Canada India Village Aid December 2014 Canada India Village Aid
Who Do We Help? In this issue we meet some of the individuals we work with in India. December 2014 In This Issue: FERRY: Upward Mobility and Mobile Repair for Sumanta Sarkar in West Bengal. 2 Ashwini Kulkarni is helping to make the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act a success in Triambak-­‐Nashik. 2 Meet Khuma Ram: The student becomes the teacher at Seva Mandir’s Residential Learning Camp CIVA connects UBC researchers to our NGO partners to reduce corruption and improve social policy in India. Since 1981, CIVA has raised funds to support projects benefitting the peoples of rural India. We often tell our supporters about the different projects and organizations we support, why we choose to support them, and how many individuals we help. But we don’t very often let you know the individual stories of the lives your donations have touched and transformed. So, this newsletter is dedicated to that goal. If the stories inspire you, please give again. 3 4 "The stories in this issue show that small monetary inputs – combined with big ideas and determined people – can have transformative effects on the lives of the poor" -­‐ Dr. Sophie Low-­‐Beer, CIVA Chair Canada India Village Aid December 2014 FERRY: Upward Mobility and Mobile Repair in West Bengal Foundation for Economic Rehabilitation of Rural Youth (FERRY), which celebrated its 30th year in 2013, is a small non-­‐
governmental, entirely voluntary organization involved in rural development in West Bengal, India. FERRY provides short vocational training courses to unemployed youth to help them set up businesses or get jobs that will provide them and their families with a living income. FERRY also extends such training to young women forced by widowhood or desertion to fend for themselves. Not too far away from the FERRY office in Khanyan, West Bengal, a young man, around 23 years of age, learnt of a new course being offered by FERRY in Mobile Repair and Maintenance. About half the calendar year had passed when he set out from his residence to cover the 4-­‐5 KM to submit his application. Not very long ago he had, in fact, undergone some training offered by a commercial multimedia company in mobile repairing, but he was dissatisfied with what he had learnt. With FERRY's reputation of providing good solid market-­‐oriented training in other fields, Sumanta Sarkar felt like there were things to be gained here; in order to keep abreast of the recent boom in IT related communications, this was an opportunity not to be missed. “He is now an independent man. The only way is ahead, and the future is bright.” Sumanta applied to FERRY, made the cut, and came regularly for classes. Continued on page 4 NREGA: A Stepping Stone for Small Farmers In Triambak-­‐Nashik, many of the farming practices are rain fed. Farmers primarily cultivate paddy and finger millets along with oilseeds and pulses like Niger, Urad, and Gram in winter, relying almost entirely on soil moisture for germination due to limited access to irrigation facilities. The region, despite being in a high rainfall zone, faces a water scarcity problem. In the monsoons, rainwater runs off the vast, rolling terrain, carrying off the topsoil, and thus allowing very little water percolation while exposing boulders in the fields. Given these conditions, farmers like Ramesh Pawar and Sanjay Triambak undertook water harvesting By Ashwini Kulkarni (Pragati Abhiyan) 2 Continued on page 5 Canada India Village Aid December 2014 360 Degrees: The Impact of Seva Mandir’s Education Programs recalled. He remembered how he overcame his initial In 2000, Seva Mandir launched its first Residential Learning Camp (also known as Camp), to give out-­‐of-­‐
school children a chance to learn and get a foothold into the mainstream education system. Many of these children are unable to go to school because they work as migrant laborers or they tend to their family farms. They come from some of the most impoverished and rural tribal communities in India. In our work area, there are many economic incentives that discourage children from enrolling in schools. The purpose of Seva Mandir’s education program is to give children access to a good quality education while also strengthening the value of education in the communities we work in. Eight-­‐year old Khuma Ram Gameti was among the first students at the Camp in 2000. “While coming through the Training Centre gate for the first time I felt nervous. I wasn’t sure why I was here”, he anxiety at the 25-­‐day camp and eventually made friends with children from other villages. Nobody could have guessed that 13 years later Khuma Ram would return to the camp as a teacher. He began his schooling at a Seva Mandir non-­‐formal education center in 1998. He was then recruited to enroll in the first Camp at Kaya, which he now remembers fondly. After the camp, Khuma Ram enrolled in a nearby government school, but maintained his connection with Seva Mandir by becoming active in the local Youth Resource Center. As the first person in his family to receive an education, his commitment never wavered. In an area where most children never make it through primary school, Khuma Ram, the son of poor farmers, graduated from secondary school in 2011. He was Continued… 3 Canada India Village Aid (Continued) then recruited to work at a shop in Mumbai, but feeling dissatisfied with the pace and strain of urban living, he left after two months to pursue a college education and work towards a better future. Soon after returning from Mumbai, Khuma Ram was approached by a Seva Mandir field worker who asked him if he was interested in working as a teacher for Seva Mandir. When we asked him about why he took the offer he said, “I benefited a lot from Seva Mandir, I have taken [their] help every time in my life. I will never turn down any job from Seva Mandir”. His eyes swelled then swelled with pride, “I have gotten offers from other NGOs, but I decline them. I will only work for Seva Mandir”, he said. At the Camp, Khuma Ram is quite the hero. He laughed when he recounted the disbelief and astonishment when, on the first day of the camp, he revealed to all the children that he is a former Camp student himself. To these new first-­‐generation learners, he serves as a living role model who can relate to these students better than anyone. Khuma Ram is now in his first year at a private university – the first university student from his village. He is proudly studying to become a better teacher and said he would prefer to stay close to his village and family rather than take a more lucrative teaching position in the 4 December 2014 Upward Mobility, Mobiles (Continued) He did have some advantage over his classmates (due to prior training), but this only added to the classroom experience: in the spirit of friendship and of community, he and his classmates learnt more. Indeed, this class was vocal in asking for an extension of the course so that they could better learn the trade. After the extended course ended, Sumanta was soon able set up shop. Over the next two years his business-­‐
