Mr. Abhay was here on 11th April 2009. He was born brought up in Hydrabad. He completed his Engineering degree in Electronics and Communication. He Joined an MNC in Bangalore after completion of his Engineering. He inspired himself to work in social sector and moved to Raichur district, Karnataka. He started working on Devadasi system. He started an organization called “Navajeevan Mahila Okkut” it is not registered. The organization is working on many social evils. Already organization covered around hundred villages in Raichur district.
He was here to speak about on Advocacy. He used advocacy tool to fight against corruption and social evils. Following twelve point people has to remember while doing advocacy.Advocacy should be done by people who affected by the issue
Understanding the issue theoretical and practical aspects both in local contents and in other parts of country and the world.
Believe in the issue as belief in the strategy is important.
Grass root level work on the issue, both activism and constructive involvement.
To work along with the media and not use the media.
Data collection and presentation should be human, not just statistics.
To always have the goals broke down in to short term, medium term and long term demands. Understanding of the government administrative machinery and way of working is very important.
Should have well wishes in all fields.
Proper use of all forums available sensitive days of year and reacting to important events is very essential.
Regular follow-ups is a very important.
Attack the issue simultaneously from many fronts, also one is some required to take two steps back and then move ahead.Always fight for issue not people responsible. (Reference: Abhay)
Ms.Chetna Gala Sinha, Founder and Chairperson of Manndeshi was in Deshpande Foundation to address the fellows. It was a session in which she shared about her personal life, the way Manndeshi came into existence, the challenges she faced to build it.
She is educated in the field of Economics and during student life she had involved her self in Public movements. During the moment, she came across a person and accepted him as her life partner. Husband was from an agriculture family, different in caste and class, it was a challenge to she took where she saw different corners of life. It was her first exposure to agriculture and farming family.
About the organization: In 1987 Chetna along with her husband, went to Kolapur from Maswad to sell two tons of onion they grew, but the amount they got was lesser than what they had to pay for transportation. This gave her a thought to start up a Credit Co-operative Bank for farmers with the share value of Rs.10/-. During those days, it was monopolized by NABARD and the village had municipal council. This was observed till 1991-1994, during this period she found that women are better money managers and thought of starting something for women that can give financial stability. Then she started a women bank, for which she started working from the grass root level, writing proposals and thus it was started from the scratch. As per the rules it needed 5,00,000/- to start the bank, but at the end 6,00,000/- was collected with each person contributing Rs. 25/-. When approached the CGI of RBI for license, the proposal was rejected for the reason most of the women were illiterate and they can’t handle the financial aspects.
This was a setback for Ms.Chetna, and she went back crying, but the village women didn’t give up. They all took it as a challenge and committed for study so that they are no more called as illiterate. When again proposal was made same question rose, but that time the women were so confident to challenge the officers with the skill they had to calculate the rate of interest. At last, the license was approved in August 1997. In the past ten years, the bank has 1, 20,000 clients and has a share of 20 crore and with this huge amount, Manndeshi started Non Banking Finance Company. In the beginning no one came to take loan and shared a story in which husband tried to manipulate the situation and to borrow one lakh.
Meanwhile a video on Manndeshi was shown to the fellows. Later on she continued saying the bank has door step banking system in which the loan amount can be paid at door step. A pigmy collector collects the amount as per their convenience, where it can be paid daily, weekly, fortnightly or on monthly basis. The pigmy collector gets 3% of the amount collected.
In the year 2006, Business School on Wheels was started for the rural women which trains women on Computer and Tailoring. According to Ms.Chetna, women think reality where as men aspires. When asked the reason behind name Manndeshi, it says Mann-River (in maswad which is almost always dry), and in Marati it means Sand and Deshi is local.
The other activities are providing scholarship of girls, providing bicycle without interest on it. HSBC is also supporting in lending money under its Corporate Social Responsibility and also Business school of education. When asked about her vision, she said the focus is on expanding whole of Maharastra and North India specifically in Gujrath.
