patch-up rather than transform. Does not this
historic opportunity, coupled with the emerging new leadership post-elections, offer India and the world a chance to
attempt transformation of the structures and paradigms? Something fundamentally different!
If we understand broadly how we reached here - From the barter of products and services, use of generally accepted
things as goods of exchange, to use of coins, to mint, store and lend coins, to use currency, to lend money even if
here is no currency in the store, to banking, to banks lending without deposits, Cash reserve ratios, and borrowing
from ‘reserve’ bank, to essential plastic money and debt-based economy, to its fall and may be collapse! What is the
way out? Some one said, “India is safer because it has a lot of black money”. Do we get back to barter as far as
possible? Do we build local self-reliant communities, their organizations and networks that exchange products and
services? Is not the quality of life intrinsically linked to simplified life patterns and style?
If we love the world, if we believe that the world belongs to all human beings, in fact all life, then we need to pool the
best minds of the world to work on this structural transformation and paradigm shift. If we become aware that there is
enough for everybody’s need, we need to find ways to create wealth differently but equitably, and channelize the
wealth for caring the world and the life that needs care, as a right and an entitlement. We need to find ways to
redistribute the wealth to all the communities from whom it was taken. We need to discover how we can be a part of
the solution. Can we? Should not we? Should not our new leaders? Leaders of the new phase and new lease?
Yes, if we love the world. And may be, this is the TIME.
Apart from building the leaders in the society and community, we need business leaders with these thoughts. They
will come from the entrepreneurs. They will come from the professionals working in the collectives. They will come
from the community leaders managing their collectives. They need entrepreneurial induction. Important principles and
insights that matter, which we can learn from the successful visionary entrepreneurs, include: listen to people who
matter – the clients/customers; have talented people around and let them thrive; keep learning and open to change;
appreciate that there are failures and mistakes; focus, specialize, focus; be aware that service provision is a
business; feel and have total responsibility; flow with the change and use it; use intuition, all information may not
come or it is too costly; do not seek universal acceptance of an idea and go with the believers in the idea; keep
improving.
It has to be understood that leadership is about leading people and not things. It would mean inspiring people,
building new leaders, building relationships and leveraging them. All this is possible for the leader only when s/he is
not stressed out and exhausted. It may mean listening, counting the blessings, contemplating and reflecting, knowing
and reading, apart from yoga. Of course, they need to live the change they are leading.
When you want social enterprises, you need visionaries and inspiring leaders. You need context in favour of them,
offered by the leaders in the society, government and community. We need external facilitators to work on them
and internal animators to work with them. We need to build them urgently.
Therefore, can we concentrate to work with them? They work with the leaders in the society, government,
community, business and civil society in thinking and beginning to transform the existing structures and
paradigms for creating and channelling wealth differently? All of us are aware - it is a lot of hard work, over long
periods of time. But we know some of these new emerging leaders of the new phase and new lease can talk, walk
the talk and bring the legacy of change we are yearning for. 
*Information till Mar-2009