graph, so to speak, kept rising. In the shop that he presently runs, Sumanta not only repairs mobile phones, he also sells assembled phones and assorted equipment. The location of his shop is to his advantage -­‐-­‐ his shop is the only one in the vicinity. But these external accidents (location, capital, even training) are secondary to a more important aspect of one's own personality: the will to learn, the drive to succeed, the dream to live well. Sumanta Sarkar wanted to improve his life, and so he underwent FERRY training and became a part of FERRY's extended family. Today, at 26 years of age, he has the means and the confidence to stand on his own feet and contribute to society at large. He lives with his parents and supports them. He is presently single, but it is not unlikely that he will be married soon and have his own children. He is now an independent man. The only way is ahead, and the future is bright. The Value of Education Khuma Ram: “I benefited a lot from Seva Mandir, I have taken [their] help every time in my life. I will never turn down any job from Seva Mandir”. His eyes swelled then swelled with pride, “I have gotten offers from other NGOs, but I decline them. I will only work for Seva Mandir”, he said. A Role Model: In a country of rapid urbanization and deteriorating conditions for the rural poor, Khuma Ram serves as a reminder to many tribal children that their fate is in their own hands. Canada India Village Aid MGNREGA (Continued) and conservation works on their farmlands under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), which helped them cultivate mustard, millets, and vegetables last winter, while Nitin Choudhary started an ambitious aquaculture project alongside his regular agricultural activities. Ramesh Pawar constructed a farm pond on his land, and despite not being able to get it down to its planned depth (they hit a rock while drilling, rendering the work technically incomplete), this enabled him to bring an additional 3 acres under cultivation, which were previously inaccessible as they were located uphill and at a great distance from any source of water. Thirty-­‐six labourers, including himself, worked on this asset for a week. With the help of the pond, he has been able to cultivate paddy on all 9 acres of his land, revive a dying cashew and mango orchard, and plant a vegetable patch on which he grows brinjal and other leafy vegetables. Apart from his land, around 4-­‐5 acres belonging to two other farmers also have benefitted from this pond. He says the pond has reduced his dependency on the monsoon for sowing paddy and has also helped increase yields. He plans to try his hand at cultivating wheat next season as the pond allows him to draw water till January. Sanjay relocated to Triambak around 15 years ago when he lost his land to a big river valley project in Gujarat. Since then, he has managed to not only buy 3 acres of land but also convert a barren piece of land into a productive farm, which was his mainstay. His efforts to make a living, he asserts, were aided by the roll out of the MGNREGA. Over the last four years, he has improved agricultural productivity by taking advantage of the opportunities to create assets – a well and embankments and land levelling on his fields – created under the Act. He uses the water from the well to cultivate rice, finger millets and onion, and has recently included brinjal to his list of produce. December 2014 He also shares well water with his neighbours for non-­‐farming purposes. He says that the well, along with other water conservation work, has allowed him to more than double his rice yields over the last 3 years. He also has a nursery set up under the Act next to his house. In another part of Triambak, a young farmer Nitin built a farm pond under the MGNREGA while sacrificing a portion of his productive land to do so. He had seen his acquaintance in a neighbouring village farm fish and was inspired to do the same. At the time of our visit, he was into his first season of pisci-­‐culture and the entire village was waiting to see if he would succeed. If he does, “more of us will do the same”, exclaimed a villager. The farmer explained to us that this time he had chosen not to buy expensive commercial fish feed because he was still experimenting and learning, but the next time he would. The main problem, he said, that it was hard to get a loan to run a commercial fish farm, even if the MGNREGA had provided them a stepping-­‐stone. Ashwini Kulkarni belongs to the Civil Society organization Pragati Abhiyan based in Nashik. She has been associated with rural poverty related programs for two decades. Pragati Abhiyan works with tribal villages of Nashik district and is also involved in research and policy work related to the equitable implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). She is currently working in partnership with CIVA and UBC on a research project that focuses on how information technology can be brought to bear on reducing graft and improving governance in Indian villages. Specifically, it attempts to examine whether direct benefit transfers in biometrically identifiable bank accounts can reduce the leakage of government funds allotted to a poverty scheme (NREGA) and reduce the power of the local elite. Her innovative work has made her a much sought after voice amongst policy makers. 5 Canada India Village Aid December 2014 Building a Bridge between Research and Development Four years ago, CIVA approached Stephen Toope (the President of UBC) with a new idea that would allow UBC experts to use our grass root level contacts in India for doing research that would help improve development policy in that country. We believed that on one hand the expertise at UBC could be put to a fruitful use and on the other hand the faculty and graduate students at UBC would benefit through the facilitation of their research. On receiving an enthusiastic endorsement from President Toope, we proceeded to link one of our partners – Pragati Abhiyan to the Department of Economics, UBC with highly rewarding results. So far Pragati Abhiyan has worked closely with the faculty members of the Economics Department to carry out two major research projects. This project is now concluded and a paper based on this and titled “Clientism in Indian Villages” has been accepted for publication in American Economic Review – the flagship journal of American Economic Association. The first one focused on how the higher caste elite manipulated local village governments in Maharashtra to keep the schemes enacted by higher levels of government from reaching the poor lest the poor feel empowered to bargain for better terms of employment. The current project hopes to determine whether biometrically identifiable bank accounts can help reduce graft in the NREGA (See NREGA above) Clearly, the bridge built by CIVA between UBC researchers and CIVA’s partners is already paying dividends.