After Deshpande Foundation Started supporting Manndeshi, it started a new branch in Hubli, Karnataka during August 2007. She shared about the challenges, she was worried of what can be done with bus sent from the head office for the purpose of training. Those were the days she even thought of sending it back.But after all the hard work now situation is entirely changed and expressed the feel of joy to say, now two more buses are needed as the enrollments are taking place even long way back. The session was very interactive, all the fellows got chance to ask questions and were addressed from the guests. Manndeshi has no funding from the Government, Ms.Chetna doesn’t not entertain as she faced the different views while tried taking those funds.
Thus the session gave an insight about the social concern of enlightening and upliftment of rural women with a concept of Enterpreneurship.
As a part of our fellowship program we had a RTI module for three days. Mr. Ashuthosh and Mr. Thippanna from APNA IT were the resources persons for this module.
This Act is a weapon to fight against corruption and to bring transparency in Public authorities. This Act came in to existence on 15th June 2005 in India except Jammu and Kashmir.
Public authority (where we can get information)
Authority established
Under Constitution
Law made by Parliament
Law made State Legislature
Institutions financed by Government directly or indirectly
Information means:
Records, documents, memos, e-mails, opinions, advices, press releases, circulars, orders, Logbooks, contracts, reports, papers, samples, models, data material held any electronic form and information relating to any private body which can be accessed by public authority.
Suo-Moto, Section 4 (1) (B) its a self declaration by a public departments under this Act. This information should be with department within 120 days of Act existence. Under this act you can get information about department. It contains 17 points of basic information. There will be no application charges for this information but person has to give money for information he or she gets.
Section 6 (1): under this section person can get particular information from the organization. For this information we have to pay Rs. 10 of postal order. There is no specific format to apply for the both under 4 (1) (B) and 6 (1).
Whom to contact: There should be a Public Information Officer (PIO) in every office of Government offices, in case of his/her absence or leave there Assistant PIO has to take the application.
Application should include person address, if possible email address or phone number. The content should be clear what you need exactly.
Duration:
Within 30 days of application date the information has to give. If information not reached to the person with in the period the concerned authority will be responsible and the information should be given free of cost.
Rejection of Application:
At any circumstances authority cannot deny information except if effects on integrity of the nation, and includes security information, Intellectual property, foreign confidence, ongoing investigation details, cabinet meeting the application can be rejected.
Holi is the Festival of Colours, is a popular Hindu spring festival observed in India, Nepal, and countries with large Hindu diaspora such as Suriname, Guyana, Trinidad, the UK, Mauritius and Fiji. In West Bengal of India and Bangladesh, it is known as Dolyatra (Doljatra) or Boshonto Utsav ("spring festival"). (source: wikipedia)
On 15th March we DFP fellows celebrated holy festival.
Dr Hiremat, Neuroclinical psychiatrist, was here on 6th March founder of Manovikas. Manovikas is an institute for rehabilitation center for mentally retarded children. He said that his daughter is the inspiration for starting this special school as she suffered from meningitis and died in the year of 1994. During that time he was working for an USA agency. He resigned the job and started Manovikas in 1994. He started a small day care center with two rooms from 10.30am to 4.30am for retarded children. It has become a residential school by 2003.
Reasons for the Development of mental retard
Age of the mother
Mental & physical health of the mother
Genetic abnormalities
Mother’s addiction to drugs
Malnutrition
Half attempted abortion
Use of unpriscribed drugs
Accidents
Epileptic attack by hormonal change
Forceps delivery (80%)
Anoxia
Prolong delivery
Cesarean (2%)
Low birth
Manovlkas is an institution for rehabilitation center, especially for mentally retarded children.
Dr. J.K.Hiremath, founder of this organization says his daughter is the inspiration for starting this special school. She suffered from meningitis and died in the year 1994.