Hope, Now is the TIME!
Happy Ugadi!
It is an election quarter – March, April and May 2009. Results are expected on 16 May. Time for new phase,
new lease for the people in general and poor in particular in India! We got used to recession now, living on
hope and optimism that we will be through it soon. Pakistan continues in crisis.
In the midst of the elections, we continue to ignore many international days - World Water Day (22 Mar); World Health
Day (7 April). We may not celebrate World Creativity and Innovation Day (21 April) and World Earth Day (22 April).
Half of India went through versions of New Years – Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Tamil, Punjabi etc. Examinations of
students have ended. The students began preparations for their entrance examinations and admissions. The election
code is in operation for more than a month now halting some initiatives in the public domain. Of course, a very hot
summer has set in meanwhile. There are five National Parties of significance contesting more than 100 out of 545
Lok Sabha seats in these elections. There are two existing fronts - the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) led
by Congress, and the opposition – National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by BJP. Two more fronts – third and fourth
fronts - have come into being. The regional parties are able to call the shots in many states. The parties have
released their manifestos. They have also announced their candidates to a large extent. Many of them are still
tackling their rebel contestants. National and regional opinion polls are being conducted and projections are being
made. Most projections talk about no clear winner.
Simultaneously, the elections for the Assemblies in AP, Orissa and Sikkim are also being held. Most seats are
seeing multi-cornered contests.
Of the many issues that have been talked about, three things struck me – taking out the black money from Swiss
Bank Accounts amounting to a whopping (at least) Rs.25 lakh crore; Cash transfer (to poor) scheme; only BJP
(national) and TRS (regional) talk about Telangana and Darjeeling. On many other issues, there seems to be a broad
agreement amongst all the players.
While the opinion polls talk about ‘hung’ results, still the 50% of all the voters (‘new half’) in the country, can cause
miracles. Further, the untiring campaigns for voting by all, the ‘new’ voter turnout, if inspired, can make a huge
difference to the country, the people in general and the poor in particular, and their livelihoods.
If we take a cursory look at the manifestos of the parties, most of them talk about: universal compulsory education for
10-15 years; access to health care and insurance, health security; universal pensions to elders, disabled, widows
etc.; universal subsidized public distribution system, food security; universal self-help groups and their higher order
organizations, to meet their credit and other livelihoods needs; universal access for 100-150 days of employment/
year; minimum wages and minimum support prices to produce; cash transfer to families; skill development for jobs,
employment, self-employment and collectives/cooperatives; smaller administrative and governance units (panchayat,
block, district, state…) and devolution of powers, budgets and responsibilities to them. Most manifestos talk about
security.
While INC talks about 9% of GDP on education, its manifesto is rather sketchy with no in-depth treatment. While BJP
is talking about low tax and low interest regime, its manifesto is more detailed, touching almost all the relevant spects
of development and social justice, and offering insights into their thinking. It is also sustainability-friendly. Both of
them project their likely Prime Ministers – Manmohan Singh and LK Advani. The manifestos of the parties in the third
front are rather sketchy and does not offer comprehensive inputs for a common minimum programme. In fact, there is
no likely three-digit winner amongst them. And no leader is projected for the Prime Minister. Of course, there is also a
fourth front. It can be decisive king maker. There is NCP, as part of UPA, with Pawar projected as the PM.
As the road shows, rallies and campaigns progress, some meeting with accidents, some getting caught with bundles
of unexplained cash, the election juggernaut is rolling on.
Forget not to choose a good leader who loves life in all its manifestations and vote. All you know this can be
the decisive moment of our history. Let us play our part.
Seeing elections with livelihoods lenses, elder care, entrepreneurship and our now-regular engagement with young
development/livelihoods professionals are the main foci of the month. Personally, with the full 36 hour fasting per
week now, all my physiological, intellectual, emotional and spiritual systems are functioning far better. I am getting
cleansed and tested with deeply explosive churning processes within. I remain excited and enjoying every bit of it,
including my deep drenching and quiet ‘progression’ in the flow of the nectar of the universe.
It keeps coming back to me - recession is an opportunity to transform the financial, economic and monetary
structures in this country and the world.
Borrowing is nothing but spending our future, unearned, uncertain income today. When we borrow we are committing
ourselves to certain payout from future uncertain income. Therefore, borrow if you have to, to meet your basic
necessities in life like housing, health care and education. Once you have borrowed, get out of it as soon as possible.
One of the prudent borrowing rule of thumb suggests that your liability should not be more than 50% of your assets
for which you are borrowing. Further, we need to remember, when we service loan we are earning for someone else.
When we pay interest from our hard earned income, it becomes income for the lender. This means we are working
hard to generate income for the lender.
Recession may mean cut in remuneration for some and for some others, it may be a job loss. Then, the way out is to
find another job, to be self-employed or to start an enterprise. First step for going forward is to make an assessment
in terms of management capabilities, team engagement/work capabilities, multiple task handling capabilities and
versatility, ability to act independently with systematic, meticulous and detail-orientation, and self motivation, apart
from the achievements, experience history and technical and other soft skills. The next step is to zero on
employment you want – job/self-employment/enterprise. Recession is not a bad time to start new. It costs less!
In general and in recession time in particular, please appreciate that our basic needs are food, water, air, clothing,
shelter and entertainment. Then, the following tips, gathered together, may help: eat at home; carry a bottle of water;
buy the items that you need and not what you come across; buy in bulk; buy local products; choose unbranded items;
shop less frequently; buy off-season; and pay cash rather than swipe a card.
If we understand broadly how we reached here – from self consumption to local consumption and barter to local
market to ‘free mobility of goods’ - from swaraj to interdependent economy. This globalization with free mobility of
goods and services and this recession has made us realize that we do not know what goods and services make up
India’s competitive edge. For sure, we know many of our agriproducts are not competitive. It is a bad news for a
country with 70%+ living on agriculture and allied activities. While we need to explore the goods and services we are
good at globally, do not we build local self-reliant communities, their organizations and networks that exchange
products and services? Is not the quality of life intrinsically linked to simplified life patterns and style?
While we get used to the impact of global economic recession, our economy seems to be heading towards deflation
(negative inflation), driven by ongoing demand destruction. Deflation is a decline in the general price level. It is
caused by factors such as low money supply and credit, and a curb in spending by households, industry or
government. The lower demand during deflation often leads to a rise in unemployment levels. For starters, in a
deflationary environment, sectors with high proportion of variable costs compared to fixed costs are likely to benefit
from falling input prices. RBI may cut the cash reserve ratio further by some 150 basis points to reduce/reverse the
trend.
We always guessed it. Here is an endorsement now. A background paper for the DFID annual conference (9-10
March 2009, London) argues that the current global recession seriously threatens the achievement of the Millennium
Development Goals, and may push more than 90 million people into poverty. Times are uncertain, because the
scale of the downturn is not yet known, and the impact could be even more serious. Already, it is estimated 1.4 billion
people live in extreme poverty in the world. 800 million people are food insecure before the recession and the figures
might have, now, doubled after onset of the recession.
Unfortunately more than a third of them live in South Asia in and around India. No poverty reduction, no hunger
reduction, no unemployment reduction can happen in the world, unless they are addressed here. This requires lovers
(of life) and believers (that the world belongs to all), pooling the best brains (with heart) of the world to work for
hunger-free, poverty-free and unemployment-free world. This would mean working for structural transformation in this
world. This would mean shifts in existing paradigms. How can we have a person who finds no work and if s/he finds
it, the wage can be as low as Rs.20-30 per day when another person can take wage of more than Rs. One million per
day – some 50000 times? How can we have a person living on the street without a roof and another living in 100+
rooms at the same time? If we become aware that there is enough for everybody’s need, we need to find ways to
create wealth differently but equitably, and channelise the wealth for caring the world and the life that needs care, as
a right and entitlement. We need to find ways to redistribute the wealth to all the communities from whom it was
taken/is being taken. We need to discover how we can be a part of the solution. Can we? Should not we? Should not
our new leaders? Can we not choose our leaders with passion in this? Is it not a historic time?
Yes, if we love life, if we love India and if we love the world. Now is the TIME.
Apart from the political leadership, we need community leadership, business leadership and social leadership, with
these thoughts, abilities and passion. These will be men and women, mostly young. These will be entrepreneurs;
professionals in collectives; community leaders managing their collectives etc. All of them and us need to appreciate
that leadership is about leading - inspiring people, building new leaders, building relationships and leveraging them –
and living the change they are leading.
We need facilitators to work on/with these leaders. Can we get into this task, as quickly as possible, and
exhaust ourselves in this? I know it takes time, energy and persuasion. It can be tiring, and frustrating, at times. But
there is hope - some of these new leaders can walk the talk and bring the legacy of change we are yearning for. 
*Information till April-2009
Youth in the Lead!
Welcome to young Lok Sabha and young cabinet! 16 May - results are out. 15th Lok Sabha is constituted. A
more stable and young cabinet (government) led by Manmohan Singh is getting ready to be sworn in! People
in general and poor in particular in India are expecting them to deliver, deliver whatever is promised and
whatever is needed, with less time spent on managing the coalition partners!
We got used to recession now, living on hope and optimism that we will be through it soon. Pakistan
continues in crisis with more than a million fleeing Swat area. LTTE gives up in Sri Lanka and its Chief
Prabhakaran is dead, with more than a quarter million people running helter-skelter.
In the midst of the elections, we continue to ignore many international days – May Day (1 May); World Fair Trade Day
(9 May). We may
not
celebrate
World
Day
of
Cultural Diversity
(21
May)
and
International Day
for
Biological
Diversity (22 May).
It is also the time
of
very
hot
summer.
The
results show a
mixed trend of
voting
for
National
Parties
and for Regional
Parties.
five
National Parties of significance have managed to get 350+ seats. Of the 543 seats, the ruling - United Progressive
Alliance (UPA) led by Congress got 262, and the opposition – National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by BJP got
162. Third front could not cross 100 and the fourth front could not cross 50. The regional parties called the shots in
many a state and the multi-cornered contests changed the outcomes dramatically – AP, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal,
Orissa, Bihar, UP etc. Like in the Lok Sabha where UPA consolidated its position, in the simultaneous elections for
the Assemblies in AP, Orissa and Sikkim, the incumbent governments swept the elections (in Sikkim – all 32 by SDF;
in Orissa – 103/147 by BJD) except in AP (where Congress could get absolute majority on its own) because of multicornered contests.
More than 200 youth leaders are entering Lok Sabha, making it young and the Cabinet is expected to be young.
Further, we can safely assume that the old guard (read Manmohan Singh) is holding it for the youth leadership (read
Rahul Gandhi) for sometime. The future is transitioning from the old generation to the next generation.
The new governments have to deliver the promises made in the manifestos, and also meet the emerging needs of
the people. Whether in the manifesto or not, the basics that can not be ignored by any government include - universal
compulsory education for 10-15 years; access to health care and insurance, health security; universal pensions to
elders, disabled, widows etc.; universal subsidized public distribution system, food security; universal self-help groups
and their higher order organizations, to meet their credit and other livelihoods needs; universal access for 100-150
days of employment/year/person; minimum wages and minimum support prices to produce; cash transfer to families;
skill development for jobs, employment, self-employment and collectives/cooperatives; smaller administrative and
governance units and devolution of powers, budgets and responsibilities to them; ICT for all and for better
governance; security and safety of the citizens; food security for the marginalized; energy security beyond the nuclear
energy; and addressing the economic recession and effects of globalization. It will be great if they can announce their
complete plan for the five years in the first 50-100 days in office. Black money needs to be tracked and brought in.
Universal Education, Health and Livelihoods of the Poor have to remain in the focus. Everybody wants to watch
whether 9% of GDP will go for Education or not. Similar investments are required for Health and Livelihoods. Rural
Employment Guarantee needs to be expanded to include occupational groups and urban poor. Integrated Poverty
Reduction Efforts need to be intensified. As usual, middle class expects a low tax and low interest regime. Cash
Transfer to the institutions of the poor has to be considered seriously. Given the climate change considerations,
sustainability-friendliness has to be displayed. Devolution of Powers and Responsibilities to the Local Governments
has to be delivered – a long standing promise! Smaller governance units are the need – smaller Gram Panchayats,
Blocks, Districts and States.
Accountability increases. Corruption is the biggest menace that needs serious attention. If this is not addressed,
whatever else we do is of little consequence to the people at large. It is time to really begin the processes of bottomup planning, facilitating the people in their communities and neighborhoods to analyze their current reality/livelihoods
situation, identify the gaps and opportunities and plan. These can be taken upwards for consolidation and developing
district plans, state plans and national plan. To facilitate this and later extend support the communities, their
organizations and the local governments to implement the plans, 100,000 development professionals, may be one
for every 2,500 families (or about 1,000 poor families) can be identified with appropriate competencies that include
strategic influencing, development orientation, results orientation, tenacity and self-control, and nurtured/mentored for
this task. Further, 2.5 million development community leaders/animators can be nurtured and made available to
the communities. Incidentally, all this may not cost as much as the whopping cost of the electioneering (Rs.500
Billion!). It is also the time to think about a National Poverty Eradication and Food Security Mission. It is eminently
possible to think about the development cadre discussed can be part of this mission. Further, Employment
Guarantee, Skill Development Mission, Poverty Mission, Risk Management Efforts and Planning have to work hand in
hand.
Cabinet formation is in progress and the key ministries that matter to the livelihoods of the poor are not the topic of
discussion at all! However, the youth leaders are likely to enter the Cabinet in a big way. I tend to think that these
leaders get the portfolios that matter to the poor rather than the flashy ones.
Seeing elections with livelihoods lenses, elder care, entrepreneurship, collectives/cooperatives and our nowregular
engagement with young development/livelihoods professionals are the main foci of the month. In difficult times,
exciting times, and challenging times, like the times NOW, one area of concern is sourcing human resources for the
task. First people to be sourced are the most critical people, the dominant talent segment. For
development/livelihoods portfolio, it is people with development orientation and strategic influencing competencies
matter the most. Their induction has to be accordingly different.
They need to have the same vision as the leadership;
They need to remain the best friends of the communities and the leadership;
They need to believe in the capacity of the communities and their leaders;
They need to believe that the poverty and suffering are eradicable and need not continue;
They need to have some sense of urgency;
They need to have the grasp of the basic situation of the communities and they need to have tools to facilitate the
communities understand their reality;
They need to have the ability to see, source and put together all the knowledge, skills and resources from
within
the people (PK), from within all of the people working with the communities (our - OK) and from anywhere else
(outside - OK)
They need to have the ability to listen to the ‘silent’
They need to stay with the communities, outside of their own/native areas Another set of human resources is the
entrepreneurs from within the community.
Our new leaders should appreciate that the human beings are multi-dimensional and no one solution will suffice all.
Our new leaders should remain committed to this plurality of solutions. They need to be in the business of changing
the world, to make a difference for the good of communities who do not have loud ‘voice’. Now is a good time
because the world is ready to change (the market exists!). No business can succeed without a good plan. No
business can succeed without a fix on the structure, the structure of planning and delivery. High performers do have a
fix on their values. The values help us to choose when in doubt. Then the next thing is to be fixed is the culture and
life style that is simple but functional. The third thing is the team(s) that brings mutually exclusive but collectively
exhaustive set of skills, expertise and experience (not clones of the leader!). Of course, some funds are required. Is
that a problem? We always hear that the funds are not the problem and the problem is the ideas for the funds!
It is important that people know what is happening. They should know various view points from a variety of lenses.
They should participate in understanding their reality, the reasons for their reality and the ways to move forward. We
need to remind ourselves it is their life and they need to take responsibility for it. The new leaders should facilitate
and contribute to this significantly rather than shrunk in their traditional comfort zones of coteries and ‘experience’.
Can we not invest in identifying and building this resource for the community? Should not we? Should not our
new leaders think about this? Should not we induct our new leaders? Should not we and should not they reverse the
processes of planning? Should not we start exploring to come out of our comfort zones, of ‘leading’ to becoming a
‘servant leader’ of the community, truly, for a giant-leap forward for the new leader, new generation and future India?
Planning is the first step. Knowing the fundamentals is the zero step and these include food, water, climate, energy
and self-reliant communities!
Yes, if we love life, if we love India and if we love the world. Now is the TIME. Now is the TIME we see youth in
the new leadership in political arena. We see new entrants, not just the children of the politicians. We see youth in
new business leadership. We see youth in social leadership. We see youth in the community leadership. We see both
young men and women in leadership positions. We see them have these thoughts, abilities and passion. Some lead
from front and some lead by servicing the people and their collectives. Some are new entrepreneurs. Some are
trained. Some have grown with earthy wisdom.
Of course, we need to multiply this trickle into a stream, into a flood. This trickle of youth leadership has to take
responsibility to lead, inspire and build new leaders, build relationships and leverage. For sure, we have reasons to
believe that they live the change they are leading, bring the legacy of change and walk the talk.
Can we work on/with these leaders? Can we exhaust ourselves in this, right away? It takes time, energy and
persuasion. It can be tiring, frustrating, and at times brings brickbats and hardly any laurels. Yet, there is hope. That
is all matters. I know we are incorrigible optimists! Let us get going. 
*Information till May-2009
Be together! Collectivize!
Let us pray for reliable monsoon!
In the scorching Sun, missing monsoon
and troubling Aila, we can not fault any
body for ignoring international days –
World Environment Day (5 June); World
Day Against Child Labour (12 une);
World Day to Combat Desertification and
Drought (17 June) etc., We may not even
realize the day has passed - United
Nations Public Service Day (23 June).
UPA firmly in the saddle! Meira
Kumar joined as the third in troika of
women
–
President,
Head
of
Governing
Coalition,
Speaker!
President unveiled 100-day plan of
action of the Government. We are still
awaiting them to announce their plan
for the entire tenure of five years.
They may not announce! Budget will
give some hint of this.
It may be reiterated that it is time to really begin the processes of bottom-up planning, facilitating the people in their
communities and neighborhoods to analyze their current reality/livelihoods situation, identify the gaps and
opportunities and plan. These can be taken upwards for consolidation and developing district plans, state plans and
national plan. To facilitate this and later extend support the communities, their organizations and the local
governments to implement the plans, 25,000 development workers/ professionals, may be one for every 10,500
families can be identified with appropriate competencies that include strategic influencing, development orientation,
results orientation, tenacity and self-control, and nurtured/mentored for this task. Further, 2.5 million development
community leaders/animators can be nurtured and made available to the communities.
A National Poverty Reduction, Food Security Act (as promised in the 100-day plan) and Universal Education
Mission have to come immediately and improved National Employment Guarantee Act, Skill Development
Mission, etc., have to work hand in hand. Scaling-up the self-help movement in the entire country, collectivizing
and facilitating the poor in realizing a better proportion of the consumer rupee and meta-skilling them for improving
their livelihoods in the changing world on a national scale should be the key focus of the pro-poor agenda of the
government(s).
One needs to think how the food security will be delivered. If the method is to procure food and supply to the poor, it
can have disastrous consequences. The better method can be transferring the cash difference between the current
market prices and the prices promised as the food security prices in the account of the family. NREGA needs to
expand the scope to increase 100+ days per person rather than the family and should bring in occupational groups
into the fold.
Again, let me say at the cost of repeating myself. In difficult times, exciting times, and challenging times, like the times
NOW, one area of concern is sourcing and inducting the dominant talent - for development/livelihoods portfolio, it is
people with development orientation and strategic influencing competencies. Second set of human resources that
need to be identified and nurtured is the entrepreneurs from within the community. We should appreciate that the
human beings are multidimensional and no one solution will suffice all.
Environment/natural resource management, collectives/cooperatives, and marginalized communities have been the
main foci of the month. Visiting cooperatives and knowing how they service the significant needs of their members
sustainably has always inspired me. This time it is no different when we visited Mulkanoor and other CDF group of
cooperatives, thrift and credit, dairy and other commodity cooperatives. Amidst the visits, we hear that the doyen of
Indian Dairy Cooperatives, mentor par excellence, Dr Verghese Kurien was airlifted from Anand to Breach Candy
Hospital in Mumbai. As of now, he is stable and progressing well, according to his daughter Nirmala.
We are also hearing loud voices seeking Bharat Ratna for him. As his mentee, I think it does not really matter
whether he gets this award or not for he transcended all this. The month has also taken us to the collectives of high
risk groups with multiple discriminations – trans-genders, sex workers and men having sex with men. The projects for
them are providing clinical services and other support in the domain of health. Collectives have emerged to meet their
identity, solidarity, mutual support and advocacy needs, apart from ensuring involvement and participation in these
projects.
Some of them are able to transact and be part of mainstream collective efforts to meet their livelihoods needs like
savings, credit, employment, skills, insurance etc. Yet, some others are not able to meet some of these needs and
are able to articulate them. Some of them are also articulating that they want to life with dignity if there are realizable
alternatives. Thinking about the fast-depleting natural resource rich tribal areas consisting of traditional local tribal
communities (some of them being ‘primitive tribal groups’), migrant tribal communities, scheduled caste communities,
migrants and other mainstream population, always throws up a big question – why these areas are poor? What can
be done about them? Abundant land and good rainfall, selfsupporting minimal maintenance life styles, do not explain
the situation fully. What is the way forward? Is the education, alternative education a way out? Is the micro and small
enterprises a way out? Is collectivization a way out? Communities in the margins have to be in the centre stage.
This will happen with decentralization. This will happen with smaller units of governance. For example, Adilabad
district has to be split into at least three districts, if not more. AP should have at least 40 districts, if not 42. India can
have at least 50 states, if not 100. Then, they may require development workers in large numbers that sit with the
communities and help them to plan in their small groups, in their small habitations, in small panchayats, in small
clusters, may be around markets/ shandies, in mandals, in sub-districts and districts. One per 1000 families may be
the need in tribal areas. Every 50-100 families may need an animator to work with them. Planning is the crux.
Pedagogy to understand their reality and plan based on the reality within, gaps within and the opportunities outside is
the crux.
All of us need to appreciate the processes of marginalization and realize that marginalization, many a time, is based
on artificial constructs. Further we need to recognize that collectivization is a necessary element, but not sufficient, in
reducing the impact of marginalization and reducing poverty, apart from education, no/low-cost public services and
infrastructure. We need to acknowledge that some are potential entrepreneurs, some are potential self-employed
service providers (individually and/or in groups), and some are potential job holders in enterprises or with the service
providers.
They need to be supported differently. Further, the poor cope with their risks through diverse portfolios of multiple
livelihoods. We need to think 100 times before tearing apart this basic diversity fabric of theirs. Yunus, the Nobel
laureate, is convinced that social business, rather than charity, is the way to tackle social problems like reducing
poverty and tackling marginalization. Should we take his opinion seriously or not? Interestingly, we cannot agree
more with him when he says - social business, no matter what you say or do, is a matter of joy. This would mean all
thinking and sensitive individuals, if intelligent, should migrate to social business. Can we go whole hog in
persuading more and more talent into social business? Recession is a better time to step up this persuasion.
Is not it?
It is acknowledged that Recession and Slowdown appears to be an opportunity to develop low cost solutions, build
internal capacities and multiple skilled human talent, explore new avenues/opportunities and of course, draw the
workers/ professionals in mainstream organizations to look at alternative social businesses.
In social business, irrespective of its complexity and size, I understand, there are seven different managerial time
horizons (or less), from 3 months to 20 years and corresponding seven levels of hierarchy. The people with a shorter
time horizon treat next higher time horizon people as their superiors, and so on up the scale. It means, someone, with
less than 3 month horizon, treats some other with 3-12 month horizon as the boss. This theory is known as ‘requisite
organization’.
Typically, social businesses start small, may be on a pilot scale, and want to scale-up later. Being used to organic
growth in development domain, scaling up a social business is different cup of tea but an exciting and challenging
proposition. Getting social venture capital is critical but just one part of it. While by now, microfinance-based business
could be simplified and standardized, robust business models evolved and large doses of private venture equity
attracted, the other social business areas are in their formative stages because of their diversity and complexity.
Other critical parts of scaling-up process include attracting right talent, deploying appropriate technology, developing
marketing strategy and sales function, and having meaningful controls. More than anything, while the entrepreneurs
and managements have a concept that is scalable, they need to be ambitious and capable. Can we identify and
mentor them?
A recent idea, of social entrepreneurs in and around Hyderabad, of getting and being together as a network to
support each other and to identify and mentor more and more social entrepreneurs of potentially scalable social
businesses, is a step in the right direction. Thus, the poor have to be organized and their collectives have to engage
themselves in the businesses that matter to them. Their leaders have to have big picture and have the ability to
manage the talent that works for them. The development workers and the development animators have to be built as
a development cadre and be available to the communities to help them to plan up for collectivization and realization
of better lives for them.
The unemployed and under-employed within them have to be skilled and metaskilled for realizing better and decent
wages than today on a long-term basis. The entrepreneurial amongst them have to be spotted, nurtured and
supported for becoming entrepreneurs and build enterprises that provide jobs and/or manage the collective
enterprises. The social entrepreneurs, through their social businesses, have to specially focus on the above and help
communities to be together and collectivize in multiple ways on one hand and ensure availability of products and
services the community needs on the other hand at a scale that makes a significant difference.
Can we not invest in identifying and building these for the community? Should not we? Now is the TIME. Of
course, it is not new. There is already a trickle, may be in small streams. We need to scale them up into rivers. We,
those of us within us who have realized this, need to take responsibility to lead, inspire and mentor individuals, ideas,
initiatives, interventions and institutions to build pilots, leaders, relationships, levers and legacy - because we love life;
because we love communities to have decent livelihoods that do not eat into the capital of next generations; because
we want to learn and disseminate the learning; because we belong together. Of course, for sure, we have reasons
to believe that we live the change we are articulating, and walk the talk. Can we exhaust ourselves in this? It takes
time, energy and dogged persistence. It can be extremely tiring and frustrating. Yet let us get going, as we are
optimists to the core! 
*Information till June-2009
Entrepreneurs! Collectives!
India is praying for monsoon showers, with drought in the horizon! The temperatures have cooled down, with the
flowing monsoon with occasional showers and some drizzles. Reservoirs are still almost empty. The power cuts and
water supply cuts continue, all over. Arguably the greatest entertainer of the history, Michael Jackson, calls it a day
on 25 June 2009. Amidst controversies around his life earlier and now around his death, MJ could ‘entertain’ more
than a billion people all over the world, and inspire a good percent of them! His final message – spread love, and
therefore, joy; heal the world.
As we live the month, International Day of Cooperatives (4 July – first Saturday of July) and World Population Day (11
July) pass by. Delhi High Court has set aside application of Section 377 of Indian Penal Code for Consensual Sex
amongst adults irrespective of their sex and sexual orientation. Supreme Court and Government of India are mulling
over it. Meanwhile, Cabinet has approved the Bills for Food Security Act and Right of Universal Education Act. We
have to see the discussions that ensue and the final shape they take. Yashpal Committee (Committee to Advise on
the Renovation and Rejuvenation of Higher Education) Report has been submitted. The Committee recommends
merger of UGC and AICTE and creation of National Commission for Higher Education and Research, with a
Constitutional Status. They discuss - mushrooming engineering and management colleges, and Deemed
Universities, with some notable exceptions, have largely become, mere business entities dispensing very poor quality
education. It further highlights –
Besides making people capable of creating wealth they have a deep role in the overall thinking of the society and the
world as a whole. This job cannot be performed in secluded corners of information and knowledge. It would be silly to
deny the practical role of experts in areas of science, technology, economics, finance and management. But narrow
expertise alone does not make educated human beings for tomorrow. Indeed, speaking more seriously, one could
almost say that most serious problems of the world today arise from the fact that we are dominated by striations of
expertise with deep chasms in between.
…. Hidden in small places, in obscure schools, colleges and universities, there are potential geniuses to be discovered.
Many of them could be the great knowledge creators of tomorrow. We have to discover and implement ways that would not
put useless hurdles in their path. …. Stand-alone single discipline institutions should try to broaden themselves to provide a
more wholesome education to their students and thus qualify for the title of a degree giving university. …. in order to enrich
our higher education we might invite from abroad a substantial number of potentially great academics and scientists to work
with our students and teachers.
A report that can make a huge difference! Government of India responded that it would implement the same in toto.
We hear that Government is contemplating, rather seriously, a National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM). It can
take the responsibility for enhancing livelihoods of the poor, thereby reducing poverty, and improving National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act provisions and implementation, and Skill Development Mission and creating jobs for the
youth, and integrating them with the community institutions and collectives. It is expected that the mandate of
organizing poor women (50% now, i.e. 40-50 million of them, as indicated in the Budget) into SHGs, their higher order
federations at village, block, district, state and national levels, will be with the NRLM. It is also time to hire 25,000
development workers/professionals, @1 per 10000 families, to really begin the processes of bottom-up planning,
facilitating the people in their communities and neighborhoods to analyze their current reality/livelihoods situation,
identify the gaps and opportunities, plan and consolidate them to develop district plans, state plans and national plan.
Further, 2.5 million development community leaders/animators can be nurtured and be involved with the
communities in the process now and later in facilitating community collectivization processes. 2009-10 Budget Papers
submitted to Parliament quote Gandhi on the cover page – “Democracy is the art and science of mobilizing the entire
physical, economic and spiritual resources of various sections of the people in the service of the common good of all”.
Budget is one tool of this democracy in that pursuit. In difficult times, exciting times, and challenging times, like the
times NOW, one area of concern is sourcing and inducting the dominant talent that can mobilize these physical,
economic and spiritual resources and apply them for the common good. Second set of human resources that need to
be identified and nurtured is the entrepreneurs from within the community. We should appreciate that the human
beings are multi-dimensional and no one solution will suffice all.
The Budget focuses on some goal posts, in the domain of inclusive development –
Slum free India in five years
Direct transfer of subsidy to farmers in due course
Improved NREGA for all with Rs.100 a day as a real wage for 100 days for each working adult
National Food Security Act -25 kgs of rice/wheat a month at Rs.3 a kg to poor
Pradhan Mantri Adrash Gram Yojana in 1000 villages with 50%+SC population
National Rural Livelihoods Mission, restructuring SGSY, focused on organizing 50% of all
women into SHGs, bank
linkages and interest subsidy
Rs.500 Crore to Rashtriya Mahila Kosh as corpus
National Mission on Female Literacy to reduce female illiteracy by half in three years
Universalization of the Integrated Child Development Services Scheme to every child under the age of six, in three years
Interest-free education loans to access higher education, reaching out to 5 lakh students
Implementation of Unorganized Workers Social Security Act. It may be noted that the unorganized or informal sector of our
economy accounts for 92% of the employment in the country.
Mega handloom cluster each in West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, one powerloom mega cluster in Rajasthan and one mega
cluster each for Carpets in Srinagar and Mirzapur.
Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) for all BPL families
Eight National Missions towards adapting to Climate Change and enhancing the ecological sustainability
Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for providing unique identity numbers to each and every Indian resident
Goods and Services Tax (GST) from 2010
The
The
Budget Estimates 2009-10 provide for a total expenditure of Rs.10,20,838 crore
revenue deficit as a percentage of GDP is projected at 4.8%. The fiscal deficit as a percentage of GDP is projected at
6.8%.
Lots of encouraging intentions in Budget and we have to wait and watch how they unfold during the year. On the
other hand, railway budget remained passenger friendly. Collectives, Employment, Education, Economy,
Environment, Entrepreneurship, Human Resources and Marginalized Communities continued to hog the most of our
time during the month.
It has been re-confirmed - Entrepreneurship and Enterprises are not very different from leadership and organizations.
The stages of the group/team/organization – form, storm, norm, perform, followed by deform or reform/transform are
equally applicable to enterprises. The groups/teams/organizations require leaders/leadership to lead them and the
enterprises require entrepreneurs/entrepreneurship to deliver. The threshold competencies, the entrepreneurs and
their facilitators require, include – tenacity, self-control, strategic influencing, concern with impact, initiative, critical
information seeking, and the ability to see big picture and at the same time dig deeper. Entrepreneurs may have to
have results orientation and the facilitators – development orientation.
Facilitators may also shift between being ‘karta’ and ‘akarta’. Both of them need to have People’s Skills and Team
Management Skills. The processes for taking the bright (but poor) minds and helping them to be future leaders have
also been very similar. The competencies they look for include – drive, conviction, resilience, emotional intelligence,
integrity, optimism, openness. These are similar to those applicable to entrepreneurs, business leaders and social
entrepreneurs.
Social Entrepreneurs are slightly different from other entrepreneurs, in terms of their basic orientation of creating
social value, not necessarily economic value. One broad definition I liked the best is – social entrepreneur is an
innovative, social value creating change agent, in the constant pursuit of opportunities, not limited by her/his current
resource endowment, with a sense of accountability. The successful social entrepreneurs - all successful
development facilitators, public service providers and political leaders are social entrepreneurs in some degree – are
dreamers, decisive, doers, determined, dedicated, devoted, detail-hungry, in-charges of destiny, concerned about
sustained dollars (revenue), and distributors of ownership. They are focused, fast (in decisions, not hasty), flexible,
forever innovating, flat (organization), frugal, friendly, fun (place), and founders (supportive co-founders). Not just the
poor, the entrepreneurs need to be in collectives. The facilitators need to be in their networks. The leaders need
other leaders to be in groups. The social entrepreneurs are social animals and they need to find other social
entrepreneurs so that they grow, perform and transform.
It comes back again - we need to acknowledge that some are potential entrepreneurs, some are potential
selfemployed service providers (individually and/or in groups), and some are potential job holders in enterprises or
with the service providers, promoted by entrepreneurs or community collectives. They need to be supported
differently. The facilitators, therefore, have to first focus on understanding the current reality and appreciating the
gaps and opportunities, together with the communities and the potential entrepreneurs, job-seekers, best
practitioners and opinion makers. Then they need to build the vision for the community (in groups) and the
entrepreneurs, and support them in realizing the vision(s).
Social Business, no matter what you say or do, is a matter of joy. And we, the thinking and sensitive individuals,
should pursue joy. Then, we need to pursue getting more and more people into this. We need to pursue the existing
social business leaders to scale-up. Here, we need to reconcile that some are good to initiate and deliver the
prototypes, pilots, etc.; some are good in taking them to scale; some are good to manage and maintain them; some
are good to implement ‘exit’/’wrapping-up’/’winding-up’. Some of them, rarely, can transform themselves to play these
multiple roles.
We need to figure these various people and pursue them differently. They also have to be nurtured to learn and
acquire capabilities to deliver. They need to learn to pursue significance. They also need to be oriented to ecological,
economic and social integrity that helps the poor, marginalized and disadvantaged. They need to become, and
remain biased in favour of this. They need to be exposed to the functioning of the businesses. After all social
business is a business too!
We belong together, yet we are not identical. We need to be together so that we meet each other’s needs, yet we
play our own roles within the team. We may be a facilitator, leader, entrepreneur, employee in an enterprise,
manager of a collective or an active member. Whatever we are, we need to pursue meta-fishing, beyond fishing to
survive. We need to become enterprising and entrepreneurial (within/without). We need to be in collectives, teams,
groups. We need to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly! Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till July-2009
Skilling Youth! Integrating Facilitators!
It is drought, floods in some pockets not withstanding. As we live the month, International Day of the World’s
Indigenous People (9 August) and International Youth Day (12 August) pass by. In a couple of days, World
umanitarian Day (19 August) will also go by. You may note that International Literacy is round the corner (8
September). The Teachers’ Day is on 5 September – let us remember one teacher who has made a difference to our
lives. Of course, on 15 August, we commemorate 62nd Anniversary of Indian Independence. Jaya Ho, Vande
Maataram! On 14 August, it is Janmashtami, birthday of Krishna, the transporter of joy.
During the month, we have discovered 5Es – Environment/ Economy, Employment, Entrepreneurship,
Empowerment, and Education, in addition to existing 5Is – ideas, initiatives, interventions, individuals and
institutions for 5Ls – Life, Livelihoods, Leadership, Learning and Love. Further, as in the last few months, Human
Resources, Entrepreneurship, Collectives and Marginalized Communities continued to hog the most of the time of our
time during the month. Skilling the youth for their livelihoods has been engaging us for a long time. Recent
‘Round Table’ on this topic has provoked us to dwell on the issues therein at length. When about 20 million children
enter school (subsequently in workforce) every year, less than 20% pass the secondary education (Class X), not
even 5% join the undergraduate/higher education, and a fraction (less than 2%) join the organized sector
employment. Thus, about 80% have to join the agriculture and allied sectors as owners/labour, or become
selfemployed artisans or join the casual/semi-skilled/skilled workforce. Even half of them join the traditional sectors,
the other half has to be ‘rehabilitated’ in alternative sectors.
While the aspiration profiles of the youth, more or less, remain the same, the capability sets are very diverse. They
are not a homogenous set. The differences exist in multiple axes – background (tribal, rural, urban), literacy (less,
more), skills (less, more), security (security seeking, entrepreneurial – self-employed, running an enterprise, leading a
team), sex, marriage, knowledge, skills and behavioral competencies etc. Many may lack the basic 3R (reading,
writing and arithmetic) skills.
Many paradoxes exist – skills needed vs skills available, employers need skilled persons vs skilled persons need
jobs, skills without certificate vs certificates without skills, skills in abundance vs skills that support/enhance our
competitive edge, placement vs admissions etc. Industry’s ways of dealing with skilled workforce (blue collar) vis-àvis other human resources (white collar) is under scrutiny and there is a consensual demand for treating everyone as
human resource. With increased share of services in GDP, the concepts of service level agreements and full-time
equivalents are heard more often and they find their way into industry too. This paves way for increased outsourcing,
large units taking outsourcing from multiple units for increased scale and cost effectiveness, and need for multiskilling.
The issue is much larger outside the organized sector where 80-90% of the workforce of the year joins. It appears
that all skills that can be thought of are in the schedule of wages for minimum wages – if not in the list, it is treated as
part of others. With NREGA working, for unskilled, market has to pay at least Rs.120 for any skill. Under the
circumstances, how can we absorb with remunerative incomes guaranteed, some 10 million youth every year from
now on, after accommodating the existing 200+ million youth on the ‘bench’? Tall order! It can be a long wait!
Can we list the vocations and trades which are required for us and/or in which we have competitive edge in the
world? While we do so, we need to leverage our diversity. We need to add more diverse vocations and trades. None
of us know the future well. This would mean offering the youth multiple skills and meta skills so that cope with notso-certain future and future projections/forecasts. This would also mean better foundation of 3R skills to all. This
would mean encouraging and facilitating more youth to pass through the education funnel – say, we move towards at
least 50 clearing Class X out of the 100 entering the funnel. And towards all the 50 demonstrating reasonable
3R skills!
This would also mean we,
as families and schools,
teaching or children dignity
of labour early on. This
would
also
mean
increasing skill-schools,
occupational/vocational
gurukulams. Many of
them need initial funds to
begin and for infrastructure
and
they
can
be
encouraged
to
be
selfreliant in due course.
The trainers need to be
trained in the new and
expanded curriculums that
include soft skills, life skills,
etc. There should be space
for continuing education
and career paths should be visible. This would also mean they getting paid well, as well as or better than an
unskilled/ less skilled educated assistants. Then, it is possible for the youth to take loans, call them professional
education loans, and buy the skills education. Some of them need to become self-employed. They need to be
prepared for this. Some of them can be entrepreneurial in the skills-domain – they can lead teams/groups, or they
can start tiny enterprises that can take on outsourcing work, they can become service providers, they can be
collectives of service providers with multiple but interlinked/integrated services. Some of them need to be dovetailed
into viable business models.
Financing these models needs to be facilitated. In addition, there is a need for place to stay, eat and socialize in the
environment s/he is familiar with. This offers scope for ‘temping’ enterprises. I guess, New Livelihoods Mission that is
in the offing and the Skill Development Mission take all this understanding of the current reality in their stride and
respond. In all this, identifying the people based on their competency and interests, inducting them, and mentoring
them become the key processes forward.
Some BIG questions that come up – are we pushing ‘migration’ into cities? Where are the employers? Are we going
to have skills that are required in rural areas? What about the unemployment in the ‘educated’ – for example, Andhra
Pradesh alone has more than 400 Engineering Colleges, 800 MBA Colleges? Are they getting absorbed? It is
confirmed beyond doubt that employability of the ‘educated’ youth is less than 20%, by any reckoning. Their skilling
and training is beginning only after their ‘education’ – interesting, isn’t it?
With $2 per capita expenditure a day as poverty line, twothirds of India is poor. These poor, their organizations and
the organizations that work for them need skilled workforce, skilled in community mobilization, collectivization,
servicing their collectives, analyzing and planning for households, groups and collectives, pooling resources,
providing market intelligence, sourcing inputs, pooling the produce and adding value, marketing the pooled produce,
extension in managing natural and physical resources, social resources and financial resources, so on and so forth.
They also need service providers. They need teachers. They need health workers. They need milk testers. They
need book keepers. …… some 1 for 20/25 – i.e. 30- 40 million! Some 0.5 – 1 million integrators, wor k i ng as chief
executives (or their deputies) of community organizations, or the support organizations/units! Each organization
may service 1000-10000 people. We are aware of many organizations of this service outreach have business
turnovers in the range of Rs.100-1000 Million, comparable to medium size corporate!
Livelihoods/Development Management Education is required for these integrators/integrating facilitators. We need
more Lschools or D-schools or B-schools having L/D in their curriculum. This may not be enough. We may cover
some ground in the distance mode. National Institute of Rural Development is launching shortly one-year PG
Diploma in Sustainable Rural Development, in association with University of Hyderabad. Some 50-200 participants to
come out every year! This diploma is expected to become selfsupporting in 2-3 years. We need more of them,
programs and centres! If you allow me to dream, at least 100,000 participants need to be pursuing this every year!
I understand, from association with the design that is in process, the 35-credit one-year diploma, in two semesters,
will have seven 4-credit courses –
1. Sustainable Rural Development: Themes and Perspectives
2. Development: Methods and Processes
3. Policies and Programs of Rural Development
4. Resources and Livelihoods
5. Project Planning and Management
6. Stakeholders in Sustainable Rural Development Appropriate Technologies and Practices in Sustainable Rural
Development and 7-credit Project Work in two parts: 3-credit part 1: understanding and analyzing the context of
reality and 4-credit part 2: project/intervention. It will have audiovideo material, in addition to printed reading material
and 4 sets of contact classes, twice in each semester, for 5-6 days each time. Graduates can seek admission and the
participants get the diploma only on clearing the minimum grade.
Skilling youth, making the service providers available to the poor and their organizations etc., and increasing the pool
of integrating facilitators is the core of social development and/ or social business. Social Business, however tiring,
trying and frustrating it may be, is a matter of joy. Then, joy needs to be pursued by all. We, who have become
conscious, have to pursue others to pursue joy through this.
We may be a facilitator, l e a d e r , m e n t o r , entrepreneur, integrator, m a n a g e r o r a communicator in this
pursuit. Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to pursue meta-fishing, beyond fishing in skilling,
in d e v e l o p m e n t management education. We need to learn and mentor lear n i n g.
Tirelessly! Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! As I complete this, Government of India released a draft
tax code to be passed in the Winter Session of Parliament. The code proposes far-reaching tax rationalization.
Income tax rates, for individuals and unincorporated bodies, are proposed to be revised – 10% tax up to Rs.1 million,
20% up to Rs.2.5 million and 30% thereafter. Effective corporate (business) tax rate to be 25%! This may or may not
help in voluntary compliance envisaged. I get a feeling that this facilitates more people entering the world of
entrepreneurship and enterprises.
The code proposes no income tax for thrift and credit cooperatives, agriculture and allied including dairy, poultry and
fisheries cooperatives and other small cooperatives up to Rs.100,000/-. However, it proposes that non-profit
organizations have to pay tax of 15% on its gross receipts less permitted outgoings.
Further, the code proposes to replace the charitable purposes with ‘permitted welfare activities’ in the context of nonprofit organizations. These include relief of poor, education, medical relief, environment, art and monuments and any
other object of general public utility. Any other object of general public utility does not include trade, commerce,
business and service provision for fee for the services to trade, commerce and business, irrespective of the use of
such income later. Let us wait for the Winter Session! 
*Information till Aug-2009
Campaigns, Cadres and Collectives!
It is a national drought, last lap rains not withstanding.
As we live the month, Teachers’ Day (5 September) and International Literacy Day (8 September) pass by.
International Day for the Preservation of Ozone Layer (16 September) is round the corner. We need to remember
International Peace Day (21 September), World Tourism Day (27 September), International Day of Older Persons (1
October), International Day of Non-violence (2 October), and World Habitat Day (5 October – first Monday). One
more occasion to remember our teachers – World Teachers’ Day (5 October)!
Dr YSR’s death has prompted to order 12000+ statues! 400+ deaths! So much for his popularity! Combining
development/ growth with welfare has been his mantra to popularity, not withstanding a variety of allegations of buildup of assets, and corruption.
During the month, we have discovered that we are frail and fall prey to our egos easily affecting the relationships,
results and responsibilities. Further, as in the last few months, Marginalized Communities, Vulnerable Groups, their
Collectives, the people who work with/for them – staff, volunteers, professionals, entrepreneurs, mentors and the civil
society continued to hog the most of the time of our time during the month. Sustainable Development has been
engaging us for a long time. Recent and continued engagement in developing the curriculum, course material etc., for
the distance mode PG Diploma in Sustainable Rural Development has forced us to focus on it in depth. The course
outline that emerged is a good beginning to scale-up the campaign to build cadres for Sustainable Development,
particularly in rural areas.
The outline of the course looks as follows:
1. Sustainable Rural Development: Themes & Perspectives (4 Credits)
Understanding rural communities: structure, culture and polity
Rural social structure and social system; Social inequality and social exclusion; Social conflicts and social change
Approaches to the study of development
Development theories and rural polity; Economic growth; Growth with equity; Social development; Sustainable
development
Rural development in India
Community mobilization and institution building; Cooperative Management; Corporate social responsibility;
Development- induced displacement and rehabilitation; Democratic decentralization
Sustainable development: global and Indian context
Communities, state and civil society:
2. Development: Methods and Techniques (4 Credits)
Approach, theory and methods
Development processes
Social mobilization; Empowerment; Negotiations; Partnerships; Advocacy, accountability & transparency; Rights
and entitlements
Formulation of development projects
Basic statistical Techniques
Qualitative methods
Report writing
3. Policies and Programmes for Rural Development (4 Credits)
Colonial rule and rural India
Vision for India’s rural development
Planned rural development in India
Policies and programmes
Consequences of policies and programmes
4. Resources and Livelihoods (4 Credits)
Mapping of resources: ownership and access
Agriculture and other livelihoods
Animal husbandry and fisheries
Marketing
Environment
Livelihoods
5. Project Planning and Management (4 Credits)
Introduction to project planning
Project management systems
Implementation and monitoring
6. Stakeholders in Sustainable Rural Development (4 Credits)
Rural development and its stakeholders
Communities and their organizations
Cooperatives and other formal and informal organizations
Projects, stakeholders and power dynamics
Conflicts and conflict management
State, PRIs and civil society.
7. Appropriate Technologies and Practices for Sustainable Development (4 Credits)
Energy: Non renewable and renewable resources, water conservation and sustainable use, drinking water
Housing: low cost, eco-friendly
Rural infrastructure
Use of ICTs for rural development
Agriculture
Rural artisans and non-farm sector
8. Project: Guidelines for Formulation & Execution (7 Credits)
Formulation of sustainable development project
Project implementation
Project Evaluation
Project report evaluation
The same thing is required for
sustainable development in urban
areas. It becomes critical when the
urban population is moving towards
crossing the half-way mark. One
important question that has been
troubling us has been the form of the
collectives. Is it the cooperative? Or
can it be Mutually-aided Cooperative?
Multi-state cooperative? Can it be
producers’ company? Trade Union?
Association/Society? Trust? Company?
Unregistered Group? When Pranab
Mukherjee talks about new tax code
that talks about no tax on cooperatives,
what should we do? When the late Dr
YSR proposed to take over any
association/society or cooperative or
MACS, what should we do?
Under these circumstances, Producers’
Company under Indian Companies’ Act
(Section 581) comes as a relief, if
Pranab Mukherjee extends ‘no tax’ to the Producers’ Company also. When poor elders want to come together to
meet their credit needs, can we think about this? The objects referred to in Sec 581 include: production/consumption
and related, processing and related, education, training and technical services, power, NRM, insurance, mutual
assistance, welfare, financing and credit. It allows for individuals and/or incorporated and unincorporated groups/
institutions. It functions like a cooperative on governance and values patronage.
If this is not OK, NBFC can be a difficult option. Scale is an issue. Including welfare measures can be cumbersome. A
25,000 member community-based MFI, with an estimated credit turnover of Rs.1000 million! What is the way out?
Amidst this, Kapil Sibal announces scrapping examinations for Class X in CBSE. The obvious step should be to make
this applicable to all the state Boards. Let us hope he succeeds in convincing the states.
Reservation for women in Local Bodies has been raised to 50% from the current 33%. While we still have the raj of
Sarpanch Patis, in many a place, this paves way for more and more women occupying the seats of local
governments. Mean while, can we expect the women reservation in Assemblies and Parliament comes about?
Weavers’ issues remain unfathomable for many of us. At least Sainath is there to explore dry-land framing and
farmers’ suicides. Who is there for ‘weavers’? When a textile (handloom) park comes near a weaving cluster, when it
seeks weavers to work in the factory (park), when it seeks the weaver to specialize in a small part of the value-chain,
will it benefit the weaver? Is it OK to make a self-employed weaver, although chained to master-weaver and/or the
trader, into a wage worker and strip of his wholesome skills? Is it OK to move family-based occupation individuals out
of the family for work? Is it going to benefit the traditional weaving families or the new entrants? Further, can we think
of powerloom park? Does it really help the wage weavers? Is it not displacing more handloom weavers out of work?
Are there any ways by which we can ensure that the weaver moves up the value-chain? Are there any ways, we can
help their spouses?
When we need to increase the options before the people for them to make choices, is information, knowledge sharing
through books, literature, magazines, websites etc., will suffice? Is ICT going to help? Do we need cadres of
development workers?
When we discuss the cadres for sustainable development for India, we are talking conservatively, 1 million
professionals @ one per 100 families. If we talk districts, can we think about 100 professionals per district? This
would mean 60,000 in total. Plain enough, we need to work with 10+ to ensure that 1 is available. This takes us to
600,000. Let us agree to take a decade to reach this. Then, we need to ‘produce’ 60,000 a year. If we assume
batches of 30, we need 2000 batches a year. If we reckon at least 3 persons to mentor/facilitate a batch or two
batches a year, we need a team of 3000 mentors/facilitators/teachers working every year. This would take us the
mentors of the mentors or trainers of trainers. Let us take 3-4 years to have 3000 mentors. We need 100
TOTs/MOMs working every year for three years to ensure availability of 3000 mentors. This is the task. We need to
work towards. National Livelihoods Mission needs to commit to. Planning Commission needs to commit to.
Youth leaders need to commit to. Hope they are listening! We may be a facilitator, leader, mentor, entrepreneur,
integrator, manager or a communicator in this pursuit. Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to
pursue building mentors of mentors, lead mentors, mentors, professionals, leaders and volunteers. We need
to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly! Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till Sep-2009
Workers, Professionals and Entrepreneurs!
Unprecedented Floods - it is a national disaster!
As we live the month, we realize that October is a month of disasters and development! As usual many international
days pass by - International Peace Day (21 September), World Tourism Day (27 September), International Day of
Older Persons (1 October), International Day of Nonviolence (2 October), World Habitat Day (5 October – first
Monday), One more occasion to remember our teachers – World Teachers’ Day (5 October), 8 October (International
Humanitarian Day), 10 October (World Mental Health Day), 14 October (International Day of Natural Disaster
Reduction), 15 October (International Day of Rural Women), 16 October (World Food Day), 17 October (International
Day for Eradication of Poverty) have passed by.
During the month, we have discovered again that we are frailer than we realize and fall prey to a variety of physical,
emotional, relational, behavioral and ego, stamina and stress-related injuries and afflictions that affecting the
relationships, results and responsibilities.
Further, as in the last few months, Marginalized and Vulnerable Communities/ Groups, their Collectives, their
Sustainability and the people who work with/for them – development/livelihoods/social workers, professionals and
entrepreneurs continued to hog the most of the time of our time during the month.
We worked further on the course – Resources and Livelihoods as part of the distance mode one-year PG Diploma
in Sustainable Rural Development (this is poised to reach out to more than 5000 persons a year). The unit/
chapter/lesson-wise outline of the course looks as follows:
1 (Livelihoods): 1. Livelihoods – meaning and principles; 2. Livelihoods Framework; 3. Assessing Livelihoods
Reality; 4. Analysing Value chains; and 5. Livelihoods Interventions
Block 2 (Resources): 1. Resources – ownership, access, use; 2. Natural and Physical capitals; 3. Human and
Spiritual capitals; 4. Social capital; and 5. Financial capital
Block 3 (Environment): 1. Environment and Climate Change; 2. Environment and livelihoods, incl. Legal aspects;
and 3. Environment conservation and enhancement (EMF)
Block 4 (Farm-based livelihoods): 1. Farming System, Farmers and Labour; 2. Irrigated and Dry Land Agriculture; 3.
Horticulture, Floriculture, Commercial Crops; 4. Forest-based Livelihoods, NTFP and Medicinal Plants; 5. Livestock,
Dairy, Poultry, Meat, and Leather; and 6. Fisheries
Block 5 (Non-farm based livelihoods): 1. Artisans and other Rural Services; 2. Wage Employment and Job
Employment; 3. Self-employment, Entrepreneurship and Enterprises; and 4. ICT and other New Livelihood
Opportunities
Block 6 (Value-addition & Marketing): 1. Beyond Production – Storage, Transport and Disposal, market intelligence;
2. Local Value-addition - Off-farm and Nonfarm; 3. Processing and packaging; 4. Output market channels (Existing
and Emerging, Export); 5. Marketing into rural areas; and 6. Collective marketing (both production and consumption,
products and services)
Block
This effort is also continuing for other courses in the programme. A variety of programmes in the broader domain of
rural livelihoods/development needs to emerge. Then, this needs to transcend rural – to urban, to global and so on.
On similar lines, there is a need to attempt to design a complete campaign material to build development/
livelihoods/social workers, professionals and entrepreneurs, and disseminate the same in a variety of forms and
media. The e-learning, distance learning and self-learning material should be available in plenty so that the cadres so
build will not be ‘lost’ in due course of the pursuit of good to the poor.
Sainath said – everybody loves a good drought. That should be – everybody loves a good disaster! The
unprecedented level of floods in Krishna Basin is a case in point. The people affected, not affected, the volunteers,
the corporates, the leaders, the civil society, the donors, the researchers, the government servants, the contractors,
the helicopter providers, the transporters, so on and so forth get into action and derive benefit including addressing to
their inner calling. Amidst all this, one can understand the floods in Karnataka are a result of fury of the nature, may
be induced by climate change. The floods in Andhra Pradesh are beyond nature’s fury. Human faults have
compounded the problem. We are lucky that the second low pressure zone has become weak without affecting us.
Otherwise, the damage could have
been of the order of unimaginable magnitude! Even now, the estimated loss is
to the tune of Rs.250 Billion. The families and the communities, more than a half a million of them, will take more than
a couple of years to recover with all help flowing in full measure! Kurnool City may have to plan for a fool-proof
disaster coping plan including a wall around the city. Towns/Villages like Alampur, Rajoli may have to be built in
separate locations. Most of the productive assets have been damaged seriously. Standing crops have been lost.
Quite a number of them may not be able to get back to work within six months.
This would mean supporting them to survive for six months in addition to providing new assets, providing
working capital and rebuilding the shelter. Right now, after the end of immediate relief, affected people and the
volunteers are engaged in cleaning up inside and outside their houses, their workplaces, localities, streets etc., the
state is attempting to restore the roads. In a month or so, the task of restoring the livelihoods will begin. By that time,
emotions may dry up and cold rational calculations come to the fore. This is here we need to come up with rationally
sound solutions based on the current ground reality leveraging all the existing and committed support and the
articulated programmes of the state, donors and civil society. This requires building up cadres working with the
affected at that point of time to build their livelihoods and life restoration plans for consideration by post-disaster
supporters.
When Nobel Prize (Sveriggs Riksbank Prize in memory of Nobel) for Economics has been announced to Elinor
Ostrom, it is a testimony and endorsement to many of us in the development/livelihoods domain advocating
relentlessly for collectivization for survival, solidarity, managing commons, managing community systems,
consumption, risk diversification, value-addition, purchases, sales, marketing and advocacy for rights, entitlements,
and justice. We hope that the state will offer at least one form of organization for the people to come together with
completely favorable ambience/environment. Pranab Mukeherjee needs to extend ‘no tax’ to collectives, whatever
their form, engaged in a variety of activities, multiple activities. They need not be limited agriculture and related
activities. They need not be registered as cooperatives. Currently the best in the available forms, Producers’
Company needs to be in the list.
Society, Association and Trade Union can also be in the list. When Dr Balagopal succumbs to heart attack on 8
October 2009, we have lost the only hope of ‘rights’ in the country. We need to rise up to the occasion and fill the
huge void came about by his ‘departure’. His clear stand against ‘violence’, extra-ordinary simplicity and deep legal
acumen, coupled with compassion for the common man, make him an inspiring role model for many of us! The
debates about the climate change, global warming, increasing temperatures, changing seasons, decreasing periods
of rain, changing time horizons of monsoons, regularly irregular droughts and floods with unprecedented intensities
etc., make us look at alternative ways of living, producing and consuming. This includes agriculture. We know for sure
these changes affect the poor the most. This coupled with globalization, liberalization and privatization calls for
building food security, nutrition security and safety net
mechanisms.
Sustainable agriculture, by whatever the name, has
reached some significant scale. Indicative conclusions are
that there is no conflict between productivity needs and
sustainable agriculture; local food is the best food; avoid
food transport; disturb the soil to minimum; and
agriculture community needs to keep this in all studies,
research and comparisons now. Further, it reduces the
cost of cultivation to small and marginal farmers. The only
way forward, therefore, for sustainable agriculture, is to
expand.
From local food, we need to discuss local cadres. It is a quick guess that every six persons at least require 1 local
youth servicing their needs. These needs span education, health, consumption, information and communication,
inputs delivery, delivery of consumption items including food and water, marketing, services in the local
people’s/community institutions, retail shops, etc. Some of these needs are in the domain of enhancing existing skills
so that they remain useful. Some are jobs locally. Some others are self-employment opportunities. Some offer scope
for entrepreneurship and starting enterprises. For this universal saturation, we need to think of providing knowledge
and skills (hard and soft), building institutions of the people and employing youth, building institutions of youth to run
the enterprises that service the people or supply products to handholding support. There are reasons to believe that
some youth stay back to be useful locally. We need to explore matching and supporting locals with local needs.
Is there any other alternative?
When we discuss the cadres for development/livelihoods domain in India, we are talking conservatively, 600,000
professionals, and 600,000 social entrepreneurs @100 each per district, apart from 6 million community
professionals/ leaders. If we take a decade to reach there, we need to ‘produce’ 2,60,000 a year. Meaning, we need a
team of 23000 mentors/facilitators/teachers working every year. If we take 3-4 years to have these mentors, we need
200 longterm inductions facilitated by lead mentors. This is the task. We must ensure this!
Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to pursue building these lead mentors, mentors,
entrepreneurs, professionals, leaders and volunteers. We need to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly!
Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till Oct-2009

Development needs everyone!
Recent Floods have been declared as National Calamity. Further, recent rains in Nilgiris have also been
devastating! As we live the month, World Development Information Day and United Nations day (24 October), World
Vegan Day (1 November), World Freedom Day (9 November), World Diabetes Day (14 November), and International
Day for Tolerance (16 November) pass by. World Toilet Day (19 November) is round the corner. 14 November is also
the Children’s Day in India and 20 November is treated as Universal Children’s Day.
During the month, we have rediscovered that we are not having any control on the path we take. We remain ready to
flow in the direction of our intent and the universe flows take us in their stride. Further, employment,
entrepreneurship, enterprises, sustainable development/livelihoods/ agriculture, coastal communities, tribal
communities, elders, marginalized communities, vulnerable groups, their collectives, the people who work with/for
them – staff, volunteers, professionals, entrepreneurs, mentors and the civil society continued to hog the most of the
time of our time during the month. The effort to write the material for Resources and Livelihoods Course of the
distance mode PG Diploma in Sustainable Rural Development is in progress.
Efforts to evolve Socially Responsible Micro-Finance Institution for the Elderly are also in progress. Beyond rescue,
relief and rehabilitation, the project for restoring the livelihoods of the flood affected in rural and urban areas is being
conceptualized. The discussions in one village in Medak point out that the youth, as we always thought, are reluctant
to pursue the occupations of the family. Both unemployment and underemployment are highly prevalent in rural
areas. But a majority of them have to be absorbed in rural wage employment and traditional occupations. Employers
still talk about not getting useful candidates for employment in the areas they look for. The trained youth display three
kinds of propensities – job employment, self-employment and entrepreneurship/enterprise development. Some job
seekers are looking for jobs in urban areas and some other can opt for jobs in the enterprises of the rural
communities. Some of the self-employed can be rural service providers. The key is to go to an area to intervene in
this total ‘employment’ domain rather than looking at this issue in a piece-meal manner.
The poverty reduction efforts in the public domain across the country are taking four basic routes and their
combinations. These include – targeting through the existing government machinery like subsidy programs, NREGA
etc.; staffintensive projects like Indira Kranthi Patham, Vazhandu Kattuvom, Jeevika etc.; efforts out-sourced to
NGOs as contractors; and National Rural Livelihoods Mission as an extensive mission approach across all the
districts with universalization and saturation agenda.
Recent brainstorming deliberations on sustainable livelihoods and agriculture has reminded us of the brainstorming
workshop some eight years ago. Then we talked about transition from level 0 (social mobilization) to level 1 (universal
and collective businesses at village level). Now the transition is to level 2 (beyond villages, sustainable livelihoods
agenda at scale). One issue that came up is the network of structures that support livelihoods agenda. Similarly,
there are merits and demerits in both single commodity/function institutions and multi-commodity/function institutions.
There is a need to see production interventions and marketing interventions separately when we think of scale.
Quality appears to be the key concern.
We continue
to
remain and stuck at
cross roads on the
institutional options
for the collectives of
the poor. Society?
Cooperative?
MACS? Producers’
Company?
Company? We need
to
really
dive
deeper. If scale is of
concern, less than
Rs.50 Million private
companies,
less
than five years ago,
are now talking
about Rs.50 Billion.
We do not see
growth
at
such
scales
in
the
community
collectives.
What
should we do? May be it is better this way as the community retains control and local market sustains them,
reasonably free from complex, less certain and unpredictable market patterns.
One hopes, given that it is arguably the best institutional form for the community collective business enterprises, the
Producer company, a cooperative in its spirit and functioning, will be treated as cooperative and ‘no tax’ will be
extended to it also. While it is true that certain marginalized sections of the communities like elders, differently-abled,
destitute and vulnerable are yet to become bankable on scale, for mainstreamed poor and not-so-poor, there is no
dearth of the funds really for their activities. Banks lending up to Rs.0.5 – 1 million to a SHG and Rs.5-10 million to
the SHG Federations is becoming the trend. The key question then remains is where and how to invest these funds?
On the other hand, the poor and their collectives are beginning to think about tiny/micro-enterprises that require
venture support, in terms of equity, grant, loan, leveraging and handholding support. Windows for this effort needs to
be created and kept open at a variety of levels. Now is also the time for digging deep for the institutional structures
that support these enterprises.
Related corollary is the staff to work with the community – as service providers, as staff in the community
organizations and the support organizations. The range of these individuals is varied from being a service provider
like a book keeper of the SHG to being the specialists and chief executives of district/state/national organizations
requiring abilities far superior to the abilities of mainstream business executives and managers. The leaders of the
organizations have to learn to manage this kind of staff. All this would mean large scale and sustained capacity
building and learning effort across the country as a momentum.
This is where we see the role of National Rural Livelihoods Mission in rural areas and a similar set-up may have to
evolve for urban areas. We need to build the orientation of livelihoods – feasibility, viability and sustainability in the
communities and the people who work with them, A culture of making business plans, plans versus performance
monitoring systems and learning has to nurtured. We need to cross-fertilize the development domain with the best
practices from the corporate world. We need to enlist volunteers from variety of the worlds outside of development
domain to give more and more quality time to the poor in a regular, frequent and sustained manner.
When millions of women and men are being organized across the country into SHGs and their higher order federal
structures and when we have history of performance considerable number of these institutions more than a decade,
we need to attempt a current reality assessment on scale.
We need to employ ICT to
bridge
knowledge
gap/chasm that exists
across.
It
will
also
enhance
the
choices
before the people. It will
also help them to make
more informed decisions.
We need to augment,
rather
multiply,
information/knowledge
sharing through books,
literature,
magazines,
websites
etc. In the near future, we
are thinking to start a
separate web blog where
one can see the latest
news in the livelihoods
domain every day, in
addition to the current
emonthly.
Dedicated
development/ livelihoods channels at state and/or national level are required. Let us gather ourselves to go ahead in
this direction, apart from the community radios and audio-video CDs currently pursued. Elearning platforms are being
built and they need to be encouraged, expanded and popularized.
Of course, we need cadres of development workers across - we are talking 1 million+ professionals/community
professionals @ one per 100 families. We need mentors and mentors of mentors to build them up. It is an easy task if
we join hands and get going. We need to tap all sources and resources. We need to make our promising youth
leaders to commit to this agenda. We may be a facilitator, leader, mentor, entrepreneur, integrator, manager or a
communicator in this pursuit.
Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to pursue building mentors of mentors, lead mentors,
mentors, professionals, leaders and volunteers. We need to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly!
Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till Nov-2009


Right to be Independent and Developed!


World Leaders fail us at COP15! Some more time is lost in putting a framework for sustainable planet!
Telangana spurs movements for small states and movements for keeping the large states intact!
As we live the month, International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women (25 November), World AIDS
Day (1 December), International Day of Disabled (3 December), International Volunteer Day for Economic and Social
Development (5 December), International Anti-Corruption Day (9 December), Human Rights Day (10 December),
International Migrants Day (18 December), UN Day for South-South Cooperation (19 December), International
Human Solidarity Day (20 December), and Winter Solstice (21 December) pass by, without much ado.
During the month, our rediscovery that we are not having any control on the path we take, has been endorsed many
times over. We remain ready to flow in the direction of our intent and the universe flows take us in their stride.
Watersheds, employment, entrepreneurship, enterprises, sustainable development/livelihoods, coastal communities,
tribal communities, elders, marginalized communities, vulnerable groups, their collectives, the people who work
with/for them – staff, volunteers, professionals, entrepreneurs, mentors, mentees and the civil society continued to
hog the most of the time of our time during the month. Efforts continued to appreciate applying livelihoods framework
for coastal communities and outline processes for using venture capital and innovation funds. Material for Resources
and Livelihoods Course of the distance mode PG Diploma in Sustainable Rural Development is getting ready. The
program is expected to be launched in January 2010.
Business Plan for the Socially Responsible Micro-Finance Institution for the Elderly, and Strategic Plan for scaling-up
sustained community action to address health needs including HIV/AIDS are also taking our time. Scaling-up
community-managed sustainable agriculture offers new options for the poor farmers. We are yet to transcend the
draft conceptualization of the project for restoring the livelihoods of the flood affected.
CNN IBN annual awards announced: AR Rahman voted Indian of the year; Rahul Gandhi - politician of the year; and
Pratham –Indian of the year for Public Service. While 80%+ of Indians are poor if we go by USD 2 per capita line,
37% of Indians are poor, according to a report by the expert group headed by former chairman of Prime Minister's
Economic Advisory Council Suresh Tendulkar. Bihar and Orissa are the poorest states. For the first time, poverty line,
defined based on items - a wider access to commodities and services like health and education and not just calories,
has been used – per capita/day of Rs. 19 in urban areas and Rs. 15 in rural areas. The report has also concluded the
drop in poor in India is marginal over the decade. This would mean we need to raise allocations for the poor at least
by 50%, even if we want to target the existing schemes to all the poor.
Government of India has evolved common guidelines and is supporting the implementation of Integrated Watershed
Management Program, with a view to cover the entire cultivable land in 10-12 years. Thus, the micro-watersheds
gave way to larger integrated watersheds to be implemented by the Mandal/Block Panchayats, instead of Gram
Panchayats in Hariyali program. A way forward in decentralization!?
This month also belongs to Telangana. Telangana, meaning 'land of Telugus', was a part of the erstwhile princely
Nizam state of Hyderabad. After the accession of Hyderabad State with India in 1948, it remained a separate state till
1956 when it was merged with Andhra State, carved out of Madras province, to form Andhra Pradesh. It was India's
first state formed on linguistic lines. Currently, 10 districts – Adilabad, Hyderabad, Karimnagar, Khammam,
Mahabubnagar, Medak, Nalgonda, Nizamabad, Ranga Reddy and Warangal – form part of Telangana. It is situated
at a high altitude in an upland Deccan plateau with two major rivers Godavari and Krishna flowing through the region.
However, most of the land is arid. It shares borders with Andhra and Rayalaseema (parts of the existing Andhra
Pradesh), Karnataka, Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh. Its area is 114,800 sq km and population - about 35 million.
Major languages spoken include Telugu and Urdu. It sends 119 legislators to the 294-member Andhra Pradesh
assembly and 17 MPs out of 42 Lok Sabha MPs from AP. As of now, Greater Hyderabad, the capital of AP, is located
almost at the heart of Telangana. Telanagana was merged with Andhra in 1956 despite the recommendation of First
State Reorganization Committee. The struggles for separate Telangana in 1969 and separate Andhra in 1972 have
been successfully ignored. BJP wanted to give Telangana in 2000 but their alliance then with Telugu Desam could
not afford it. Telangana became a part of the Common Minimum Program of UPA in 2004 but did not see the light. In
2009, Telugu Desam and new Prajarajyam expressed their solidarity with Telangana.
Then, KCR of Telangana Rashtra Samiti went on to do indefinite fast on 29 November 2009. Students, Employees,
Jouranlists, Advocates etc., joined the struggle. Suicides, Rallies, Bandhs etc., continued. Most parties across the
spectrum have shown solidarity with Telangana. Finally, in response, Chidambaram announced on 9 December 2009
that the process for creating Telangana would be initiated.
Telangana witnessed jubilant celebrations and the rest of Andhra Pradesh witnessed wide-spread protests. Calls for
Jai Andhra, Greater Rayalaseema, Uttara Andhra, Kalinga Andhra, Greater Hyderabad as Union Territory, apart from
United Andhra have been raised. Strangely, most parties have changed their mind in a day and said they cannot
support Telangana. Assembly in AP and Parliament have been paralyzed for days. Demands for more small states
outside Andhra Pradesh have regained currency. Demands for commissioning State Reorganization Committee have
also sprung up. In AP, most MLAs and MLCs outside Telangana Region have submitted their resignations. Some
Leaders have started indefinite fasts. Health of many of themis deteriorating. Protests, Rallies, Bandhs etc., are in full
swing. Telangana is also persisting and pressing for separation in its own way. Meanwhile, Rajagopal et al started
ending their indefinite fasts. Now, Chidamabaram on behalf of Core Committee has put Telangana on hold on 23
December – "… after the statement (on Telangana on 9 December), the situation in Andhra Pradesh has altered. A
large number of political parties are divided on the issue There is a need to hold wide-ranging consultations with all
political parties and groups in the State. Government of India will take steps to involve all concerned in the
process….." Telangana started the fight again. En masse resignations followed.
Notwithstanding whether Telangana and other small states become a reality or not, there is a case for
decentralization in federal polity. When USA with 400 million population can have 50 states with less than average
population less than 10 million, India can think about at least 60 states with an average state population of 20 million.
There is nothing wrong in more than one state per language. Already Hindi’s states are multiple. Thus, we need more
small states. Telangana will be one. Tomorrow, it can become two more states.
In a family, if one of the members has opted to be on her/his own and have a separate family, it makes enormous
sense that sentiment is respected when s/ he persists for a long time, say more than 60 years, and let her/him lead
her/his life her/his way in her/his way. Period. In fact, others have to support her/him in establishing the family in a
decent manner, rather than coming in the way. Decentralization does not end with empowered small states. We need
empowered small districts. If I have to say a number, we need at least 1200 districts – one per 1 million population.
AP could have 75 districts. We need empowered small blocks/mandals, one per 5000-10000 families. Further, we
need empowered Gram Panchayats and Municipalities. It would mean implementing 73-74 amendments to
constitution and building further on them. 25 years is a long time to announce the intention to decentralize and
actually ensure that this happens and the local governments get empowered.
Further, empowered units have to ensure increased greater local participation and greater accountability in the
delivery of services, which has become possible with units of governance being optimally small. Building plurality of
effective leaders, in a variety of fields and disciplines, for these units is also important. It has to be noted that new
small unit does not mean losing out. The newly carved out unit and the remaining unit, both, may show performance
superior to the performance when together/united. The issue is, when one of them is unhappy, whatever be their
reasons, for a very very long time, the way forward is to endorse separation.
However, when separate, they need to work to a vision and robust strategic plan (s) including building
clusters/engines propelling growth spread all across. Further, the separate units need to be weary of rapacious rentseeking politicians.
They need to pursue sound policies that work to support universal inclusion and strong people’s institutions, business
and social entrepreneurs across sectors, and sound human development indicators including social security. They
need to run schools to produce hundreds, if not thousands, of ethical business and social entrepreneurs and
professionals who work in ethical business and social enterprises. At UN Climate Change Summit 2009 (7-19
December), COP15, at Copenhagen, world leaders have missed an opportunity for ensuring a better and safer
planet for our children. They could not agree to reduce the dominance of fossil fuels and Carbon emissions in our
biosphere at large and America and China in particular.
So called deal at COP15 contains no legally binding targets and no indication of when or how they will come about.
There is no declaration that the world will aim to keep global temperature rises below 2 degree C. Copenhagen has
revealed that climate change crisis or carbon crisis is indeed a political crisis at its core. US, EU, and China have not
responded well at all, given the scale of the crisis. In fact, there is nothing in this agreement that would persuade
energy utilities to go out of business. Negotiations under the Bali Action Plan (BAP) and the Kyoto Protocol (the
current treaty to fight climate change) remain inconclusive.
However, something that can cause little cheer is the setting up of $100bn global climate fund. Most of us, who
understand development cooperation and funding, can figure out this fund is largely made up of existing budgets.
There is no indication of how the funds will be raised and distributed so that poorer countries can go green and adapt
to climate change. Of course, BASIC has become stronger. At COP15, what we saw and heard articulated by the
most powerful men who ever lived was nothing less than the very worst instincts of our species. So much for
prosperity, peace and sustainability of the planet for our children! What should we do? We know that dependency is
not liked by anyone. We need to let people bridge knowledge gap/ chasm that exists across, enhance choices before
people and help them make more informed decisions and seek accountability from these ‘powerful’ leaders. We need
to build and make our promising youth leaders to commit to this agenda. We may be a facilitator, leader, mentor,
entrepreneur, integrator, manager or a communicator in this pursuit.
Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to pursue building mentors of mentors, lead mentors,
mentors, professionals, leaders and volunteers. We need to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly!
Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till Dec-2009