Dr. Hiremath was working in an American organization resigned his job came to India & in 1994 he started a small day care center with two rooms from 10:30am to 4:30pm for mentally retarded children. This grew into a residential school by 2003.
Reasons for the development of mental retardness
Age of the mother
Mental & physical health of the mother
Genetic abnormalities
Mother’s addiction to drugs
Malnutrition
Half attempted abortion
Use of unpriscribed drugs
Accidents
Epileptic attack by hormonal change
Forceps delivery (80%)
Anoxia
Prolong delivery
Cesarean (2%)
Low birth
Functions of Manovikas
The functions of Manovikas as follows
Visiting the villages & building the awareness: This includes early identification, facilities available from the government, diagnosis & issue of certification.
Convergence service: They have adopted 7 villages of Kanpur taluq, each village is having some SHGs which helps in the taking care of the children, for this parent of the children are charged Rs2/-
Upanayana: Here they train the parents as co-therapists. Different therapies will be given to the child. Like,
Hydro therapy
Sand therapy
Jump fit therapy
Multisensory stimulation therapy
Squint correction therapy
Physiotherapy
Vita therapy
Speech therapy
Drooling therapy
Special education system: Here level assessment of the children is done by check list. They follow the individual rehabilitation program (IRP), in which each child will be having its own
curriculum. Basic knowledge like Time, Money, Writing name, Signature was taught to the students. For female domestic ability development program is also conducted. Music therapy, sports, yoga, dance is also part of the school activities.
Residential service: They teach self help skills like, Toilet training specially reporting, eating, bathing, grooming, for female menstrual hygiene. They also take children for excursions.
Achievements of school.
One of the students won the Gold medal in special Olympic organized in China
ntroduction: The Nagnur village comes under Shurshetti Koppa Panchyath, Khalgatigi Taluk of Dharwad district. It is 25 KM away from Hubli city. Only road transportation available for this village. Four our team members and me visited this village on 11th and 12th of Feb 2009. Before this we had orientation in Gramachethana. Mr. Deepak, coordinator BIAF explained the motive behind Gramachethana. After that I moved to Kmapli Koppa along with my Classmates. We had practical experience of the PRA. I have been in matrix group. We did the matrix ranking regarding Compost. The ranking showed that still villagers are fond of Farm Yard manure (FYM).
History of the village: ‘Nagnur’ means village of snakes. We got different stories from the people regarding village history. One of the elders said that the village was called Laxmipura after that it changed to Yalghatigi Nagnur and Nagnur. Other sources said that some body found Nagalinga in the village long back that is why villagers named Nagnur.
Transect Walk We started our journey from Gramachethana. Naganur village is 2 KM from Gramachethana. On the way we saw ground nuts, cotton, and sugarcane & sunflower crops in the field. When we entered in to the village Coconut trees welcomed us in front every houses. We met some youths & old men few of them helped us for transect walk. We observed that houses are built very systematically side by side. In the entrance of the village there are houses built in the planned way given by Govt. Roads are very big. Majority houses are Kachha houses. When we entered the village people were busy with their works. They were waiting for bus at Basavanna temple, some people were going to the field, and others were having tea at hotel & children were playing in front of community hall. There are 5 temples in the village; Basavanna Temple, Devamamman Temple, Hanuman Temple & Durgamman temple. There is a primary school, an Anganwadi , community hall, Milk Dairy, Panchayath office. There is a Durga. Village was clean. Everyone has drawn rangoli in front of their houses. It shows their indigenous knowledge, local customs & practices. Rapport building was main challenge for us. As soon as we entered the village we initiated rapport building. When we met people our team members were saying “ Namskara “ to villagers. We clearly explained them reason for coming to their village. Afternoon we visited field we collected some information regarding soil and crops.
Demographic details: In this village360 habitants have been living. Village is having 1390 population in that male 686 and female 704 are there. Total 891 voters are there in that male 473 and female 418. There are 230 BPL families living in the village. Village is having 90% literacy. 1431 Acre land has been cultivated in the village in that 348 Acre irrigation land and 1083 Acre dry land is there.