Leading in Knowledge Domain!
Jyothi Basu expires! An era ends!
State is a governance unit in a country. Why is it misunderstood as a country? How many lives need to be
lost? How many person-days need to be lost? For a Telangana, a state to be de-merged? When are we
making smaller districts? Why can’t we have perspective plans for these regions, in any case?
As we live the month, as food prices go up, Christmas, English New Year, and Sankranti are celebrated on a low key.
Kumbh Mela, the largest congregation of Hindus in the world, passed off without any serious incidents. Youth Day (12
January), World Religion Day (3rd Sunday in January - 17 January), and National Girl Child Day (24 January) have
passed without much ado. We see no agenda as yet for commemorating 2010 as International Year of Biodiversity,
International Year of Forests and International Year of Youth! While New Year began with lunar eclipse, solar eclipse
on 15 January was one of the longest in this decade.
By 26 January 2010, we are 60 years as Indian Republic! It is 60 years since we adopted Tagore’s Janaganamana
as Nationa Anthem (24 January 2010).
During the month, we got repeated endorsement – pursue processes/plans; results are byproducts. When natural
flows of universe become our processes, universe takes us in its stride.
Food Prices and Food Security, watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social enterprises, sustainable
development/livelihoods, elders, marginalized communities, collectives, the people who work with/for them, plans and
creative tension continued to hog the most of the time of our time during the month. We are still working to make the
material for Resources and Livelihoods Course of the distance mode PG Diploma in Sustainable Rural Development
ready. About 600 participants are going through the program in the first year of the launch itself. Looking at the
Business Plans of social enterprises, and working on strategic plan for scaling-up sustained community action to
address health needs including HIV/AIDS are also taking our time. Visit to Institute of Rural Management has aided
my reflecting on collective entrepreneurship and differentiating community entrepreneurship from collective
entrepreneurship. The work on preparing detailed project reports for clusters of micro-watersheds is still to begin.
Lent a hand in coconceptualizing Bharatiyam program with Vidya and Jeevika as two independent but inter-related
program components. Elements in Vidya include – vidyarthi, vidyaalayam, gurukulam and/or nidhi; and elements in
Jeevika include – kutumbam, jeevika, gramam and/or nidhi. More details can be seen at www.bharatiyam.org.
Business plan for ‘L-channel’ has also been initiated.
Another month has elapsed on Telanagana! All-party meeting at New Delhi on 5 January 2010 appealed for peace!
However, Telangana suicides are continuing! BJP expressed unequivocal support. All are awaiting some declaration
on or before 28 January 2010. While Glaciers may not melt by 2035, as projected earlier (recent faux pas admitted!),
we need to remain concerned of climate change. Stopping use of plastic bags can be one small step as part of our
remaining concerned – use biodegradable/fabric/paper/bamboo bags; carry folded cotton bags when going for
shopping; reuse nylon bags; if at all you have to use, thicker bags so that reuse is possible; etc. Start eating raw food
– as they offer better nutrition, fibre, flavor, health etc.; as they reduce preparation time; as they consume less
energy; and as they increase immunity.
Since I have been teaching Post-graduates (in Development/Livelihoods Management!) for a while, I went over the
recent book - What they teach you at HBS. HBS offers its curriculum in two parts – Required Curriculum (RC) in first
year through 10 courses and Elective Curriculum (EC) in second year through 10 out of 96 electives. RC establishes
a common foundation in the fundamental practices of business. The courses include: 1 & 2. Finance I and II, 3.
Financial Reporting and Control, 4. Leadership and Organization Behaviour, 5. Marketing, 6. Technology and
Operations Management, 7. Business, Government and International Economy, 8. Strategy, 9. Leadership and
Corporate Accountability, and 10. Entrepreneurial Manager. EC offers an opportunity for depth, breadth or both. The
critical advices from two years at HBS, brought out by Philip, include:
Resist the temptation to be a short-termist;
Be honest with yourself in choosing the right job;
Keep your moral compass;
Maintain the proper balance;
Make ‘change’ the friend;
Do not be a ‘career engineer’ but learn and grow at every opportunity;
Only thing you cannot afford not to do is to learn;
Professional happiness would come from being very good at something difficult;
Do right and be seen doing right;
It is important to learn why good people did bad things and to avoid that fate; and
Learn how to say no and how to juggle schedules. One question that is arising repeatedly is – all enterprises serve
some purpose which is of use to some customers (people, therefore social). Then what is so different about social
enterprise? What is that special social in social enterprise?
The best meaning of helping others in development action has been provided by John Dewey and it reads – The best
kind of help to others, whenever possible, is indirect, and consists in such modifications of the conditions o life, of the
general level of subsistence, as enables them independently to help themselves.
The five principles for "helpers" trying to provide help to "doers" are:
help must start from the present situation of the doers—not from a "blank slate";
helpers must see the situation thro’ the eyes of the doers—not just through their own eyes;
help cannot be imposed upon the doers—as that directly violates their autonomy;
nor can doers receive help as a benevolent gift— as that creates dependency; and
doers must be "in the driver's seat"—which is the basic idea of autonomous self-direction.
The helper-doer relationships are captured at length by the following "gurus":
Albert Hirschman - development advisor and a government,
E.F. Schumacher - development agency and a developing country,
Saul Alinsky – community organizer to the community, Paulo Freire - educator and community,
Søren Kierkegaard – counselor and a student,
John Dewey – teacher and learner,
Carl Rogers - therapist and client, and
Douglas McGregor - manager and worker (Theory Y).
With our work arena and abilities/skills mostly limited to sensing, analyzing/thinking, reading, writing and talking, we
tend to believe that we are knowledge workers. Then we need to appreciate - Knowledge is the capacity for effective
action. Knowledge sharing is a human behavior. Everyone is in the business of creating knowledge and sharing it.
Knowledge is born in chaotic processes that take time. We should know to appreciate and tolerate chaos.
Then, the organizations that work with knowledge workers need leadership different from charismatic decision
making. Here leadership roles are designer, teacher, and steward, requiring skills of building creative tension, mental
modeling and integrative systems thinking. In essence, it would mean developing an architecture that fosters
continual expansion of the capabilities of the members and building leaders, learning and growing leaders.
Building creative tension would mean building shared vision and appreciating current reality of where we are.
Facilitating personal visioning and aspirations, communicating and asking for support, re-visioning on a dynamic and
an on-going basis, etc., are part of this. Surfacing and testing mental models would require digging into
generalizations and abstractions, balancing inquiry and advocacy, differentiating what is espoused and what is
practiced, recognizing and working on defensive routines , etc. Systems thinking calls for seeing big picture, seeing
interrelationships, seeing beyond blame, detail vs dynamics, focusing on high leverage, going beyond symptomatic
solutions, translating the intuitive insights into logically argued conclusions etc.
To acquire these skills, the leaders need to learn to use tools - systems structures/sub-structures in management/
leadership domain like limits, short-cuts, lowering goals, reactions, tragedy of commons, growth vs investment, etc.;
charting strategic dilemmas like listing, mapping, contextualizing, sequencing, cycles, synergy, integration, linkages
etc. While we see networks of Corporate organizations, NGOs in districts, at state and national level, we do not notice
networks/coalitions of support organizations, consulting groups and social enterprises in development sector.
There is a need to build these networks and coalitions for solidarity, learning and collaborative bidding and work.
Further, we need low-cost software for small CBOs and NGOs. We need to have knowledge and learning platforms
in e-domain. We need wide-spread knowledge sharing/dialoguing through radio, websites, e-books, e-magazines,
you-tubes, slots in existing channels, and dedicated channels.
We are able to see beginnings of all these. They need to be done on scale. It would mean partnerships. Building
models of participation in creation, organization and dissemination. Financing through grants, venture capital, loans
etc. Seeking volunteers and running campaigns. So on and so forth. This may mean producing hundreds, if not
thousands, of ethical business and social entrepreneurs and professionals who work in ethical business and social
enterprises in knowledge management in livelihoods/ development domain.
Who should do this? Who can do this? What should we do? How can we help them to do this? Yes, we need to build
and make our promising youth leaders to commit to this agenda. We may be a facilitator, leader, mentor,
entrepreneur, integrator, manager or a communicator in this pursuit.
Whatever we are, we need to make it our business to pursue building mentors of mentors, lead mentors,
mentors, professionals, leaders and volunteers. We need to learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly!
Persistently! Repeatedly! Again and Again! 
*Information till Jan-2010

Learning to Learn, Practice and Lead!
Food Inflation is not budging. Food Security, a mirage! Srikrishna Committee comes to study ‘Telangana’.
Resolution postponed by a year!?
As we live the month, Sivaratri is celebrated. Valentine’s day remains a low key event. World Day of Social Justice
(20 February) and International Mother Language Day (21 February) have passed without much ado. We could
complete the material for Resources and Livelihoods Course of the distance mode PG Diploma in Sustainable Rural
Development during the month. 500+ participants are going through the program in the first year of the launch itself.
Bharatiyam Foundation has come into being on 15 February 2010 and it is going to manage/ implement Bharatiyam
Programs – Bharatiyam Vidya and Bharatiyam Jeevika. The work on business plan for ‘Lchannel’ is inching forward.
Watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social enterprises, urban, rural, tribal and coastal livelihoods, elders, poorest
of the poor, marginalized communities, collectives, innovations, the people who work with/for them, business/
strategic plans and creative tension continued to hog the most of the time of our time during the month.
This is also the budget month. Economic Advisory Council to Prime Minister has released its report. It picked up for
comment - Prices, Agricultural Productivity and Power Infrastructure. Food inflation has crossed 20%, despite having
enough food stocks. It points out two principal constraints to growth in India - low productivity in agriculture, and
inadequate physical infrastructure particularly in power sector. Research, to increase productivity in pulses and
oilseeds in rain-fed areas, and cereal productivity in water-excess areas, has to be stepped up. There is a need for
mitigation strategies for the four risks of Indian farmer - credit and finance, price, acts of god and technology. Other
highlights of the Economic Review 2009-10 include:
GDP growth rate projections: 7.2% in 2009-10; 8.2% in 2010-11; 9% in 2011-12
Large fiscal deficit is unsustainable; it needs to come down by 1-1.5% in 2010-11
Reduce expenditure-GDP ratio by 1 per cent
Expand service tax coverage; unify rate with Central Excise Duty/VAT
Scale up nuclear power generation
Let us await Pranab’s response in his budget proposals at the end of the month.
Most of us welcomed the decision to keep Bt brinjal on hold. Now that Shyam Saran, Special Envoy of Prime Minister
on Climate Change, has put in his papers, we are not sure of the direction of Indian climate change policy.
Seeing how a student chooses to a B-school to join – brand equity, average placement salary, profile of jobs, peer
group, accreditation/recognition, first impressions, exposure, domain preference, faculty, campus, cost, loan, return
on investment, location, facilities, etc., it is clear that we need to have comparable or better development
management or social enterprise b-schools. Then only we will be able to get bright young minds into social
development and livelihoods domain. We have 5000 Bschools in the country, producing 500,000 B-managers in the
country. Then, as we need 100,000 development managers/social enterprise managers every year, we need to have
at least 1000 D-schools, at least one per district.
Can the governments, corporate, civil society act on this? We are running out of time, please! In any case, we still
ave to figure out - What is that special social in social enterprise? We know all enterprises serve some purpose which
is of use to some customers (people, therefore social). Then what is so different about social enterprise?
While we take time to figure this out, we are absolutely clear that our managers and leaders in business, politics or
development are knowledge workers. Knowledge is the capacity for effective action. Everyone is in the business of
creating knowledge and sharing it. Managers and leaders facilitate this. Then they need to remain forever learners
and they should not be falling into the trap of ‘getting in their way of going forward’ –
need to win always and best others, add value, show the ‘smartness’ to the world;
need to be ‘me’;
need to pass judgment, as a matter of fact; need to comment even if it is not worth it;
ifs, buts and howevers;
not listening; anger, frustration and negativity; punishing the messenger;
refusing to express regret; failing to express gratitude;
holding information because ‘too busy’, or ‘forgot’;
not giving credit/recognition and claiming undeserved credit;
making excuses; passing the buck;
clinging to the past when the focus is present and the future;
losing track of purpose with focus on the mechanics
playing favorites
Let us try and learn to get out of the trap lest we will be less useful including to people around us. If we do not, the
very reason we exist, will be lost! We seem to be progressing towards have Rural Selfemployment Training Institutes,
one in each district, as part of National Skill Development Mission or is it National Rural Livelihoods Mission? Finally,
National Rural Livelihoods Mission is on its way to start its work soon. Social Mobilization and Collectives of the poor
as the key strategy is inescapable in poverty reduction or livelihoods improvement effort across, coupled with safety
net, education, capacity building and skill development. Accordingly, NRLM is expected to pursue the same. The
elements therein can be –
Three-tier sensitive support organizational architecture, at district (and sub-district), state and national levels
Universal social mobilization of all poor into self-help groups and their higher order federal structures at village,
mandal/block, district, state and national levels
Building their institutional capacities in terms of knowledge, skills, infrastructure, human and other resources - using
a variety of options including training of trainers and community resource persons/ paraprofessionals on scale
Pro-poor financial services including interest subsidy and leveraging revolving funds/ corpus grants to people’s
institutions
Convergence with other programs, schemes, civil society etc.
Scaling Skill Development for jobs, employment and enterprises
Demand driven plans
Accountable and transparent systems including social audit, concurrent evaluation and ICT-based online MIS Rural
includes plains, dry-land, tribal and coastal areas.
However, the processes that have been working in rural areas are being taken to urban areas as well. For example,
the Mission for Elimination of Poverty in Municipal Areas (MEPMA in Andhra Pradesh) is also adopting the similar
strategies for its way forward. The additional pointers that have come up, in recent consultations for way forward,
include:
we cannot stop at organizing women, it is time we take the next step of organizing men also;
developing an strategy for youth of an area, rather than looking at urban and rural youth separately; We need to
appreciate that both of them are competing for the same space in jobs and placements. We need to remember that
these youth can also provide services to their local constituencies. We need service providers to and staff in the
people’s institutions. Some of these youth can get into this.
Further, some of the services (like security, office support, etc.), that are being outsourced can be taken up by the
youth as a group or a formal collective.
collectivizing the youth who have been trained for jobs and placed;
collectivizing self-employed, enterprising entrepreneurs including street vendors, food vendors, etc.; May be a
tiered-structure of SHGs federated into a producers’ company. It can take up collective purchases, marketing,
branding etc., apart from offering solidarity.
As we see the progress of social mobilization of the poor, we notice that a good quarter of them (let us call them
poorest of the poor – POP) are not getting into the groups and accessing the benefits of mobilization. We need to
focus on this with more effort and alternative strategies. A dedicated cadre exclusively working for them needs to be
build.
On the other hand, we are also seeing the plateuing of the existing groups/institutions, clicheing of the existing
practices, sometimes ritualistic and sometimes lip sympathy. The time has come for efforts of rejuvenation, re energizing and new vision building. The paradigm of economies of scale that needs to include non-poor in scaling so
that the poor are in leadership and share the benefits of collectivization completely needs to be pursued.
The challenge now is how we combine this prosperity paradigm and POP strategy and get going. The challenge is
also to integrate poor and their institutions with the panchayat raj institutional processes and other programs in
convergence without they getting overloaded, burdened etc., still retaining the control on the benefits that need to
accrue to them. Yet, we know when democracy is not working well, the way forward is nothing but more democracy.
Let us facilitate democracy. Let us facilitate governance with poor in command. Let us facilitate convergence and
integration. Let us facilitate transparency.
Let us facilitate accountability. This may mean more knowledge; more skills; more leaders; more human resources
with capacity and knowledge; more platforms; more forums; more institutions and groups; so on so forth.
Yes, we need to build and make our promising youth leaders to commit to this agenda.
The leaders, the human resources available to people’s institutions and their support organizations, the community
resource persons, paraprofessionals and service providers, and other facilitators/supporters need to learn to serve,
support and lead. For this, they need to learn how to lead their personal lives first. They need to practice the art of
leadership, management, professionalism and service. The practice includes: setting aside time for solitude and quiet
reflection, physical care and fitness that may include walks, nutrition and live nourishment, reading, learning and
knowledge building, chronicling actions, thoughts and feelings, saving some sleep time and using it, plan for the day
and days ahead, listen and relish music, self-talk, recite and write pursuits, building character of principles that matter
which includes courage and relentless pursuit, and simplification of life. Do not give up practice. Join the rchitects
of the future. Know what you truly love to do (purpose) and then direct all of your energy towards doing it.
That is it! Universe will take care of everything else. Who should do this? Who can do this? All of us! We may be a
facilitator, leader, mentor, entrepreneur, integrator, manager or a communicator in this pursuit. Whatever we are, we
need to make it our business to pursue – learn and mentor learning. Tirelessly! Persistently! Repeatedly!
Again and Again! 
*Information till Feb-2010
Investing in Social Leaders!
Food Inflation is not budging. Inflation is expanding to other sectors instead. While suicides continue, Tissue slides into background for the time being! Government of India has presented a middle-class friendly
Budget! Reservation for women in Parliament and Legislatures has come centre-stage. Rajyasabha has
voted. LokSabha may vote for it in May! When SCs/STs can have quota within quota, why can’t the OBCs?
Happy Ugaadi (New Year)!
As we live the month, Holi is celebrated. 100 years of International Women’s Day (8 March) has made its presence
felt. World Consumer Rights Day (15 March) may not show its presence. We are immersed in understanding
institutions of the poor in AP where more than 10 million women have come together as Self-help Groups and their
higher order federal institutions.
The work on business plan(s) for ‘Lchannel’ is inching forward. Watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social
enterprises, urban, rural, tribal and coastal livelihoods, elders, poorest of the poor, marginalized communities,
collectives, innovations, the people who work with/for them, business/ strategic plans and creative tension continued
to hog the most of the time of our time during the month. In the midst of all this, we have noted that Government has
proposed to introduce a bill on cooperatives to insert article 43B “The State shall endeavour to promote voluntary
formation, autonomous functioning, democratic control and professional management of co-operative societies.” in
the Constitution of India. This paves way for cooperatives free from state’s interference in a year’s time in all the
states across the country. A watershed in cooperative movement! A better alternative to producers’ company!
Pranab’s budget proposals towards meeting the key challenges - quickly reverting to 9 percent growth and then
aiming for double digit growth; making growth more inclusive and strengthening food security; and overcoming
weakness in government’s public delivery mechanisms – include:
�� The total expenditure proposed in the 2010-11 Budget Estimates is Rs. 11,08,749 crore (8.6% over last year);
The Plan and Non Plan expenditures in e estimated at Rs. 3,73,092 crore and Rs. 7,35,657 crore respectively. Fiscal
deficit is Rs.3,81,408 crore, i.e. 5.5% of GDP.
�� The spending on social sector has been gradually increased to Rs.1,37,674 crore in 2010-11, which is 37% of the
total plan outlay in 2010-11.
�� Another 25 per cent of the plan allocations are devoted to the development of rural infrastructure.
�� Service tax to remain 10 per cent; 10 per cent central excise duty on all non-petroleum products; unified Goods
and Services Tax from 2011; Implementation of direct tax code from April 2011.
�� Income Tax – 20% tax for income above Rs 5 lakh and up to Rs 8 lakh; 30% for income above Rs 8 lakh; 10%
tax slab for income above Rs. 1.6 lakhs up to Rs. 5 lakhs; and No income Tax upto Rs. 1.6. lakhs.
�� Limits for turnover over which accounts need to be audited enhanced to Rs. 60 lakh for businesses and to Rs. 15
lakh for professions.
�� “The advancement of any other object of general public utility” to be considered as “charitable purpose” even if it
involves carrying on of any activity in the nature of trade, commerce or business provided that the receipts from such
activities do not exceed Rs.10 lakh in the year .
�� National Social Security Fund created for workers in unorganised sector with allocation of Rs.1,000 crore –
Government to give Rs.1,000 for each National Pension Scheme account opened by workers in the unorganised
sector
�� Rs.1,900 crore for Unique Identification Authority of India
�� Draft Food Security Bill prepared and will be put in the public domain
�� Banking facilities to be provided to all habitations with a population of 2,000 and more; RBI is considering giving
some additional banking licenses to private sector players including Non Banking Financial Companies; RRBs are
being infused more financial capital.
�� Banks have been consistently meeting the targets set for agriculture credit flow in the past few years. For the
year 2010-11, the target has been set at Rs.3,75,000 crore.
�� Rs.66,100 crore allocated for rural development in 2010—11; Rs.40,100 crore for National Rural Employment
Scheme; RS.48,000 crore for Bharat Nirman
�� Allocation to Backward Region Grant Fund enhanced by 26 per cent from Rs.5,800 crore in 2009-10 to Rs 7,300
crore in 2010-11.
�� Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) chaired by the Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission to be set up to
evaluate the impact of flagship programmes.
�� Rs.1,270 crore allocated for Rajiv Awas Yojna for slum dwellers, up from Rs.150 crore, an increase of 700
Perspectives percent with the aim of creating a slum free India.
�� 46% of plan allocations in 2010-11 is for infrastructure development
�� National Clean Energy Fund to be established
�� New fertilizer policy from April 2010
�� Organizing 60,000 “pulses and oil seed villages” in rain-fed areas during 2010- 11 and provide an integrated
intervention for water harvesting, watershed management and soil health, to enhance the productivity of the dry land
farming areas.
�� An Annual Health Survey to prepare the District Health Profile of all Districts shall be conducted.
�� Insurance and other services to be provided using the Business Correspondent model. By this arrangement, it is
proposed to cover 60,000 habitations.
�� Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana benefits extended to all such Mahatma Gandhi NREGA beneficiaries who have
worked for more than 15 days during the preceding financial year.
�� National Skill Development Corporation has approved three projects worth about Rs 45 crore to create 10 lakh
skilled manpower at the rate of one lakh per annum.
�� Exclusive skill development programme for the textile sector to train 30 lakh persons over 5 years.
�� Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana to meet the specific needs of women farmers to be launched with
a provision of Rs 100 crore as a sub-component of the National Rural Livelihood Mission.
Latest Forbes’ list of the world’s rich has 2 Indians in the top 10
and Mukesh ambani is now fourth rich in the world with his
wealth exceeding Rs.100,000 Crore. I hear that he wants to
devote a fraction of his wealth for the social good
in the country and outside. Three ideas merit his attention –
investing in building the development/livelihoods workers
in the country – one per 100 poor families (even if we assume
half of India is poor by 2-dollar poverty line) – 1.2 million
professionals needing at least Rs.100,000 – 200,000 per
professional, 12 million community paraprofessionals/workers,
dedicated development/ livelihoods channels, and augmenting
environment for educating the poor children – some lace to sit
and read, some tuition, some reading material etc. These three
initiatives together may not cost Rs.25,000 Crore over 10- 15
years. This is not a big amount by any token of imagination. I
hope Mukesh picks this up, pushes this and gets going!
This will ensure we will be able to get bright young minds into social development and livelihoods domain. We will
have service providers in most of the services the poor need. The poor will have the knowledge-skills-resources
‘elephant’ known to the poor.
This will mean we need 1000 D-schools, at least one per district. This can be initiated. Governments, corporate, civil
society act on this, if someone like Mukesh leads from the front. The way Bill Gates is leading on the health front. We
are running out of time, can we work on these leaders to become social leaders, social entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs
supporting social entrepreneurs, please! Let us try and learn to get into this lest we will be less useful including to
people around us. If we do not, the very reason we exist, will be lost!
Yes, we need to build and make our promising business leaders, together with the political leaders to commit
to this agenda. Do not give up practice. Join the architects of the future. Know what you truly love to do
(purpose) and then direct all of your energy towards doing it. That is it! �
*Information till Mar-2010

Transforming Leaders!
We got used to inflation now.
Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education becomes an Act and is being implemented with effect
from April 2010. However, it misses on child’s growth from the embryo to age 6, and age 14 to till s/he attains
majority, the crucial transition period. As we live the month, World Water Day (22 March), World Health Day (7 April),
and World Entrepreneurs Day (16 April) pass by, and World Creativity and Innovation Day (21 April), Earth Day (22
April), World Book and Copyright Day (23 April), World Intellectual Property Day (26 April) and World Day for Safety
and Health at Work (28 April) may not show their passing by. Dr BR Ambedkar has been remembered widely (14
April). We are further deeply immersed in understanding institutions of the poor in AP where more than 10 million
women have come together as Self-help Groups and their higher order federal institutions. Zero drafts of the
business plan(s) for ‘L-channel’ and other L info units are ready and the work on the deeper details is inching
forward.
Collectives, watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social enterprises, urban, rural, tribal and coastal livelihoods,
elders, poorest of the poor, marginalized communities, innovations, the people who work with/for them, financing the
poor, their collectives, the institutions/enterprises that ‘work’ for them, business/ strategic plans and creative tension
continued to hog the most of our time during the month. Appreciating Education value-chain from the stage of the
embryo in the mother’s womb till adulthood and productive employment - job, self employment or enterprise and Land
Value-chain applicable to poor – land access to land development to production to marketing produce has also
consumed considerable effort.
Of late, we see some progress in Islamic Banking – banking with no interest charge. In Murabaha system (like hire
purchase or purchase and re-sale), the banker provides/sells the asset to the client and the profit from the asset
provides reasonable return on investment to the banker and the client repays the amount in agreed number of
installments. In Musharaka partnership system, like a venture capital, the banker provides a part of investment and
agrees to a sharing of profits proportional to the investments, after deducting agreed level of management expenses.
In the long term, the investment of the banker can be bought by the entrepreneur in a gradual manner or otherwise.
Some bankers limit to charging some fixed administrative/service charges. In a variant, the money could be sourced
without cost and lent on service charge basis. The successful entrepreneur then pays back a certain lump sum
amount as a token of gratitude/ goodwill, or a certain percentage of the returns as an annual/ regular payback so that
others can be ‘helped’.
We also see the initial public offer from SKS Microfinance Limited. Md. Younus has found this not OK, saying that we
cannot assure shareholders that they will make more returns on their investment and providing credit to the poor at
reasonable rates, at the same time. Let us take a hypothetical and simplistic organization, which puts in Rs.100 as
equity and borrows Rs.1000 from banks for lending to poor. Assuming that they lend at 20% per annum in a declining
interest rate, they get an interest of Rs.220 from the lending operations. If they incur 5% towards
management/operational costs, MFI will still have Rs.165 from which Rs.120 may have to be paid out as interest on
loan funds. The net surplus will be Rs.45 on equity investment of Rs.45. This is a clear 45% returns per annum.
The market talks about equity returns beyond 100% also. Of course, most of this goes into business expansion. The
issue becomes more interesting if we realize that some of the Rs.100 comes from philanthropic sources. In an
extreme case, most of it is philanthropic and becomes private in due course! Top management receives share
allotment in a significant manner, receive stock options and gains from allowing to sell the shares in the market early
on. Further, the managerial remuneration to the top management is comparable to the mainstream business
(sometimes better!). The remunerations received by the professional staff have also increased by more than 100%
even in these times of recession. If we see the placement of most management professionals with some
development orientation, they are all ending up in these organizations. Unfortunately many other organizations are
not able to cope with competition for human ‘talent’.Interesting, isn’t it?
However, the news is that 31 NBFC-MFIs have come together to set up MFIN, a self regulatory organization of
NBFC-MFIs. Its articulated aim is to work with the regulators to promote MF to achieve larger Financial Inclusion,
enhance responsible lending and institutionalize processes of credit information sharing. Further, MFIN members
have invested in Alpha Micro Finance Consultants P Ltd (Alpha), which in turn has invested Rs. 2 Crore in setting up
a credit bureau. The credit bureau will help improve credit risk management within the sector and ensure multiple
borrowing and over indebtedness is checked. MFIN has also defined a Code of Conduct for member MFIs. This
includes: fair practices with borrowers, transparency, overall lending limits at client level, data sharing, recruitment
practices, whistle blowing and enforcement mechanisms. Members have also committed to communicate interest
rates on reducing balance method and other charges clearly to members while following fair recovery mechanisms.
2010 is talking about profiling the citizens in a variety of ways (PAN cards; Election cards exist; National Population
Register for all persons aged above 15 years, including biometric identification of all 10 fingers and photograph, as
part of Census, under the Citizenship Act is coming; Unique Identification is on the anvil; DNA Bank is waiting to
come on board; profiling of SHG member-households is being scaledup etc.). It is understood that National
Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) will access consolidated data from a number of databases that include: railway and air
travel, income tax, phone calls, bank account details, credit card transactions, visa and immigration records, property
records, and the driving licences of citizens. The issue of privacy and safety of data is emerging as a big issue
forward. With this, the relationship between the state and the people is set to change dramatically, and irretrievably.
This is happening without a discussion about what it means to all of us. We hear that MFIs are also going to
supply their clients’ data to this UID and therefore to NATGRID! I have also come across the Declaration of Rights of
Peasants ‐ Women and Men, a document adopted by the Via Campesina International Coordinating Committee in
Seoul, March 2009 and thought worth sharing now. It defines peasants as:
A peasant is a man or woman of the land, who has a direct and special relationship with the land and nature through
the production of food and/or other agricultural products. Peasants work the land themselves, rely above all on family
labour and other small‐scale forms of organizing labour. Peasants are traditionally embedded in their local
communities and they take care of local landscapes and of agroecological systems.
The term peasant can apply to any person engaged in agriculture, cattle‐raising, pastoralism, handicraftsrelated
to agriculture or a related occupation in a rural area. This includes Indigenous people working on the land.
The term peasant also applies to landless. According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO 1984)
definition[1], the following categories of people are considered to be landless and are likely to face difficulties in
ensuring their livelihood:
1. Agricultural labour households with little or no land;
2. Non‐agricultural households in rural areas, with little or no land, whose members are engaged in various activities
such as fishing, making crafts for the local market, or providing services;
3. Other rural households of pastoralists, nomads, peasants practising shifting cultivation, hunters and gatherers, and
people with similar livelihoods.
The declaration talks about women and men peasants have equal rights; peasants have the right to full enjoyment of
all human rights and fundamental freedoms; peasants are free and equal to all other people and individuals; and
peasants have the right of active participation in policy, decision, project design/monitoring etc. The specific rights
included in the declaration:
Right to life and to an adequate standard of living
Right to land and territory
Right to seeds and traditional agricultural knowledge and practice
Right to means of agricultural production
Right to information and agriculture technology
Freedom to determine price and market for agricultural production
Right to the protection of agriculture values
Right to biological diversity
Right to preserve the environment
Freedoms of association, opinion
and expression
Right to have access to justice
After the MG-NREGA, NRLM, the bill
that is making rounds is food security.
Food security is internationally
understood as physical, economic and
social access to a balanced diet, safe
drinking water, environmental hygiene
and primary health care. We hope that
the food security in India at least will
include: Universal Public Distribution
System for all, lowcost food/food
grains to the needy, including food on
credit, and nutrition delivery systems
to the mothers, infants and children.
How can we have food rotting in the
godowns, instead of feeding the
starved!
We have now come to appreciate that
poverty addressal would require, apart
from policy support: institutional networks of the poor – catering to solidarity, savings, credit, insurance, consumption,
local value-addition and social needs, internal animators – leaders, resource persons and staff from within the
communities, and external facilitators – staff in support organizations, government departments/ projects etc. This
basic architecture needs to be supplemented with plugging the gaps in education valuechain beginning with
embryonic stage till employment/ enterprise, having preventive, promotive and curative support systems in health,
livelihoods organizations that connect to/fro the market across the tiers, and IT enabled services to bring in efficiency
and cost-effectiveness. This wider architecture needs to be supported with social entrepreneurs and hybrid social
enterprises that provide services as per their need for a fee.
We need leaders who build or support this wider institutional architecture across. We are running out of time. Can we
work on our political, business, academic and bureaucratic leaders to become social leaders and build more social
leaders, social entrepreneurs, and entrepreneurs supporting social entrepreneurs, quickly? Let us try and learn to get
into this lest we will be less useful including to people around us. If we do not, the very reason we exist, will be lost!
Yes, we need to make the Indian Leadership in every dimension to commit to this agenda. Do not give up
practice! Join the architects of the future! Direct all your energy towards doing it! 
*Information till April-2010












Leaders for Transforming Institutions!
Hot summer! Food inflation! After America, it is European economic crisis now! Intentions apart, Right of
Children to Free and Compulsory Education has hit Government Residential Schools – Gurukulams,
Navodaya schools …..
Now, they cannot have entrance tests to admit students. What is the way for taking some 100,000 students? Lots?
‘Laila’ gave respite for many in South India from hot summer for a few days, but for 1000+ villages, it was tough
times. A few lives, some crops lost. Tense 48-72 hours for thousands. As we live the month, World Press Freedom
Day (3 May), International Nurses Day (12 May), International Day of Families (15 May), World Information Society
Day (17 May) and International Day for Biological Diversity (22 May) pass by. Of course, people remembered May
Day (1 May). Mothers’ Day (Second Sunday in May - 10 May) exchanges were there. Some celebrations too! Budha
Purnima (27 May) is taking us to Sangham, Dharmam and Buddham. UPA-2 enters its second year! Rahul Gandhi is
still buying time to join in Government.
As the world democracies embrace youth leadership, we may have to wait a little longer. Incidentally, era of coalition
has begun in UK recently. Isn’t that the future – coalitions managing multiple interests, apparently contradictory
multiple interests, to evolve common minimum programs for the democracies to be truly effective; and transition of
leadership to new generation? Operation Green Hunt and Maoists’ fight back in Chattisgarh are making headlines.
IPL cricket has occupied the prime time on TV for many. In between, we had IPL controversies making news.
Telecom controversy apart, 3G spectrum could get Rs.700 billion to Government of India in auction. It could also
make us see while we tel-communicate, may be as cheap as the 2G itself.
We are also likely to get faster internet (broadband++) connectivity. This can also help in increased transparency and
accountability in community and public institutions and public service provision. It is likely that digital divide can come
down! Most of us have come to realize that we have to live with migration – pull migration, opportunity migration and
temporary migration. We need to ensure that such migration is smooth. Government of AP, Aide-at-Action with 250
NGOs have begun to map migration so that efforts for making migration smoother and less painful. These efforts
need to be scaled up nationally.
This is also a period of lots of debates – microfinance vs. Community finance, mission of reducing poverty vs. private
equity, individual money lenders vs. institutional money lenders, credit/mf vs. credit+/credit++/mf+, poor as a source
of income vs. poor as partners in business, socially responsible mFI - community-owned mFI vs. mFI of concerned
individuals with n number of caveats for being socially responsible etc. Meanwhile, self-help groups, microloans, cell
phones, now micro-businesses, mutuals (or insurance), grocery outlets, product renting, and similar other products
and services aimed at bottom-of-the-pyramid are increasing.
Sriram has summarized this
beautifully – “.. micro-finance has
moved from helping the poor to
access finance to an interesting
business at the bottom of the
pyramid. …”. We started chasing
the same customer, may be into
a debt trap, with multiple loans
without ‘purpose’, without the
adequate ability to absorb and
repay. We stopped knowing the
customer well enough as we
have no time for processes and
systems to know and appreciate
them, their families and their
livelihoods.
Thinking that database of loan
purposes
articulated
by
customers while taking loans can
help us to understand the
customers and their businesses
is not founded on appreciation of
reality. Further, when Bandhan
announced that they can reduce
the interest rates, it became clear
to us that we are charging a lot more than what we are incurring to deliver credit. Institutions that work with poor –
can they charge more is the moot question by all around. This question is accentuated further with the picking up
SHG movement across the country.
In ten years from now, SHGs and their federations will become community financial institutions that meet
their credit needs fully. A quick check on a Block SHG network in AP is adding more than Rs.20 million every year
to its kitty of own funds. This is accelerating faster than what we could envisage. This calls for repositioning of MFIs
as MF+ Institutions that deliver livelihoods and micro-businesses where the non-poor pay up the costs through the
products and services from the poor and poor pay only modest interest rates. The time is up for the argument of
meeting the costs of delivery of credit and is no longer tenable. We need to be more responsible and responsive. No
other way. If the borrower is not tied to you in no way other than credit, the chances are that they will pull the rug
under your feet because you have the rug (know that they do not have the rug under their feet), and you will collapse
for sure (as Sriram concluded).
However, improving livelihoods of the poor and reducing their poverty is rooted in mobilizing them into their
institutions and using that architecture to address the issues of poverty and livelihoods is widely acknowledged as the
way forward. This is irrespective whether they are rural, tribal, urban, coastal or livelihoods of other vulnerable. Most
projects and programs now adopt this philosophy willy-nilly. In this context, National Rural Livelihoods Mission is
taking this agenda forward in backward rural areas of India as a drive (mission!).
While on it, we continued deep immersion in understanding institutional architecture of the poor in AP. While we were
slightly slower, the work on deepening and expanding zero drafts of the business plan(s) for ‘L-channel’ and other
Linfo units is inching forward. Collectives, watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social enterprises, urban, rural, tribal
and coastal livelihoods, elders, poorest of the poor, marginalized communities, innovations, the people who work
with/for them, financing the poor, their collectives, the institutions/enterprises that ‘work’ for them, business/ strategic
plans and creative tension continued to hog the most of our time during the month.
If you have bright students who are willing to put in 16 hours a day, facilitated self-learning exercise(s) is a good way
forward in learning livelihoods and rural development. Patna-based Super 30 (led by Anand Kumar) proved – most
poor bright students can make it big if they are facilitated to put in guided 16 hours a day for a period of time.
Prime Minister’s recent Press Conference, may be after four years, has indicated some way forward for his
Government:
… I believe that the mandate of the 2009 elections was a vote for the inclusive agenda of the UPA government….
We need a rapidly growing economy to generate productive employment and also resources to finance our ambitious
social and economic agenda. Our medium term target is to achieve a growth rate of 10 percent per annum. …
Our flagship programmes such as the Bharat Nirman, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee
Scheme, the National Rural Health Mission and the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission are … on a
learning curve and we can and will do more to strengthen these programmes and improve delivery. …
We have decided to set up a National Social Security Fund for workers in the unorganized sector with an initial
corpus of Rs. 1,000 crores. A draft National Food Security Bill is under preparation….
The promise of more than a billion people, who are better educated, better fed and better equipped to be creative
and enterprising members of the global community is our hope and our inspiration. … Reduced Poverty is the mantra
now. This has to come on the foundation of the institutions of the poor. As we saturate mobilizing poor into their
institutions in multiple tiers, the issues that remain to be addressed include:
Think-tank/strategy group that focuses on poverty and integrated development, rather than any particular thematic
interventions
A coherent integrated strategy based on the local context and reality within the established broad contours
Self-managed and self-reliant institutions of the poor
Legally compliant (in toto); Integrated Accounts and Management Information; CEOs; Visioning; Progress against
Vision; Rigorous induction to leaders and staff; Scaled-up use of information and communication technology to
improve efficiency, transparency and accountability;
Second-generation self-managed and self-reliant institutions of the poor around their key livelihoods;
Jobs, Self-employment, Micro-enterprises and collectives of youth;
Focused special processes and initiatives to work with the poorest, disabled, elderly and other vulnerable and
marginalized; and
Independent Resource agencies that support poor and their institutions We need leaders who build or support this
wider and expanded institutional architecture across. We are running out of time. We need to work on our political,
business, academic and bureaucratic leaders to become social leaders and build more social leaders, social
entrepreneurs, and entrepreneurs supporting social entrepreneurs, double quick.
Let us remember that poverty is vicious – it cripples people from birth; it kills people early. Hunger is killing people.
Shame on us! 20% of the world population is consuming 80% of its resources at the cost of lives of others and other
life. This cannot go on.
We need to make the Collective Indian Leadership in every dimension to commit to this agenda. Do not give
up! Join the architects of the future! Direct all your energy towards doing it! 
*Information till May-2010














Leaders are not enough!
Monsoon has arrived! ‘Phet’ tried to change its course a bit.
Inflation is going high unabated!
As we live the month, World No Tobacco Day (31 May), World Environment Day (5 June), Fathers’ Day (Third
Sunday in June - 20 June), International Children’s Day (1 June), and World Day against Child Labor (12 June) pass
by. World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought (17 June) and UN Public Service Day (23 June) are coming.
World Music Day (21 June) is underscoring the music’s scores of inspiration, celebration, healing, solitude, and soul
searching.
Fathers’ Day (Third Sunday in
June - 20 June) may have some
exchanges and some celebrations!
This
month
endorsed
our
understanding of differentiating
work ethic and ethics of work. I
came face-to-face with situations
during the month on Employment.
During the Abilities’ Mela at
Sweekar-Upkaar organized by
LSN Foundation, there was a
discussion on selfemployment.
In India of 120 Crore people, we
add at least 2-3 Crore youth into
potential productive group every
year. We have 2-3% disabled in
them i.e. 5-6 lakh disabled youth
enter the potential productive
force. All jobs pout together in the
country may come to a mere one
lakh for them. What is the way out
for the remaining? Selfemployment
is the answer! If we have to accommodate 5 lakh youth, we need Rs.5000 Crore even if we budget Rs.1.0 lakh per
person.
Do we know who are they? What are the skills they are endowed with? What are the skills that can be provided to
them? What are the competencies one looks in a self-employed? Do they have the competencies to develop
business/sell, to negotiate, to manage a team, to manage some money? Can we offer them? Importantly, do we
have unique ideas that these youth can take up and build enterprises around them? We need to build a special
component in National Rural Livelihoods Mission that specifically looks at self-employment and enterprise
development with adequate budgets, pool of competent resource persons and protocols for converting potential
productive force into a self-employed and entrepreneurial productive force.
Second face-to-face is with the migrants in homeless shelters. What is the way we can address their employment
issues? They offer no common background, common skill, common resource base, and no trust in each other. How
do we work on this?
Third face-to-face is with the Products and Services by the families of the members in SHGs. As we are aware, poor
are in both farm and non-farm livelihoods viz., agriculture including horticulture, sericulture, floriculture, etc., dairy and
livestock, Non-timber forest produce, inland and marine fisheries, wage labor, artisans including handlooms,
handicrafts etc., trade and small local enterprises. We are also aware that they have multiple livelihoods. They need
inputs and they also have consumption and they also have risks. There are gaps in these value-chains.
They could benefit by collective purchases, collective sales and local value-addition collectively. Even then, we have
no clue why these enterprises taking of whether individually or collectively? We need to dig deeper. We need to do a
mapping – mapping of livelihoods, resources, skills, etc. We need to understand the markets and products and
services in the local markets. We need to see what people trade in and trade out. We need to analyze livelihoods in
terms of productivity, employment, income and expenditure; we need to analyze resources in terms of use, no use
and less use; we need to analyze skills in terms of various use categories and scope to enhance them; we need to
match them with job needs, self-employment needs, enterprise worker needs; we need to see their workday and
workdays in a year in a gender disaggregated and season disaggregated manner.
We also need to appreciate the positive role being played by middlemen in terms of services and supports and how
these can be continued in the new thinking. We also need to appreciate the roles, scope and limitations of existing
institutions there.
We are talking of the existing efforts, products and services from these groups. Can we build collectives of these
groups? Can we give them a brand? Can we offer quality control? What are the other ideas around which groups can
come and build enterprises? Can we build a set of protocols and routines for taking this entire effort forward? While
face-to-face with employment, we continued our deep immersion in understanding institutional architecture of the
poor across in AP and beyond. The work on deepening and expanding zero drafts of the business plan (s) for ‘Lchannel’ and other Linfo units are picking up momentum. Collectives, watersheds, social entrepreneurship, social
enterprises, urban, rural, tribal and coastal livelihoods, elders, poorest of the poor, disabled, elderly and other
marginalized communities, the people who work with/for them, financing them, business/strategic plans and creative
tension continued to hog the most of our time during the month.
Rana Kapoor of Axis Bank argues for innovations for financial inclusion in terms of customized and costeffective
products and services for under-penetrated markets. His argument is for reducing transaction cost for microtransactions using ICT – may be digital currency through mobiles (like the ‘change’ given as tokens in Chennai buses
accepted in small hotels and shops earlier).
Given our existing mobile density
and its growth can offer an
effective solution. Let us think
more. We can have more such
solutions
that
use
the
architecture of the wide-spread
community-institutions. As the
community institutions grow with
time, their combined financial
resources are increasing beyond
our imagination. A federation of
SHGs with about 10,000 members
established about 10 years go,
can talk of adding savings in its
network to the tune of Rs. 1.5
Crore savings and Rs.1.5 Crore in
interest per year. Today, they talk
of having own funds in the network
exceeding Rs.10.0 Crore.If this
trend continues, there is no reason
to believe otherwise, the network will touch Rs.25.0 Crore in 5 years and may be Rs.50.0 Crore in 10 years.
Then, they need no small loans from MFIs or banks. They need maha bulk loans. They need loans for small and
medium enterprises. Of course, this needs to be facilitated with care and concern. They need to be statute compliant.
They need to have professional CEOs. They need robust funds management and loan processing protocols. They
need to have internal audit processes. They need to have autonomous businesses. Their governance systems need
to be strengthened. Then, this will be reality. With this in the domain of possibility, mFI s may have to get into mF+
operations. That seems to be the future. Informal chits and other savings institutions can add mF into their portfolio.
We are hearing about post-office making a huge difference.
There are 1.5 lakh post-offices in the country more than any bank or MFI today. Number of savings accounts with
post offices is near to 8.0 million poor. With the paradigm shift towards prosperity and financial access, rather than
reducing poverty, post-office represents a robust and credible alternative mF provider. Leaders are not enough. We
need workers, activists, professionals and paraprofessionals too. While we persist with building leaders who build or
support this wider and expanded institutional architecture of the people and their support structures, we need to
develop mechanisms, institutes, academies, centers, and units that build these workers, activists, generalist and
specialist professionals and paraprofessionals. Some individuals can also anchor these efforts. We need to build
leaders who build these mechanisms.
We are running out of time. We need to work on our political, business, academic and bureaucratic leaders to
become social leaders and build more social leaders, social entrepreneurs, and entrepreneurs supporting social
entrepreneurs, double quick for this wider endeavor. Let us remember we have come ahead. We no longer suffer
because there are no resources. It is their distribution that is the problem. Access to financial resources is a small
problem.
Bigger problem is the human resources. Bigger problem is the ideas for investing resources; ideas for building
enterprises; and lack of span of attention of the people who matter. Biggest problem is the best minds are not
turning up for this task. This cannot go on. Let us change it. Let us begin to changing it.
Let us increase access to human resources at every level. Let us attract the best brains into this agenda. Let
us make Collective Indian Leadership in every dimension to commit to this agenda. Direct all your energy
towards doing it! 
*Information till June-2010

