TIME LINE (Historical Mapping): Health and Hygiene 1970 & Now ‘Cholera’ disease was very common But now we can see the Cancer, AIDS etc.
Hospital facility was not there PHCs is there in nearby village Less cleanliness Since BIAF intervention villagers sensitized about hygiene.
Open deification was more
Sanitation increased Dependent on well/pond for drinking water Every one using tap water
People were use to bath once in a seven days Now they are use to bath every day
It was the late evening when we started our activities because people still returning from the fields. Later we gathered the people for social mapping.
Social Mapping: We started this activity in the late evening due to non availability of the people. To gather the people was the main challenge for our group. One of our group mate given idea of applying Kunkum to the ladies. The idea was worked out.
Resource Mapping
We did this activity on 2nd of our village stay. Initially villagers scared or hesitated to involve in this activity. No one has come forward to draw the map. At last we convinced a boy draw the map as per instruction given by other villagers.
Dr. APJ. Abdul Kalam was here on 6th of February to inaugurate the DCSE (Deshpande Center for Social Entrepreneurship) building at Hubli. When he entered DCSE campus for building inauguration he came towards us and wished us. After the inauguration of the building we had taken group photo with him.
After inauguration of DCSE and Dr. RH Kulkarni Memorial Lecture Hall Complex he addressed the gathering. He spoke on Creative Leadership, Economic development and prosperity, Distinctive Profile of India by 2020, Integrated Action for developed India, Baktara PURA in 2011. The link given below will give more information regarding details of speech on that day.
It was in the news paper that February 1st is the pulse polio day. Then me and my team decided to go near by the community to have some activity that benefits the community.
Activities done: First we met Anganawadi teacher in a booth and introduced ourselves. After that we divided in to two groups (one leader and one follower) went to home visit to bring the children to the polio booths. The two groups visited around 200 houses to inform about pulse polio. Hand full of the people did not aware of the program. After the home visits they went to booth. Its my dream to work with children. It was the wonderful opportunity that i got a chance to work with children.
my team with pulse polio volunteers and my home visit photos
I visited Hampi on 30th of January with my co-fellows and deligates from various countries. We started visit from Krishna temple and ended in Kamal Mahal.
The activity or campaign was conducted on 25th of Jan 2009 at 06:00 am by Ms.Gayatri, Mr.Veeresh, Mr.Shambuling, Mr.Lakshmish. The aim of the activity was make the people take responsibility of social properties and to conserve them for next generation. The objectives of the activities were 1. To bring in awareness about cleanliness, conserving the natural resources and proper utilization of the facilities provided by Government. 2. To bring in the notice to the Government about the mismanagement by the authorities. 3. Educate the society about health and hygiene through various activities like drama, skit, role plays etc Reason for choosing particular activity: During the previous visit to Unkal lake by the fellows, came across about the unhealthy condition inside the park over there, cows and buffalo lying inside the park making the surrounding area stingy by dung all around. Gutka packs and waster paper lying throughout the park. Waste water from the companies surrounding the park enters inside and has made the part of park stagnant with drainage water. Waste thrown all over the park made it very untidy and created an unpleasant environment for those who come there for better healthy condition. This brought in the idea of advocacy in the mind of group members.
Activity: The group members led by Ms.Gayathri and Mr.Veeresh joined by Mr.Shambuling and Mr.Lakshmish as followers started cleaning the park by picking up the garbage lying all around the greenery area of the park. All the four members pecked the waste and collected it in one corner of the park. It was not an easy task as the waste was just spread over the park in each and every corner. Picking glass pieces of the cool drinks bottle and gutka packing cover was really a challenging job for the group.
The people who came for walking and jogging were slowly attracted by our activities. They started coming to us to interact what was happening and started sharing their views. They appreciated the work performed by the group.