Giving Leaders and Leading Givers!
Vagaries of monsoon are around!
National Advisory Council recommends Food Security Draft Bill!
As we live the month, International Day of Cooperatives (First Saturday of July – 3 July), Writers’ Day (8 July), and
World Population Day (11 July) pass by. World Population Day this year emphasized ‘everyone counts’ and ‘open
data’ for development. Hope they become real soon in this our world. International Cooperative Day and Writers’ Day
did go unnoticed! For us, cooperative or collective action is religion.
Writing (documenting, analysing and articulating/ disseminating) is important for many a
development worker. As I write this, Union Cabinet has approved the symbol for Indian
Currency (Rupee), fifth currency in the world to have a symbol! What does it do for the poor, I
do not know yet. This month explored the continuum of employment – wage à job à self à
enterprise. Of course, as usual, the month continued to focus on understanding the
architecture of the institutions of the poor and their dedicated support institutions.
Building visioning and plans for founding the platforms for the poor to realize their potential
through
creating
and nurturing
this
institutional architecture
and
network
supplemented/complemented it. National Rural Livelihoods Mission has begun to get ready
with a Foundation Workshop in June for the core teams for 14 states. The states are getting ready to roll out their
state and district rural livelihoods missions. Meanwhile, Union Cabinet has approved the NRLM and expected to
launch either on 15 August or 2 October. Some states have begun to launch their pilots coinciding with the national
launch of NRLM.
It appears that two ideas are here to stay – SHGs around thrift and credit and Micro-finance institutions providing
credit to people. This is because the credit needs of the poor are huge and multiple and the needs vary from locale to
locale, season to season, time to time and household to household. Each poor is articulating the need for 5-10 loans
simultaneously. Even in mature regions, the people talk about unfulfilled credit need. These need to be tempered as
savings and corpus increases with the institutions of the poor. The MFIs need to emphasize MF+. The institutions of
the poor have to add collectivization around consumption, food, fodder, health, cattle, loan and life security, and
economic activities. They need to promote second generation collectives around livelihoods.
Importantly, there is a need to
generate ideas that offer savings,
increase employment, diversify
risks and add incomes for investing
the funds available on credit. This
gap is emerging as the critical gap
once they move on the hierarchy of
the
needs
of
credit
from
consumption/survival high cost
debt swap meeting credit needs
of existing activities credit needs
for enhancing the scope and range
of existing activities reducing
expenditures without loss of quality
of life risk reduction social
development – health, education
etc. new livelihoods activities.
Someone else has put this,
differently but aptly: Consumption Effectivization (existing livelihoods) Enhancement (deepening and
increasing the chain of existing livelihoods) Diversification (more livelihoods, often unrelated).
It is now established that the household and institutions need to have vision and plans to realise vision. The caveat is
that this vision and these plans are revisable with additional insights that arrive in due course of time. The way
forward in reducing poverty includes all three – Fish à Fishing à Meta-fishing. This is to say that the poor needs fish
now to survive (short-term benefits), fishing skill, along with tools and instruments, so that they catch fish on their own
(medium-term benefits) and meta-fishing so that they look beyond fish, identify opportunities and tap the opportunities
on their own.
While the institutional architecture emerges, the need to look at the unemployed youth surfaces. This cannot be
ignored. Here, we realize that these people seek employment – wage employment, job employment, selfemployment, and entrepreneurial employment. Can we recognise who fits into what? Do we know how many people
are seeking employment? Who are they? What do they want exactly?
We see the existence, amongst them, range of educational levels, 3R (reading, writing and arithmetic) abilities, skill
and experience spectrum. We see them pursuing traditional/existing activities and seeking out new activities and we
see them in rural areas wanting to urban areas. Further, their competencies are not the same. Of course, they would
like to exercise choices. Aptitude and Ability matter in making choices. All skills do not lead to equal employability.
Skill Development should not be limited to technical skill(s). More important than the technical skills are the soft
skills.
These are required for any work. Knowledge cannot be ignored. Wage employed may need transition from a casual
wage earner to a skilled labour. Of some tools exist, the wage may increase further. The issue may be increasing the
workdays. For the job-employed oriented person, the issue is placement link. Where is the placement? How much is
the remuneration (pay)? Does it cover the costs of living and remittance to native place? What are the Postplacement stages – training again, apprentice ship, internship, probation? What is job security? What are the growth
prospects? All these matter.
What are the costs of skilling? Who puts the bill? What about the living costs? What about the stipend till the first pay
cheque? What about the costs of relocation, if any? What are the terms of appointment? Bond? They need to be
introduced the alumni/best practitioners. They can inspire them. How effective are the trainers? What is the reputation
of the training institutes? We need to remember that the poor cannot be served poorly.
They also may need to collectivise. Some people need to be service providers. Some may have to take up jobs in
people’s collectives. Some may have to become self-employed. Do we facilitate all these? It may mean funds, time
and loans. Handholding support, establishment costs, business development skills may all need to flow in. Can we
think of labour, skill labour exchanges or skill exchanges? Can we build more responsive labour adda, skill adda or
market place? We should remember that some are already in the business of offering labour, skills or services. How
do we integrate them into all this?
How do we categorise people and select them for employment continuum of wage, job and self-employment? If this is
tough, identifying entrepreneurs who build microenterprises and employ some people can be further tough. Thus,
selection and counselling becomes key first step. We know entrepreneur is an inherent behaviour. Entrepreneur
pursues opportunities relentlessly, with extremely limited resources. Entrepreneurs typically display the competencies
– Vision; Initiative, Results Orientation, Innovation; Critical Information Seeking, Inter-personal Awareness,
Adaptability;
Tenacity, Self-control, Strategic Influencing, Concern with Impact, Ability to Learn. Enterprises seek profit and growth.
We need to handhold till they succeed, knowing fully well that one in three/four will only succeed. Some statistics on
enterprises are revealing:
55% (1 person); 32% (2 person)
46% (carried out within a household; 20% (mobile)
98% (have no accounts)
90% (unregistered)
44% (suffer from shortage of capital)
67% (stagnant)
This is not enough. We are also talking about collective enterprises – collective ownership, collective workmanship …
They may need institutional forms. We are also able to think about the SHGs and their federations taking up
collective activities. We are also visualizing hybrid –individual and collective activity-based enterprises.
If we add push and pull migration in this, the problem gets compounded. Do we start in the source or in the
destination? Of course, all employment is about enhancing knowledge, skills, tools and resources so that it results in
money. Then you need to give – give knowledge, skills, tools, resources. If you give, you get more of them to give.
Interesting law isn’t it? Give to give to give.
Leaders are not enough. We need givers. We need knowledge workers to give knowledge. We need skilled
practitioners to give skills. We need tool providers to give tools. We need resourceful to give resources – natural,
physical, social, human, financial and spiritual. They need to give to give. We need context changers to give more
conducive context for increased prosperity for the poor. We need service providers to offer services. We need happy
people to give happiness. We need leaders who lead the givers in giving. We need givers leading the leaders. We
need institutions that generate more leaders who give time, energy and ability. We need training institutes that build
participants to give. We need dedicated facilitators who give support. We need internal animators who give their time,
energy and ability. We need meta-leaders who build the givers – time, energy and ability so that the participants
share knowledge, skills and resources and context changes.
We need to give ourselves to build giving leaders and leading givers. Double quick. Let us give time, energy and
resources for building more capable human resources that give to the potential of the poor; for building ideas for
investing resources and building enterprises. Let us give. I am sure more and more best minds surely give more and
more. Soon! They have no option.
Let us build the giving collective leadership that gives all that is required. Let us give towards this. 

*Information till July-2010










Caring Givers and Loving Givers!
Now, it is time of floods across the world!
Nation celebrates 63 years of independence!
As we live the month, International Day of the World’s Indigenous People (9 August), International Youth Day (12
August), and World Humanitarian Day (19 August) pass by. Festival season begins for the year with Varalakshmi
Vratam, Rakhi Purnima, the month of Ramazan and Onam. 27 August– World ‘Self’’less’ness day?
The month that went by continued to explore meeting the credit needs of the poor, the continuum of employment –
wage à job à self à enterprise, the required architecture of the institutions of the poor, and the dedicated support
structures/institutions for all these.
The guidelines for rolling-out National Rural Livelihoods Mission in the states are in pipeline. The pilot proposals are
in the making. The core teams are getting ready to anchor. The states are identifying and/or starting state level
agencies for rolling-out. The resource persons/groups are getting pooled together. The collaborators are joining
hands. The donors are getting together direct their flows together. Support agencies are thinking of joining hands to
support this gigantic effort. States with advanced effort are extending their hand and support.
Meanwhile, NRLM with some of its pilots is expected to launch on 2 October. NRLM, National Skills Development
Mission, NREGA are expected to work hand-in-hand. Rural Self-employment training institutes (RSETIs) are
expected to complement their work. We are talking 100 million households in 10 million self-help groups, half-amillion village organizations and may be some 100,000 higher order federations, collectives and producers’
companies. We are talking about poor having more than Rs.100,000 Crores of their own and similar amount in bank
and other financial linkages annually. Incomes to cross Rs.50,000 per household! Investment per household is still a
modest Rs.10,000. This would mean 100,000+ development professionals, 1.0 million+ community professionals/
resource persons! We need to gear up. A silent movement is in the making!
After
SKS
IPO
oversubscription, we
are sure that other
MFIs will follow suit.
The
news
is
Spandana is coming
out with an IPO.
Others will not be far
behind! Thus, we have
the two ideas - SHGs
around thrift and credit
and
Micro-finance
institutions providing
credit to people – are
going
to
co-exist.
Now, can we think
about – how can we
reduce the interest
rates of MFIs? How
can we move the MFIs
from pure MF to MF+
and
MF++
to
Livelihoods
Financing?
How can we think
about MFIs making
money in the valuechain that services the
non-poor rather than
the poor? How can
we increase the own funds of the poor in the SHG institutional networks? How can we encourage the collectives of
the poor around their livelihoods? How can we encourage the institutions of the poor to meet their various needs?
How can we increase the proportion of consumer rupee to the poor producer? How can we source their needs/raw
materials/services they need at lower prices? How can we encourage them to really own their demand and own their
supplies? How can they access their rights and entitlements? How can we ask both people’s institutions and MFIs to
include more services without adding margins? How can we see that the poor become employees in them in large
numbers? How can enhance their social responsibility? How can we ensure that they serve interests of the poor but
not the private gains? In essence, can we have a way where micro-finance benefits the poor without hurting them, as
Vikram Akula cautioned in his doctoral thesis, 6-7 years ago.
Further, banks are now coming forward to have banking/business correspondents to reach out and SHGs and their
federations can also think of taking up this agency. Meanwhile, we cannot ignore the unregistered chit funds,
reckoned at an astonishing Rs 30 lakh crore, apart from the registered chit funds (only Rs.30,000 Crore). In fact, it
may be difficult to draw the distinction between a registered chit fund and a MFI which lends to an individual.
In fact, Banks, SHGs, MFIs and Chit Funds compete at one level and complement at another. Added to this, informal
chits are part of a way of life in the communities. Two ideas have come to surface during the month. One is related to
alumni of premier public institutions. There are more than 2000 state-run/supported residential schools in the country
taking the students based on a rigorous talent test and each school sends out 60-120 alumni every year.
250-1000 students per year have received prestigious scholarships like national talent search, national merit etc. And
about 100-150 premier institutes are publicly funded and produce high quality professionals. Even if we take only the
last 25 years into account, the total number, deducting for duplications, may be in the order of 7-8 million, not a small
number by any reckoning. Most of these have transcended poverty and are in the upper strata of the society, may be
in the first 10% of the society. We need to bring them together for solidarity (a formidable force, by any standard), for
payback (one for ten! Adopting students, schools, villages, families!), for retaining and improving the standards in
their almamaters, and for building responsible civil society and citizenship.
The second idea is to do with collectivizing trainees in the employment-skill training centers, collectivizing the
community resource persons and community professionals, collectivizing the grassroots development workers,
collectivizing the development professionals-at-large, collectivizing the development volunteers and collectivizing the
civil society. Examples of all of these exist but none of them reached the kind of scale one is looking for. We see this
kind of solidarity in teachers, journalists, government servants etc. Can we think of similar scale in development
domain? Can we see collectives of 100,000+ for solidarity, learning and contributing? With e-advances, virtual
networks, platforms, and forums, this is easy and cost-effective.
This month reinforced the need for people with basic 3R (reading, writing and arithmetic) skills. It is not their
education qualification but the 3R abilities that matter. Most of the students we have interacted, even after their
graduation, seem to lack in 3R Skills - Language Skills and Analytical Skills. The other skills that are missing included
self-awareness, inter-personal awareness and communication skills, learning skills and leadership skills.
Major casualties are the common sense and uncommon sense. All these, typically classified as soft skills, are
missing. When we have single digit proportion of students with employable skills, these become all the more
important. As I write, law makers are trying to fix the remunerations for themselves. Hope we will have a situation
where the lowest paid remuneration in our country and the highest paid will not be more than 1:10 or should this be
1:100? Currently, we have more than 1:10000. Can we correct this anomaly as soon as possible?
There is a recent indicative study that tells us that teachers make the huge difference in how we end up doing in our
lives. We may not know when the teacher was influencing you but it shows of after some time, after a decent time
lapse, say after 5 years, a decade or more. If we want to influence, if that is the business we are in, the place to
intervene is in teaching in general, and teaching in schools and colleges and outside in particular, during that
formative age (3-30 years)!
Since there is an appeal for large-scale giving (philanthropy) by the haves, lots are obliging Warren Buffet and Bill
Gates and committing to give. The solution is not in giving alone. It is in giving to change rules of the game and
priorities for dispersed wealth creation and for crafting new rules for dispersed wealth creation. Poverty may end with
economic freedom and ability to exercise that freedom. Giving we need is that giving that wields this power of
influence for this end.
Givers are not enough. We need caring givers. We need loving givers. We need knowledge workers who give the
needed knowledge that is authentic and relevant with care and love. We need skilled practitioners to train us with
care and love. We need resourceful to give resources with care and love. They need to teach us how to use the
resources. They need to help us change our contexts and the rules that govern us our contexts. We need service
providers to offer services with care and attention. We need happy people to share happiness joyously and willingly.
We need teachers, mentors, leaders, guides and friends, who learn, earn and give with care and love, lead us in
giving with care and love.
We need loving givers leading the givers. We need institutions – family, school, village, society, and other institutions
- that tend leaders who care to give time, energy and ability with care. We need caring meta-leaders who build caring
givers. We need to love to give ourselves and live to love, to build caring givers and caring leaders of givers. NOW!.
Let us love. Let us care. More and more best minds surely know how to love, care and give more and more. As
President of India said – ‘every effort, big or small, does make a difference’.
Let us build the loving caring giving collective leadership that gives all that is required with care and love.
Let us live to love and care. 
*Information till Aug-2010











People’s Professionals!
Now, it is time of festivals! Celebrations have been hit by increased prices!
People remembered their great teachers on Teachers’ Day!
As we live the month, International Literacy Day (8 September), International Democracy Day (15 September),
International Engineers’ Day (15 September), International day of Preservation of Ozone Layer (16 September), and
Peace Day (21 September) pass by.
Krishnaasthami, Ramzan, Ganesh Navaratri and Immersion! The festival livelihoods have been hit. We were told only
half of the Ganesh idols were sold this time around. The sizes were small. The crowds were less. The days before
immersion were far less than nine for many. The month that went by continued to explore perspective plans.
Employment continuum, Sustainable Agriculture, people’s institutional architecture and dedicated support
structures/institutions, Rural Development Management – Theory and Practice, Drifting Missions, Identifying Poor,
Poorest and Vulnerable, Seeing impacts on them, Planning for them, for their organizations and for their support
organizations, were all there in the month.
Being a teacher to young men and women helps to inspire and influence. Their achievements become the source of
vicarious joy for the teacher. If some of them do not make it to the league first time, it could cause some initial pain. It
is important that we remain available to get over the initial hurdles and ordeals.
The framework for implementation of National Rural Livelihoods Mission for it to be rolled out in the states and union
territories has reached last mile. NRLM itself is expected soon, may be before Gandhi Jayanthi and the launch of
Commonwealth Games. This expectedly flexible framework is being frozen with wide-ranging consultations over
three months now. National management team for NRLM is coming in. Pool of national resource persons and
resource centres/organizations is growing. States have, more or less, fielded their core teams for NRLM processes in
their states.
They have begun their work on drawing perspective plans based on their current situation analysis. The donors have
begun to chip into NRLM effort. Support agencies are joining hands towards this gigantic effort. Convergence and
Partnerships are being discussed widely across the stakeholders. A vision of a billion poor families being out of
poverty in a decade with not less than Rs. One million million (1000 US billion), NRLM has generated deep hope and
promise across the country. Delivery may not belie this hope and promise!
India needs to gear up. Between half-a-dozen of development programs/missions in the country, it needs a million+
development/livelihoods professionals over a decade and a lakh of them every year. After the health professionals,
education professionals, the next tribe that has to grow is this. Governments, can you enable them to grow? Of
course, these are required in support structures, these are required in the people’s organizations and these are
required in social enterprises. Some of them need to become self-employed too.
Not enough. India needs 10 million community professionals/resource persons! A million every year! Some to work
with community organizations, some to lead and/or govern the community organizations, some to be community
paraprofessionals and some to be community resource persons, and at various levels. Some of them will be the
future leaders of India.
Millions of institutions of the poor are emerging. They are getting strengthened. They are meeting the needs of the
poor. Universalization and saturation is the mantra. Do not leave anyone who needs should not be left out of
mobilization. Participatory informal groups, direct democracy primary organizations and representative higher tiers,
second generation collectives and collective enterprises … augment own collective funds through savings, increase
access to credit at fair rates, increase incomes, reduce their expenditures, increase employment, increase proportion
of consumer rupee for poor producers and risks diversified and managed with insurance coverage and mutuals. An
organized new bottom of the pyramid, with bargaining power and solidarity! Owning their demand and owning most of
the supply! A silent movement is in the making!
Let us make it happen smoothly! Or get crushed and crumbled under it! India needs to gear up. It requires training
infrastructure. It needs trainers, trainers of trainers. It needs mentors and inspirers. It needs curriculum, material,
processes. It needs to use physical, distant, and virtual methods. The recruitment and selection processes need to be
fine-tuned and large-scale processes need to unfold. Competencybased selections have to become a necessary part
of these. Immersions that call for staying with for long-periods of time, instituting de-selection methods, inductions
that discusses theory and practice together, what, how and why with the inductees, exposure visits, audio-videowritten documentation and dissemination of the best practices, handholding processes, piloting, review, learning and
planning processes, leadership development and support processes etc., have to be done on scale and the resource
persons for that need to be made available. Knowledge management and dissemination portal(s), books, magazines,
radio and television channels that focus on development and livelihoods are also required.
Remuneration to the professionals and community professionals has to align with the recent increases in
remuneration to law makers and earlier to government servants. Only then, we can think of talented individuals
coming into development sector and stay put.
Amidst this buzz on mobilizing poor and supporting them, we cannot ignore simple life for all in general and non-poor
in particular. Poor are requesting them, not to make the life complicated, boring, and sad and unhappy. Simple life
includes:
earn hunger and eat local;earn sleep and sleep in fresh air; take enough rest and find variety in works; get up early
to reach work fresh and active;
say no, if required; slow down and delegate/ outsource; have less; spread out big challenges;
focus on the day; worry about things you can do something about it; forgive and be kind; throw away the ego;
keep mouth shut and listen; find time to be alone; have friends; read books; smile, laugh and laugh more; be layful,
at least a few minutes a day; listen to soft music;
plan and work the plan;
remember that you are not the general manager of the universe and be grateful to the universe for the life you
have. Richard Moron has listed many rules for success of the career professionals. Many of them are relevant for
development professionals too. These include: Celebrate small victories too, as often as possible; Keep track of what
you do –
someone is sure to ask; Write down ideas; Assume no one can keep a secret; Know when you do your best—
morning, night, under pressure, relaxed - schedule and prioritize your work accordingly; choose pay cheque, rather
than the size of the office; When stressed, take a deep breath and ask - in the course of human events, how
important is this? Deliver your work only when it is finished; and Visit a first generation entrepreneur first, if the urge
catches up with you.
Recent NCAER study on earnings and spending reveals that high income households (47 million earning more than
Rs.1.8 lakh per annum) outnumbering those in the low category (41 million earning less than Rs.40,000 per year) for
the first time at the end of 2009-10. Interesting! As ever, the middle income class (140 million; 62%) continued to
grow. That would mean we have people in income tax bracket exceed the poor. Over the past decade, high income
group has more than tripled. The % of poor has decreased to 20% from the previous figure more than 30% +.
Interestingly, middle class buys more than the upper class when it comes to household items.
Further, poor are catching up faster with them. Juxtapose this with the Tendulkar’s Committee report. In 2005, India
has 42% rural poverty. India is gearing up for doing a poverty counting from 2011/12. It is fine-tuning the
methodology, may be a participatory methodology, for the same. Hope the process finalized catches the poverty of
multidimensions with less scope for poor, poorest, marginalized and vulnerable being left out and non-poor paraded
as poor.
Basix and Vijay Mahajan have reflected on the work done by them over the past 15 days. In some sense, it brings
about the growth of microfinance sector in the country. Their contributions in demonstration and policy formulation in
rural finance, micro-finance including SHGs, MFIs, Bank Linkages, financial inclusion, insurance, livelihoods are
significant. Vijay continues to be a leading civil society leader and BASIX and Vijay are established as microfinance
leaders in the country. This reflection report can begin processes for honest and deep large scale reflection in the civil
society on one hand and microfinance sector in India on the other. This is of big use in the light of discussions about
convergence and partnerships for largescale mobilization of the poor in the country.
Human resources being available with knowledge and skills are not enough. They need to lead and they need to
give. They need to love. They need to work with the poor and become accountable to them. Of course, they are
knowledge workers. They need to combine people’s knowledge, their own knowledge and the knowledge that is
outside and offer it to the people to make choices. They need to listen and respond with needed knowledge that is
authentic and relevant with care and love. We need mentors, teachers, guides and trainers with skill and competence
to build these professionals with care and love.
These professionals are always aware of their existing current task soon. They need to leave a legacy of the
continuity of their effort behind. They need to lead them into visioning and planning. They need to be resourceful to
give resources with care and love. They need to help us change our contexts and the rules that govern us our
contexts. They need to offer services with care and attention.
They have to be happy people. Of course, they need money. But, they would not compromise on learning and giving
with care and love. They need to be learning professionals. They need to be loving professionals. They need to be
leading professionals. They need to be professional professionals. They need to be effective and efficient managing
professionals who care to give time, energy and ability with care.
Some of them need to be building them as the principal agenda. Can we be them? We need to live to love. We need
to love as long as we last. Till we live a legacy. Legacy of love! Let us inspire and persuade more and more best
minds to be them. To love, care and give more and more. Let us together be the professionals of the people, and for
the people. People deserve the best. Some of us can be the leading leaders and professional leaders to ensure
that loving caring giving collective servant leadership with professionalism works in the country. Let us lead
to serve, love and care. _
*Information till Sep-2010

Pyramid_Diamond!
Month of festivals, Common Wealth Games, MFIs!
It is not possible to escape Gandhi (2 October). We could remember World Tourism Day (27 September) and
International Day of Older Persons (1 October). As we live the month of World Days, we let them pass. These include
- Vegetarian Day (1), Smile day (3), Animal Day (4), Teachers’ Day (5), Habitat Day (First Monday – 4), Humanitarian
Action Day (8), Post Day (9), Mental Health Day (10), Standards Day (14), Sight Day (15), Food Day (16),
Development Information Day (24). We have not tracked - Right to Know Day (28 September), International Day for
Natural Disaster Reduction (Second Wednesday – 13 October), International Day of Rural Women (15 October),
International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October). We could also forget the UN Day (24 October)! Despite
our articulation otherwise, poverty and development do not get our thought bytes that they deserve.
7 October made us miss the IAS rishi SR Sankaran. For many of us, he has been the Guru and the Chairperson!
Common Wealth Games – good show, lots of money spent and lots of money made!!! From Ganesh Navaaratri, we
moved to Devi Navaratri and Dusserah. Mysore Dusserah is now 400 years old. The month that went by continued to
explore Missions, Programs, Projects, Plans, Businesses, Institutions and Human Resources.
Not withstanding recent declaration by US that India is the third largest economy and recent economic projections
that India would outpace China in a year or so, the development figures are troublesome. Half of the hungry people of
the world live in India. 46% of its children are malnourished. It may be difficult to achieve the first of the Millennium
Development Goals. According to FAO, the fact that historically the number of undernourished people continued to
increase even in periods of high growth and relatively low prices indicates that hunger is a structural problem.
Therefore, economic growth is necessary but not sufficient to wipe out hunger in an acceptable time frame.
Are MGNREGA, Food Security Act, Public Distribution System and now National Rural Livelihoods Mission sufficient
for this huge task? NRLM will be launched formally any time now. States are getting ready to begin their NRLM
activities. World Bank is coming forward to support NRLM with a National Rural Livelihoods Program. Other donors
are also chipping in, in their own way. Support agencies are joining hands towards this gigantic effort. Convergence
and Partnerships are being discussed widely across the stakeholders.
Micro-finance Institutions are being discussed widely across the country as the death (of the borrowers) toll mounts,
Government of AP responds with an ordinance to regulate them and RBI commissions a committee to look into the
interest and other issues related to MFIs. High Court of AP refused to stay the ordinance. Is the cost of capital really
so high? Then, how are the shareholders making so much money? Are we not seeing supernormal returns on equity
here? What about multiple borrowings, use of the borrowed money and repayment patterns, rather than the fixed
schedules, amounts and tenures? What about the ideas for use of the loan? Are we seeing poverty rhetoric and
businessmen as development wallahs? Are we seeing the conflict between micro and macro? Know your customer,
customer care, human touch .. are they not important? Making money from the poor – is it ok?
Business with the poor is different from business by the poor. Should not we talk about building community financial
institutions rather than the other way round? Should the MFIs enjoy priority lending status? Is not it important that the
poor get the surpluses of these operations rather than the rich? Poor, instead of losing money to unorganized local
money lenders and traders, appear to be losing it to the organized smart investors and their professional staff. If their
poverty comes down by any chance, it is incidental!
As NRLM and other programs gear up, millions of institutions of the poor emerge. They meet their needs. They
augment own collective funds through savings, revolving grants, loans at fair rates, savings in expenditures, safety
nets and managed risks and increased incomes. Let us support this silent movement in the making! Let them
tackle their problems! Surely, they will be better than us! These institutions need leaders. They need professional
staff. They need community professionals working with them. They need investors. They need enablers. They need
mentors. They need trainers. They need volunteers and they need supporters. In large numbers,
millions and millions! And India needs to gear up. India needs to inspire its bright and talented
youth to move in. India needs to build, manage and disseminate knowledge. India needs to
accelerate creating an enabling environment for the poor to prosper. India needs to augment natural, physical,
financial, social, human and spiritual knowledge, skills, tools, assets, resources and capitals in their hands. Pyramid
needs to become a diamond soon.
These internal human resources of the institutions and the external support facilitators need to love, give and lead.
They need to remain accountable to these institutions with vision and plans. They need to be learning professionals.
They need to be loving professionals. They need to be leading professionals. They need to be professional
professionals. We need passion, skills and competence to inspire and build these human resources. This is the
influence that lasts. This is the influence that is most significant. Nothing else matters. Let us together be the
transformation professionals and servant leaders of the people, and for the people. _
*Information till Oct-2010

10,000 Hours!
Festivals of Lights, Deepavali and Deepam! Development brings Nitish back! Season of Crises and Scams!
Raja bows out! Chavan gives way to Chavan! Kalmadi?! AP is getting ready for ‘Telangana’! Kiran takes
charge! After Gandhi, we have Nehru (14 November).
Many a day of importance and international observance went by - World Freedom Day (9 November), World
Immunization Day (10 November), World Diabetes Day (14 November), International Day of Tolerance (16
November), World Toilet Day (19 November), Universal Children’s Day (20 November) and International Day for the
Elimination of Violence against Women (25 November)!
The month that went by continued to explore finding ways to spend money for poor! Through Missions, Programs,
Projects, Plans, Businesses, Institutions and Human Resources! My realization – it is not easy. Obama came to India
and said India is a developed nation. He has won over India. Did we? Again, Gandhi is inescapable – Obama
reminded us – “We will always remember the Great Soul who changed the world with his message of peace,
tolerance and love. More than 60 years of his passing, his light continues to inspire the world.”
Now it is official, despite all low indicators on human development and poverty, India is a developed country. Obama
confirms. Taskforce on Credit Related Issues of Farmers asserts that the farmer is an entrepreneur. It calls for
aggregation of their financial and other inputs and commodity processing and marketing. They need to be brought
into institutional fold through SHGs of Farmers, their federations and collectives urgently. They need insurance
against loss of revenue. They need to be provided incentives/subsidies directly to farmers or their organizations
rather than through the service providers and input subsidies. It is seeking NRLM to work closely with women and
men farmers, banks and NABRAD towards increasing acreage under sustainable agriculture. Further, the taskforce
observes that the moneylender comes in many forms - as input supplier, commission agent, the buyer of produce, the
NBFC and the traditional rural moneylender. Andhra Pradesh Government appears to have fashioned its MFI
ordinance taking cue from here.
On the MF, the solution is in having MF+ Institutions that realize surpluses form the economic services because of
scale and run the credit operations on clear no profit basis. This would mean incomes from sourcing the material and
services needed from the source and supplying the products and services at the destination. This would mean taking
a small share in the increased proportion of consumer rupee realized by the poor. This may mean the MFIs become
hybrid organizations that have MFI and Economic Business Organization working hand in hand.
NRLM, pending its launch formally, is making the states to come forward with their initial action plan, poverty profiling
and perspective plans. Action in the background is in progress! As NRLM and other programs gear up, millions of
institutions of the poor emerge. They meet their needs. They augment own collective funds through savings,
revolving grants, loans at fair rates, savings in expenditures, safety nets and managed risks and increased incomes.
But, the legislations that provide framework for such institutions are under threat. Mutually Aided Cooperative
Societies Act may get repealed. Producer Company format may not be available. So, what shall we do? We know
that this silent movement in the making can tackle their problems, surely, better than us! Civil
Society has
to speak up and speak out.
There are studies that say that there are 1-10 million civil society organizations in the country. It employs 20-30
million people, more than the private organized sector. Their annual funding is close to Rs. 1000 Billion (1 Billion =
1000 million - about 10% of our national annual budget). The government projects are increasingly becoming
independent government organizations and business organizations are running their own large CSR foundations. The
other larger sized organizations are religious or spiritual in nature. Most others who are effective are small
organizations who build knowledge-skills-resources of the society at large and poor and marginal in particular directly
or through their support organizations. If not anything, they keep our stark and shameful poverty and inequality in the
public eye for public action. We need more of them.
The community collectives and these civil society support institutions need leaders, professionals, community
professionals, investors, enablers, mentors, trainers, volunteers and supporters. In large numbers! Bright and
talented youth have to move in. Let us make these people invest their time, energy and effort in a focused manner
with passion on being useful to the people at large. Let them spend 10,000 hours with such dedication, then, I was
made to believe, they become permanent resource to the sector. Let us make them invest this little time, in any way
they like!
Then, they give. They love and lead. They vision and plan. They remain accountable to the community. They learn.
They are professionals! They inspire. They build more of them. They build their competence on their own. We need to
be this influence. Influence that lasts. Influence that matters. Let us be in the business of influence. Let us give. Let us
give what we have abundantly. None of us can say we do not have. _
*Information till Nov-2010








Another 10,000 Hours!
Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!
Two Days - Human Rights and Farmers. Dr Binayak Sen is sentenced for life-term. Farmers continue to die.
We have some functions for World AIDS Day (1 December) and International Day of Persons with Disabilities (3
December). But many a other day of importance and international observance went by - International Volunteer Day
(5 December), International Day against Corruption (9 December), Human Rights Day (10 December), International
Migrants Day (18 December), UN Day for South-South Cooperation (19 December), International Human Solidarity
Day (20 December), Kisan Day (24 December)! The month that went by continued to explore finding ways to improve
livelihoods of the poor in various contexts across the length and breadth of the country including coasts, hills, deserts
and dry hinterlands. Social Mobilization, access to credit, collectivization and intervention across the employment
continuum are the main elements in any solution that emerges.
In the context of access to credit, Sivakumar [Shiv’s Third Eye] listed various plausible factors for the likely ‘death’ of
MFIs – not innovated enough to reduce the interest rate; losing sight of collective action of the poor; not building the
political capital; absence of social capital that benefit from long-term engagement with MFIs; short on regulations;
distorted MF market with Government as competitor and regulator; scaling models with requisite capabilities funds
before the sector is ready; not enough manpower, manpower with quality; loaning by group leaders; and grants and
soft loans for private gain. We still need robust pro-poor social MFIs.
Hope some of them survive and new ones come in with more robust business processes and models! Surely, they
need to be MF+ Institutions that realize surpluses form the economic services because of scale and run the credit
operations on clear no profit basis. 12th Five Year Plan Approach is talking about 12 Key Challenges –
Enhancing the Capacity for Growth including Reform of the Subsidy Regime, Public Private Partnerships;
Enhancing Skills and Faster Generation of Employment including Expanding Education and Skills, Sustainable
Livelihoods for Alleviation of Poverty;
Managing the Environment including Land, Mining and Forest Rights, Sustainable Management of Water
Resources, Mitigation Strategies for Climate Change, Waste Management and Pollution Abatement, Forestry and
Wildlife;
Markets for Efficiency and Inclusion including Making Markets Accessible;
Decentralization, Empowerment and Information including Capacity Building for Decentralized Planning, Using
Media for Development, Social Justice for All;
Technology and Innovation; Securing the Energy Future for India including Increase the share of Renewable
Energy;
Accelerated Development of Transport Infrastructure including Universal Connectivity through Greater Investment
in Rural Roads Network;
Rural Transformation and Sustained Growth of Agriculture including Drinking Water, Food Security, Rural Poverty
Alleviation; Managing Urbanization including Urban Poverty Alleviation;
Improved Access to Quality Education including Universal Primary Education with Better Quality, Expansion of
Secondary Education with Vocational Alternatives; and Better Preventive and Curative Health Care.
Let us contribute to the evolution of a more robust five year plan. NREGA, Food Security, Social Security and NRLM/
JNNURM would take the lion’s share of the Plan Funds. Already in NRLM agenda, States are working on developing
their initial action plans, poverty profiling and perspective plans. The community collectives and the civil society
support institutions need leaders, professionals, community professionals, investors, enablers, mentors, trainers,
volunteers and supporters. In large numbers! Bright and talented youth have to move in. Let us build an orchestrated
campaign to identify, build and support these people in large numbers. Double quick! Let us spend our 10,000 hours
to begin with for Getting More (Performance) for Less (Cost) for More (People) [Mashelkar calls it ‘Gandhian
Engineering’].
Let us work on the things we have control over - ourselves, our emotions, our thoughts, our actions and our 3Rs –
Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. Let us remember to write with hand as often as possible. It helps in enhancing our
learning and therefore, usefulness. Let us spend our energy in the creation process, and on people deserve our
attention and love. While doing so, let us not waste our time in the Don’ts - Trying to do everything; responding to all
and sundry (calls/mails/letters etc.); Thinking we have to do everything immediately; Putting important tasks off;
Trying to get things perfect the first time round; Being hung up over details; Not having clear goals; Not taking short
breaks; and trying to please everyone.
Let each one of us add second 10,000 hours to work on individuals to give 10,000 hours. Then we have a
movement of 10,000 hours spreading all across. _
*Information till Dec-2010














Learning to Share Learning!
Happy Pongal! Happy Republic!
KG Kannabiran – may his soul rest in peace! Of course, we remembered Swami Vivekananda (12 January) and we
will remember Mahatma Gandhi (30 January). World Religion Day (Third Sunday of January – 15 January this year),
and National Girl Child Day (24 January) went by. 2011 is also the year to celebrate life beyond human beings - the
International Year of Forests and World Veterinary Year. Government has announced Padma awards for the year.
There are Padma Vibhushans, Padma Bhushans and Padma Sris in the domain of public affairs, social work,
education, and health too. Some of the prominent development workers in the list include – LC Jain, Vijay Kelkar, RM
Pai, Sankhar Ghosh, Darshan Shankar, Nomita Chandy, Sheela Patel, Krishna Kumar, and Gulshan Nanda. A
weaver, Gajam Goverdhana, is a surprising entry.
The month that went by continued to explore rolling-out livelihoods agenda in various contexts across the length and
breadth of the country. Continuums and Commons cannot be ignored. President, Pratibha Patil, in her Republic Day
address, sought national consensus on critical goals - eradication of poverty, food security and dry-land agriculturebased second green revolution, collectives, empowerment of women, access to quality education and affordable
health facilities, civic discipline, the readiness of people to work with dedication and integrity.
Malegam Report on MFIs recommends regulation treating the MFIs as NBFC-MFIs with interest caps on lending
(24% to individuals), multiple lending, no lending by more than two MFIs, no coercive recovery, transparent charges
etc. Other recommendations include – lending be limited to families with incomes below Rs.50,000 per annum;
Maximum loan amount to a member is Rs.25000; 75% loans for productive purposes; lending to MFIs should be
treated as Priority Sector Lending; MFIs should be exempted from the provisions of the Money-lending Acts; smaller
MFIs do not require to be registered with regulator; and MFIs cannot be doing thrift services.
Ramanjaneyulu has been arguing for Pay Commission for Farmers a la for Staff in Governments. Organized sector
aligns itself with the Pay Commissions in any case. That leaves farmers, traditional occupations and self-employed
out of this. Yes, we need to do something about them. We are an enterprise country. Most of us are self-employed
and/or entrepreneurs. We are not trained. We go by trial and error. I understand, it is not easy to teach
entrepreneurship. However some tips can help. Alex Tausig has listed 15 mistakes we make –
#15: trapped in "college bubble" – grow out of micro-context
#14: no prototype; or irrelevant users – test with real users
#13: didn't research competition – it is all around
#12: haven't talked to customers – listen to customers
#11: customer acquisition strategy is not repeatable – costs and feasibility can come in the way
#10: paying for things that could be free – know that free support is available
#9: didn't practice the pitch – practice, practice and practice
#8: no good story – a story to appreciate the issue matters
#7: no idea about the investors across the table – research
#6: make stuff up instead of saying "I don't know." – be honest about what is known and not known
#5: don’t seek disconfirming evidence – it helps to improve
#4: pick easily accessible not particularly relevant advisors – look around to find ones who can make a difference
#3: hire for short-term needs, not long-term fit – double check suitability for long-term association
#2: treat fundraising like an end, not a means – idea/plan is the key, funds are required to support the plan
#1: do more than one business plan competition – once may be fine. Focus on getting to work the plan
Learning has to come centre-stage. Learning should be a national agenda. However, it should not be limited to
knowing or getting a certificate but it should include applying. Hard work, knowing inside-out and practice, practice
and practice is the key in the learning. Being a learner matters more than anything else. Real world is much bigger
and more diverse than the class room. Learn first, usefulness will come. We are in the business of learning and
influencing, nothing else, if you really care to see deep.
We learn to learn that teachers are learners and learners are teachers; learning need love and when in love it shows;
‘I understand’ makes the learner’s day; If we can’t help, we can at least pray; friends help in learning; support in crisis
helps in learning; caring helps in learning; learning does not happen uniformly over time, across people, issues and
skills; we learn by seeking learning, both what we seek and what we have not sought; learning is in the small things in
daily life; everyone needs appreciation and love so that they are on the learning curve; facts do not change because
we do not learn; learning is to get going without getting stuck with petty minds and quarrels; more than the time,
learning to love heals all life; learning accelerates by living in an environment of learning; all life is great and needs to
be warm with for learning to flow; nothing is right or simple, till you learn; learning is an opportunity we cannot miss;
bitterness and frustration stunts learning; All joy and happiness is in learning; learning is faster when we have less
time; smiling face looks better and learns faster; being grateful hastens learning; and remembering that we know very
little is the foundation of our learning.
Let each one of us be committed to sharing our learning as it challenges us to learn and share. Let us begin
the movement of 10,000 hours of learning and sharing our learning. _
*Information till Jan-2011
Let Us Argue and Learn!
Happy Valentine’s Day! Happy Sivaratri!
Happy Budget! Corruption continues to surface! Egypt is showing the way to the world to fight tyrants, corruption etc.
JPC on 2G Scam! Telangana stirs go on - non-cooperation in action! World Day of Social Justice (20 February) and
World Thinking Day (22 February) went by. International Women’s Day, World Consumer Rights Day, International
day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and World Day for Water are awaiting us in March. Of course, we look
forward to Holi too!
Union Budget is just presented. Early reports indicate –
We are Senior Citizens at 60 and very Senior Citizens at 80. Pension to poor very senior citizens is Rs.500 per
month from Government of India.
Kerosene, Fertilizers and LPG subsidies will flow to the households directly.
Plan is to set up ‘India Microfinance Equity Fund’ of Rs.100 Crore with SIDBI and ‘Women’s SHG’s Development
Fund’ with a corpus of Rs.500 Crore.
The corpus of Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) is to be raised to Rs. 18,000 Crore from Rs.16,000
Crore for exclusive investments in warehousing.
Rs.5000 Crore are earmarked for incremental lending to Micro and Small enterprises.
Rs.3000 Crore are allocated for giving to Handloom Weavers’ Cooperatives.
RKVY allocation to increase marginally to Rs.7860 Crore.
Proposals to launch National Mission for Protein Supplements and National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture are
on the anvil.
Agriculture Credit flow is expected to touch Rs.475000 Crore.
17% increase in social sector allocation, amounting to Rs.Rs.160,000 Crore (36% of the plan budget)
National Food Security Bill is expected
MGNREGS would offer a real wage of Rs.100
National Skill Development Council gets more allocation.
Education and Health get increased allocation.
The month that went by continued to explore making human resources available at various levels for rolling-out
livelihoods agenda in various contexts across the length and breadth of the country. Continuums, Commons,
Farming, Weaving, Institutions, Innovations, Wage, Job and Self-employment, Enterprises and Sustainability take our
thinking, time, energy and effort.
What needs to be done for the original entrepreneurs of the land, farmers? Huge variety – landed, landless, leasedin, irrigated, dryland, fertile,not-so-fertile, 3-crops, 2-crops, one crop, big, medium, small, marginal, progressive, notsoprogressive, variety of crops, long-duration and shortduration, horticulture, fruits, vegetable, cereals, perishables,
cold storage, storage, transport, local, export, fodder, local value-addition, small animals, large animals, milk, meat,
leather, eggs, marine fisheries, inland fisheries, prawns, boat owners, catamaran owners, seed producers, fishing
suppliers, so on and so forth. Minimum support price? direct market?
Can we ask only budgetary support? Can we ask only plan allocation? Can we collectivize? Can we work on the
value chain? Can we offer support to reduce risks? Can we go completely organic? Can we achieve economies of
scale? Can this be beginning with the existing universal institutions of poor women? Do we need special purpose
vehicles? Can we relocate the reluctant farming entrepreneurs? Can they be employed? Can they be self-employed?
How do we counsel them? How do we nurture them? Are the savings the way out for the poor? Is the education way
out? Do the bank linkages help? Do the MFIs help? Do the skills help? Does the market be friendly to the poor? Do
the social entrepreneurs really help the poor?
If a Central Training Authority comes, will that help? Can NIRD rise to the challenge? Do we need more of them? Can
we expect other institutes to pitch in? We know that asking questions is the first step in finding solutions. Let us
argue. Spend some of our time in raising questions that matter. That is the way to build the movement of learning
and sharing our learning. _
*Information till Feb-2011
















Let Us Argue, Teach and Learn!
Happy Holi! Happy Ugadi!
Happy World Cup! World Cup fever has put aside action against ‘surfacing’ corruption! Elections in five states!
Census says we are 1.21 billion now. Of course, Gadhafi is still fighting! Some stirrings for International Women’s
Day (8 March), World Water Day (24 March), and Earth Hour (8.00-9.00 PM on 25 March)! We await World Health
Day (7 April), World Entrepreneurship Day (16 April), and Earth Day (22 April).
Apart from Agriculture Planning, Rural Employment Guarantee, Self-reliant Cooperatives and Indicting People for
working with the Poor at various levels, six streams of thought dominated the month – employment, enterprises and
livelihoods for the vulnerable, perspective plans for reducing poverty in the country, partnerships and collaborations
for knowledge human resources at various levels, livelihoods continuums and knowledge commons, knowledge
management and learning channels and platforms, and Tu zinda hai to …. Shankar Shailendra’s Tu zinda hai to
zindagi ki jeet mein yaqeen kar, agar kahin hai swarg to utaar la zameen par, Tu zinda hai... roughly translates as If
you are alive, believe in the victory of life; if there is heaven somewhere, bring it down to earth.
Geoffrey James endorses five concepts in development management and social enterprise management that work –
development business/enterprise is a series of relationships towards a common shared purpose; it is a community, a
community of living beings with hopes and dreams, with mutual contributions for achieving these hopes and dreams
while aligned to the common shared purpose; we service the needs and are moving in a direction rather than
achieving some targets by hook or crook; each living being have the ability and are interested to take care of their
destiny; technology is for offering choices and creating flexibility. Can we try and adopt?
He wants to be extra careful in applying the concepts – ‘downsizing’, ‘leadership’ that does not make others
productive, ‘human resources’ as expendable, technology as ‘empowerment’, and ‘business warfare’. IFAD Rural
Poverty Report 2011 brings home some key ways forward towards reducing poverty – It is important to understand and
appreciate that the livelihoods of poor households are diverse across and within; rural poverty results from lack of assets,
limited economic opportunities and poor education and capabilities, as well as disadvantages rooted in social and political
inequalities; yet large numbers of households move in and out of poverty repeatedly, sometimes within a matter of years.
Mobility out of poverty is associated with personal initiative, enterprise, education and ownership of assets. The areas of
focus, the issues to address and the roles of different actors will all vary in different contexts. Universally, the aim must be
the development of smallholder farming systems that are productive, integrated into dynamic markets (for environmental
services as well as food and agricultural products), and environmentally sustainable and resilient to risks and shocks. A
vibrant agricultural sector as well as a variety of new factors can also drive the expansion of the nonfarm rural economy, in a
wide range of circumstances.
Greater investment and attention are needed in infrastructure, utilities, services and governance. Efforts are required in
reducing the risks of the poor, improving the risk management capacities and providing adequate social protection.
Knowledge management including making it available to the poor and building their knowledge, skills, resources and
institutions for plugging gaps and tapping opportunities on a continuous and dynamic basis should be the primary effort.
Collectivizing and strengthening Collective capabilities should be the key route for all this. This agenda requires ‘joined-up’
efforts within the government(s), and a collective effort, may be with new ways of working together and accountabilities, of
governments, the private sector, civil society and people’s organizations.
Let us hope various flagship programs, plans and budgets in the country take note and work in line with this generic
thought. Indian rural areas are having a good number of successful social mobilization efforts across the country.
More than 30 million households have been mobilized while only 60-70% of them are in the fold of state poverty
reduction programs. Remaining are in the fold of NGOs. A SKDRDP mobilized 1.0+ million poor households; a DHAN
mobilized 300,000 of them; a PRADAN mobilized 100,000 of them; a MYRADA mobilized 200,000 of them; Ten
million families by various district/state level NGOs. Also, there are working cooperatives with membership crossing
30 million. Of these mobilized, some are very poor, some poor, some not-so poor.
Some of them are federated upwards. Some are independent only with facilitating support of NGOs and some are
being controlled. The moot question is how do we avoid redundancy, duplication and confusion in the efforts on
ground? These mobilized people also need knowledge, skills and resources. How can they be provided? Further, the
NGOs can expand on this easily. Some can contribute to the pools of resource persons at community level and
professional level; they can contribute to the models and modules; they can actually take up capacity building; they
can also contribute in building the robust design of the program(s) and institutions; they can be learning and
knowledge partners; and they need support to help and assurance that their resources, including human resources,
are not undermined.
Let us argue. Let us try teaching what we understood. Let us take up the challenge of teaching so that we learn
together. May be, that is the way to build the silent learning movement in livelihoods and development. _

*Information till Mar-2011




Movement of Giving!
Happy Earth Day! Happy Bhoodan Day! Happy May Day!
The chairman of Rs.1000 billion Trust, Sri Sathya Sai Baba, leaves behind the Trust, the University, Super-specialty
Hospitals, Water projects, the one-lakh+ volunteers in 1500+ Sathya Sai Centres in 114 countries and three-six crore
devotees in 178 countries, the agenda and the ‘hope’, controversies apart. For starters, Sathya Sai Trust is one of the
highest foreign contribution earners in the country. Jan Lokpal Drafting Committee came into being as ‘scamsters’
charge-sheeted and went behind the bars, albeit temporarily. Elections are still going on in 5 states with antiincumbency sentiment all around. Commercial Cricket is going on.
Vijay Mahajan ends his Shodh Yatra at Pochampally. Some stirrings for World Health Day (7 April) and Earth Day (22
April)! Many International Days just passed by – International Day for Street Children (12 April); World
Entrepreneurship Day (16 April); and World Books Day (23 April). Let us await Mothers’ Day, Fair Trade Day, Family
Day, Information Society Day, Diversity Days and of course, Buddha Purnima.
The sixteen streams of thought and work dominated the month – institutions, employment, capitals, capacities,
contexts, continuums, enterprises, livelihoods for the poor and vulnerable, the livelihoods movement, the livelihoods
knowledge workers, the poverty reduction perspective plans, knowledge commons, channels, platforms and
consortiums, and search. We know poor have no choice but self-driven. Steve Tobak lists 10 careers for self-driven
people – chef, cook, bar tender (hospitality); sales/trade/vendor; executive; marketing; entrepreneur (start-up);
investment (cards, funds); agent (trade, retail, telecom, ICT); blog/jockey; brewer; social media/networking. Spiritual
shops need to be added to this list. We can add some more – MGNREGS job; dairy; organic farming; readymade;
security; transport; eatables; tea; courier; repairs; so on.
Penelope Trunk concludes - some gender differences are natural and we need to be respectful of this rather than
worrying about them. “In general, men have approximately 6.5 times the amount of gray matter related to general
intelligence than women, and women have nearly 10 times the amount of white matter related to intelligence than
men. Gray matter represents information processing centers in the brain, and white matter represents the networking
of— or connections between—these processing centers.” [Richard Haier]. Further, boys, rather than girls, populate
the two extreme ends of the bell curve of intelligence. In the middle, that is people, who are decent at math, science
and engineering are equally boys and girls.
By the same token, may be some gender preferences are not social constructs, they are the result of evolution.
Stephen Lloyd, co-creator and architect of the form - Community Interest Company [CIC] in UK, argues that markets
need to be controlled in order to be effective. CICs have built into them strict controls on the financial rewards that
financiers can take out either through share capital or performance related interest. Effectively CICs can only give
their investors a bond type rate of return – that is, interest and no capital appreciation. In America, benefit
corporations are now being established which are like CICs. Benefit corporations will have to prove through rigorous
reporting, etc, that they are delivering their nonfinancial returns and social impact. This could involve a beefed up role
for the regulator. But there are no caps on financial returns.
India can learn from these CICs and Benefit Corporations in regulating the profit-oriented so called social enterprises
including MFIs/NBFCs that articulate social purpose and orientation. Producer Company or Community-owned
Private Limited Company or Limited Liability Partnership can be alternatives to privately owned Social Enterprises!
Recent media space occupied by Sri Sathya Sai Baba and his Sri Sathya Sai Central Trust due to his prolonged
suffering and eventual mahasamdhi has highlighted their spiritual, philanthropic and education activities by the Trust.
These include free schools including institutions of higher learning and deemed university, free hospitals including
world class super-specialty hospitals, cultural centres across the world, and free water supply schemes to Chennai
and drought-prone areas of Andhra Pradesh. Puttaparthi has grown into a centre with metro-facilities – railway station
and airport. The Trust based at Puttaparthi is managing Rs.400-1500 billion properties and works across the globe.
This is almost the same budget that is contemplated for the entire National Rural Livelihoods Mission over seven
years.
It is interesting to note that so much could be pooled, a miraculous achievement! Only a fraction (not even 10%) of
the fund application could provide so much relief to the people and popularity to the Trust! While Warren Buffet and
Bill Gates give away or pledged to give away more than 90% of their wealth, our rich are still lagging behind. Sathya
Sai could show that charity and generosity in a small measure would take one to heights of popularity. All the rich
who are accumulating wealth, we hope, would, learn from him. Surely, his blessings are guaranteed!
Let us give. Let us learn and love to give. Let us earn, learn, love and give. Let us give because we carry nothing with
us except the name. Let us leave behind the legacy of love and give. Let us build the movement of giving towards
livelihoods and development. _
*Information till April-2011
Be with Them!
Happy Buddha Purnima! Vande Jagadgurum! Happy Mothers’ Day! Vande Prathamagurum!
The mini elections in the country brought Jayalaithaa and Mamata forward. IPL Cricket ended. Monsoon is on its way.
T-sentiment back to the fore.
Some stirrings for May Day, Mothers’ Day (8 May) and World No Tobacco Day (31 May)! Many International Days
just passed by – for instance - Fair Trade Day (14 May – second Saturday in May), Family Day (15 May), Information
Society Day (17 May), and Diversity Days (21 and 22 May). We await Children’s Day, Environment Day, Day Against
Child Labour, Music Day, Public Service Day etc. Of course, I also look forward to Fathers’ Day. Gurudev Vishwakavi
Rabindranath Tagore and his Gitanjali were remembered –
“Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure. …At the immortal touch of thy hands my little heart loses its limits in joy and
gives birth to utterance ineffable … Life of my life, I shall ever try to keep my body pure, knowing that thy living touch is upon all my
limbs …I ask for a moment's indulgence to sit by thy side …Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing dedication
of live in this silent and overflowing leisure. I have spent my days in stringing and in unstringing my instrument …In the night of
weariness let me give myself up to sleep without struggle, resting my trust upon thee …. He came and sat by my side but I woke not
… why do I ever miss his sight whose breath touches my sleep? … Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where
knowledge is free; …Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.
All that I am, that I have, that I hope and all my love have ever flowed towards thee in depth of secrecy ….let all my
life take its voyage to its eternal home in one salutation to thee. The streams of thought and work that dominated the
month include institutions, livelihoods, vulnerable, and workers. Montek Singh Ahluwalia writes on Twelfth Plan (in
Economic and Political Weekly) – “… We have done well on the growth front, but not so well on inclusion ...
Much of what needs to be done to accelerate GDP growth to 9% or so will be done by the private sector,
but the central and state governments have a crucial role to play in providing a policy environment that is
seen as investor friendly and is supportive of inclusive growth.
… The government’s own resources have to be deployed with a clear sense of priority - health and
education and critical infrastructure development, especially in water management and rural
infrastructure, and infrastructure development in backward areas must have top priority. …. Four critical
challenges facing the economy in the Twelfth Plan - (a) managing the energy situation, (b) managing the
water economy, (c) addressing the problems posed by the urban transformation that is likely to occur, and
(d) ensuring protection of the environment in a manner that can facilitate rapid growth.
Finally, the efficiency in implementation of projects on the ground needs to be greatly improved. …
Evidence- based evaluation is critical for redesign and prioritization…” It is in this context, we have to see the
national launch of the National Rural Livelihoods Mission at Banswara, Rajasthan on 3 June 2011. The constitution of
the working group on NRLM by the planning commission has to be seen in this light. The framework of NRLM that is
made available provides for grounds-up planning. Each state presents its own perspective plan for appraisal and
implementation.
It needs to take the role of converging all that happens to the poor or for the poor. These include Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in implementation for more than five years now and the National Food
Security Act that is in the pipeline. Right to Education and National Rural Health Mission have to be built into the
portfolio.
While doing so, it is important to distinguish a neighbourhood school from a Gurukulam or a Navodaya school. Their
admissions have to be strictly governed by the merit-based selection criteria. The poverty-based census has to be
seen in this context which automatically excludes certain households, which automatically includes certain
households and the last category based on some ranking. We still need to understand how this process is more foolproof than the earlier 17 factor BPL enumeration. We still need to see the numbers how they compare with the
Tendulkar’s estimates. Can we not think of universal inclusion in the remotest and/or the poorest locations for all
these? Can we not think of universal inclusion of certain communities? Can we not bring in selfselection that is a part
and parcel of MGNREGA, into this?
Can we not develop standard exclusion criteria like government job, four-wheeler, pucca house, irrigated land etc.?
We know that disadvantaged benefit being in collectives. We need Acts that allow independent people’s institutions of
the poor and disadvantaged flourish. Non-interfering Mutually Aided Cooperative Acts or Self-reliant cooperative Acts
need to be pre-cndition for NRLM roll-out in a state. Better still, Union Government itself may encourage formation of
Producers’ (value-adders, service providers, users, consumers included) Companies under Companies’ Act or come
up with an act for SHG Federations to accommodate all their special and peculiar needs.
Let us love. Let us learn and love to work with the poor, their true institutions and the institutions that support them.
Let us improve their capitals. Let us better their contexts. Let us earn, learn, love, give and be with them. Let us be
with them through their thick and thin. Let us leave behind the legacy of being with them. Let us build the movement
of being with them. _
*Information till May-2011
Let Us Know and Be With Them!
Happy Fathers’ Day! Happy Rains!
Monsoon is still finding its way. May Dr Raj Arole, extraordinary health worker of the world, rest in peace! Some
stirrings for World Environment Day (5 June) and Fathers’ Day (19 June)! Many International Days just passed by –
for instance - World Day Against Child Labour (12 June), World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought (17 une),
and UN Public Service Day (23 June).
We await Doctors’ Day, International Cooperative Day, Writers’ Day and World Population Day. Kristina’s ‘A Farewell
Ode: Missing Kabul’ (an e-mail) has been an inspiration for me this month – “ ….. I remember depressing nights hen
I remember ladies we have interviewed from various districts who said that they loved to continue their studies but
their fathers won't let them ….There were stories of … hitting women who went out alone or without a burqa. ….I
remember families sharing stories on how their brothers, fathers, sisters, or husbands, have been wounded or even
killed … I remember sleepless nights thinking children being in such a hostile environment at such a young age. I
stopped rewatching "the kite runner" for it literally tears my heart. How can I forget teenagers sharing with us
cucumber yogurts by the river and all they wanted was to have a decent job to support their living.
… I expected something worse in a war-torn place. But I was so wrong! The wonderful gardens still amaze me up to
this day! The people are also exhausted from their suffering. … they found ways to survive and move on. … The
adventure, the sadness behind the veils, the apples and the peaches, the landmines, the cassette tapes, the empty
bullet shells, the ISAF tanks, the kebabs and yogurts, the bombings, the shepherd and the flock of sheep, lapis lazulis
--- they all made me think “be the change you wish to see in the world.” Thank you Gandhi for always reminding me
this….
I know that I cannot fully understand the complexities of what the afghan people are going through but deep within
me there lies the longing to be back. I believe one day, I will be back. … Allah Hafez. :-) The streams of thought and
work that dominated the month include institutions, livelihoods, vulnerable, convergence and workers. Finally the
poverty-based census has been launched in Tripura nationally. The approved methodology - The rural households
would be classified in three steps – First, a set of Households are EXCLUDED (even if one of the automatic exclusion
criteria satisfied.
These criteria include Motorized Two/Three/Four Wheelers/Fishing boats; Mechanized Three/ Four wheeler
agricultural equipment such as tractors, harvesters etc.; Kisan Credit Card with the credit limit of Rs.50,000 and
above; Households with any member as Government Employee: Households with nonagricultural enterprise
registered with the Government; Any member in the family earning more than Rs. 10,000 per month; Paying income
tax or professional tax; Owning three or more rooms with all rooms having pucca walls and pucca roof; Owning
Refrigerator; Owning landline phones; owning 2.5 acres or more irrigated land with at least one irrigation equipment;
5 acres or more land irrigated for two or more crop seasons; Or owning 7.5 acres or more land with at least one
irrigation equipment)
Second, a set of households are compulsorily INCLUDED (Automatic Inclusion Criteria include Households without
shelter; Destitutes/living on alms; Manual scavengers; Primitive Tribal Groups; Legally released bonded labourers.
Are we missing out on the remotest/inhospitable locations in the automatic inclusion criteria?); and Third, remaining
households are RANKED as per the number of deprivation indicators (these include - Households with only one room
with kucha walls and kucha roof; Households with no adult member between age 16 to 59; Female headed
households with no adult male member between age 16 to 59; Households with any disabled member and no able
bodied adult member; SC/ST households; Households with no literate adult above 25 years; and Landless
households deriving the major part of their income from manual casual labour).
This data would be approved by Gram Sabha. One question arises if there is a conflict, in case of a conflict between
exclusion criteria and inclusion criteria. Is the exclusion first? Or the inclusion first? Next question is related to Statewise Poverty Cap. How are the Caps calculated? In the process, are we not excluding or including the real poor or
non-poor? To achieve the cut-off cap, the panchayats with lower SC/ST population (%) are excluded till we reach the
cut-off. Finally, Government’s priority is first the automatically included, followed by the households with higher
deprivation score (7 to 0, in that order). Final question – does this census bring all the poor into the fold? We still
need to see how this process is more fool-proof than earlier exercises.
Food Security Act is still in the offing. Apart from offering ration at low price, the need is to comprehensively transform
the external input based green revolution agriculture into flexible sustainable regenerative agriculture system/mosaic
with minimal external inputs including energy and water, for local consumption. Even now, when the poor spend 3060% on having adequate food and nutrition, the strain is palpable with food price inflation. There is a case for treating
food differently in the market place. Government regulation may have to continue. It needs to build up stocks. Storage
needs to be better. Local value addition and catering to local markets has to be pursued. Collectivization of the small
producers and consumers and linkages between them have to be pursued.
Let us know who the poor are. Let us know that they spend half their money on food. Let us secure it. Let us love
them. Let us learn and love to work with them, their true institutions and the institutions that support them. Let us be
with them in their movement to be out of poverty for good.
*Information till June-2011


Hope Is in The Resilience of The Poor!
Happy Gurupurnima! Happy Rains!
UPA reshuffles Cabinet. Let us welcome Jairam Ramesh to lead Rural Development in the country! He signs the
National Rural Livelihoods Project loan from World Bank already. NRLM is going to pick up momentum! Some
stirrings for World Population Day (11 July)! Many International Days just passed by – for instance - Doctors’ Day (1
July), International Day of Cooperatives (2 July) and International Cooperative Day (7 July) and Writers’ Day (8 July).
Let us await International Day of the World’s Indigenous People, International Youth Day and World Humanitarian
Day.
Gorkhaland gets Gorkhaland Territorial Authority, with more powers. Sudan becomes two nations. More than 100
members of Parliament, Assembly and Council submit resignations in AP. AP is back with T-agitation and
Unitedagitation. There is silence (may be before storm) on Lokpal. 2G investigations are in progress. CBI starts
investigations into Jagan’s wealth. We discover more money with temples. Anantha Padmanabha emerges as the
richest deity in the world, surpassing Lord Balaji. Sathya Sai’s hidden wealth is still being uncovered. Interesting
times!
The streams of thought and work that dominated the month include institutions, livelihoods, vulnerable, convergence
and workers. Community-managed microfinance – savings, credit, insurance, remittance, equity, pensions etc., and
collectivization of the poor have also taken some significant time and energy. As NSS Survey confirms that 50% of
Indian per capita expenditure is on food, and the top 10% spend 10 times the bottom 10%, our millennium
development goal chase is admittedly slow – do we bring down our poverty level to less than 20% by 2015? Can we
have all our children complete schooling? Can we have no gender disparity in all levels of education? Can we have
our child mortality rate below 42 per 1000 live births? Can we have our maternal mortality rate below 107 per 100000
live births? Can we halt and reverse the incidence of malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/IDS? Can we reduce biodiversity
loss? Can we implement strategies for decent and productive work for all our young people? The picture is not
painted well at all.
Yet, we know that we need to invest long-term so that we achieve 2015 MDGs even in 2017 or 2018 or in the ultimate
stretch scenario in 2020. The hope that we would succeed, may be slightly late, comes from looking at the poor,
looking at the contours of the poor. No poor would like to live in poverty and they are always ready. If they appreciate
opportunities, knowledge, resources and some push towards accessing these is available, they get going. Their
needs change and therefore, they outgrow facilitation faster. Their resilience is enormous – they survive where others
would have died! This resilience of the poor gives us the hope.
But this needs two pronged approach An individual needs fish first to survive, fishing skill to live on fishing and meta-fishing (beyond fishing) skill to
identify the gaps and opportunities, acquire the required skills, tools and resources and tap them for better living.
Harnessing one’s innate potential along with life skills and vocational skills is way forward for children/youth.
Education à Employment &Entrepreneurship à Decent Livelihoods.
At the same time, existing livelihoods need to be strengthened with plugging knowledge, skill, tool and resource
gaps, and Collectivization. Expansion and diversification in livelihoods is on the foundation of improved existing
livelihoods base. Job-employment, Wage-employment, Piece-rate based employment and Self-employment - to be
carefully tailored on a case-by -case basis.
Thus, reduced poverty is possible only with sustainable livelihoods and inclusive development. The Indian growth has
to persist. The contexts of the poor have to become favorable by deliberate policy initiatives at national, state and
local levels. The capitals of the poor need to be augmented – increased natural resources in their hands,
infrastructure and physical assets that they can use, strong institutions of the poor at various levels of various hues
with professional staff, and the information, knowledge and skills in the hands of the confident poor along with their
own funds and access to leveraged funds. Then they act on their incomes, expenditures, employment and risks so
that they are out of poverty by plugging the gaps and tapping the opportunities, in their own way. A little support but
long-term, beyond loans, is the way.
MF is necessary but not sufficient. Range and depth of fair MF services have to be comprehensive and on scale.
Further, MF+ is required and can be loaded on the MF platforms. Multiple players need to coexist and service the
community needs fairly, efficiently and effectively in the growing Indian economy. That is the only way forward. This
inclusion is led by the SHG movement that is being unleashed in the country. Various State Agencies of Poverty
Reduction, Civil Society Organizations, People’s Institutions and NRLM have to collectively make this a reality as
soon as possible. I want to believe that this would happen. And soon enough!
Let us know the poor from inside. Let us know their fish, fishing and meta-fishing. Let us know their resilience. Let us
organize them and let us keep the services that they require I their hands. Let us serve them well with care directly,
through their institutions and/or through the institutions that support them. Let us be with them in their movement of
resilient fight to be out of poverty for good. _
*Information till July-2011





Collectives Bring in Responsible Business Behavior!
Shashi, rest in peace! We will take some of your fights forward.
Happy Friendship!
Happy Rakhi Purnima! Happy Independence! Many International Days just passed by – for instance - International
Day of the World’s Indigenous People (9 August), International Youth Day (12 August), and International Lefthanders
Day (13 August). Let us await World Humanitarian Day (19 August), Teachers’ Day (5 September), International
Literacy Day (8 September), International Day of Democracy (15 September) and International Day of Peace (21
September). President signs removal of 14F (clause), making Hyderabad part of the sixth zone for police
recruitments.
Anna Hazare gets 3-day permission to fast (on Lokpal placed in Parliament)! More investigations into Jagan’s wealth
in the pipeline! EMAAR could sell plots/villas at less than 25% of the market rate to many an influential person. The
streams of thought and work that dominated the month include livelihoods and collectives of the poorest, vulnerable
and other poor.
Tata unveils a plan to sell houses @ Rs.32,000 in rural areas in a year from now. It is a pre-fabricated house (with a
life of 20 years) of 20 square metres that can be built in 7 days. An upgraded model of 30 square metres would cost
Rs.45000. Will they succeed?
How do we increase the products available to the poor – for savings, for credit, for equity and for insurance? Does
Islamic microfinance model expand the portfolio of products before the poor? Will it pick up? How do we ensure that
the producers, consumers and intermediaries get rewarded based on the effort/work they put in? How do we ensure
that both the buyer and the seller share the equal benefit in a transaction? How do we ensure that the investor and
entrepreneur/worker share the profit and loss? How do we ensure that the creditor and loanee share the profit and
loss of the investment of the loan? How do we ensure that all the playes know what is happening? How do you
ensure that there is no violation of any business Acts? How do we ensure that spirit of service is brought into the
entire gamut of activities? How do we help the vulnerable? Will this work without the flow of charity? Do we see the
possibilities of models emerging that combine the spirit of communityowned and managed collective financial
institutions and Islamic micro-financing?
We hear that 2% mandatory CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) is coming in as the voluntary CSR has not picked
up. Companies (with net worth exceeding Rs.500 Crore or turnover exceeding Rs.1000 Crore or a net profit
exceeding Rs.5 Crore) have to provide a 2% (of the profit) mandatory provision for CSR spending. The PSUs with net
profit have to make a provision of 0.5-3% of the net profit. We know that India is a country of self-employed and
entrepreneurs. Its majority of the households are selfemployed.
However, they are not trained entrepreneurs. How do we offer this training? It appears there is some help coming for
some of them through “Training Resources for Enabling Enterprises Society (TREES)”. TREES runs a Certificate
Program in in Rural Enterprise Administration and Management (CREAM) - 30 days of classes spread over six
months to teach basic business skills with appropriate local examples. Can we have more and more of them? Can we
have more practitioners join in conducting such programs?
Everyone agrees that the only way out for the poor is come together for their social, economic and solidarity needs.
SHGs with participatory democratic processes and their federations with representative democratic processes cannot
take up all the activities that meet the various needs of the poorest of the poor, vulnerable and the poor. There are
issues of bandwidth - range of activities, expertise, economies of scale and space for professionals amongst other
things, that make us look at multiple institutions. We have also seen ‘amul’ cooperatives that meet economic needs to
a large extent around a livelihood/valuechain. That is, obviously, not enough. A good way is to have SHGs
institutional architecture and ‘amul’ cooperative architecture. And may be more types! Shashi comes in here. In her
latest review (25 July 2011 in ET), she opens up a road map for us. Map all the collectives/cooperatives in the
country. Assess them.
Remember some may need to be folded up. However, presence of member-owned and member-controlled
collectives in the marketplace brings in responsible behavior from the capital controlled business enterprises. This is
required. We need collectives in every village and at various levels. They need to be federated with space for taking
in investment if required from outside without losing the member-control. That should be our mission. The way
forward, therefore, is in identifying and including all the poor beginning with the poorest and the most vulnerable in
the basic solidarity, savings and credit groups and livelihoods-based collectives simultaneously. They need funds but
they have to flow in as seed capital in the institutions. They need to be federated at higher and higher levels so that
economies of scale will be there. They need professionals to work with them. They need community professionals to
take responsibility in interacting with the members as directly as possible. The youth need to be given options to get
some decent jobs or get self-employed with workable enterprise. The collective enterprises that add value locally and
provide employment have to emerge.
This is hard work over long periods of time. We need leaders from within and mentors from outside with sustained
enthusiasm and inner resources. Let us be in the movement to build leaders and mentors to be with them in their fight
to be out of poverty for good. _
*Information till August-2011
Towards Inclusive Growth!
Towards Inclusive Growth!
Happy Krishnaasthami! Happy Ramzan! Happy Ganesh! Happy Teachers’ Day!
Many International Days just passed by – for instance - World Humanitarian Day (19 August), and International
Literacy Day (8 September). September/October is a month of international days. We await International Day of
Democracy (15 September), International Day of Peace (21 September), Right to Know Day (28 September),
International Day of Older Persons (1 October), International Day of Non-Violence (2 October), World Humanitarian
Action Day (8 October), International Day of Rural Women (15 October), World Food Day (16 October), and
International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October).
Anna Hazare’s 13-day fast yielded a ‘Sense of the House’ resolution of Lok Sabha on Lok Pal! Investigations into
Jagan’s wealth are in progress! Meanwhile, CBI arrests ‘mining’ Gali Janardhan Reddy. Telangana agitation takes up
a decisive step forward: All People’s Strike since 13 September. The streams of thought and work that continued to
dominate the month include livelihoods and collectives of the poorest, vulnerable and other poor. Planning
Commission has released its approach paper for 12th Five Year Plan – towards Faster. Sustainable and More
Inclusive Growth.
It aims 9 percent growth for the Twelfth Plan. To achieve rapid growth, the economy will have to overcome constraints
posed by limited energy supplies, increase in water scarcity, shortages in infrastructure, problems of land acquisition for
industrial development and infrastructure, and the complex problem of managing the urban transition associated with rapid
growth. Greater efforts also need to be made in agriculture, health and education to ensure inclusion of the most excluded
and sometimes invisible parts of our population. All sections of society – government, farmers, businesses, labour and
concerned citizens – have to adopt newer, more effective ways of pursuing their activities, so that we can collectively
achieve our lofty goals.
For growth to be more inclusive, Planning Commission argues for – Better performance in agriculture; Faster creation
of jobs, especially in manufacturing; Stronger efforts at health, education and skill development; Improve
effectiveness of programmes directly aimed at the poor; Special programmes for socially vulnerable groups; and
Special plans for disadvantaged/backward regions Further Planning Commission articulates –
Target at least 4% growth for agriculture, particularly noncereal foods, animal husbandry and fisheries; Technology must
focus on land productivity and water use efficiency; Farmers need better functioning markets, infrastructure, storage and
food processing; Expand RKVY; Redesign MGNREGS to increase contribution to land productivity and rain-fed agriculture,
but with convergence with NRLM; Higher priority to watershed management; Universalization of secondary education by
2017 and Raising Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in Higher Education to 20 percent by 2017; Expenditure on health by
Centre and States to increase from 1.3% of GDP to at least 2.0%, and perhaps 2.5% of GDP by end of 12th Plan;
Team Anna has lesson for us, livelihoods/development workers in the pursuit of poverty reduction. Big Picture,
Visioning, Belief that resources flow in, Strategic Planning, being always ready with a plan, willing to revise it as many
times as required, plan broken into tiny pieces of microplans, diligent start-up/initial plan, a small team of committed
and tireless workers with complementary skills (12 for Jesus, 12 for Vivekananda!), Teamwork yet clear individual
accountability, faith in the leader, drawing in charismatic social, religious and public leaders into the fold, open to
supporters without yielding the leadership, symbols (name, logo, brand building), ICT use, working with/on media,
feed the media faster than media gets information on its own, access to quick logistics as and when required, etc.,
are the key elements in taking the effort forward.
Hope we keep them in mind when we build ‘efforts’ towards reducing poverty. Of course, we need to learn to be at
least as good as what we ask others to be. We need above board in legal/statutory compliance. We need to keep
accounts of every pie that comes in and that goes out. We need to be reasonably careful in spending the money
despite its abundance realizing that we are only trustees. Recently, when National Council of Rural Institutes want to
establish a national award to a rural institute with outstanding performance in working with the poor, we have asked
them to look at and score on the following criteria –
Poorest and Most Vulnerable Focus, Significance and Uniqueness of the contribution, Demonstrated
loyalty to the work, community, theme in the long-run, Outreach, Impact of the contribution, Community's
stake, Scalability and Replicability, Self-reliance and Future Sustainability, Vision and Plan Forward,
Leadership, Governance, Management and Systems Committee's Overall Impression on Loyalty's,
Gandhian Thought, Hope we are not off-the-mark.
Sustainable livelihoods and decent quality of life in the context of inclusive growth paradigm is in the organization of
the poor, the poorest and the most vulnerable so that they realize the benefit of the growth and access their rights
and entitlements and the right to live, decent livelihood portfolio, good education and good health. The architecture of
the institutions of the poor owned by the poor with human resources from within them working for them is the way
forward. This is hard work spanning over long periods of time. Let us be in the movement to build leaders and
mentors to build and be with this architecture. _
*Information till Sep-2011
