Some Extra Curricular Observations During Visit Of ' KUPTI', disstt. Nanded, Maharashtra.
The inhabitants of village, which is located 165 km away from district head quarter, lack many symbols of modernity in village. The livelihood is dependent on mono crop of cotton, which suffers immensely for want of irrigation facilities. Farming and farm labour are the only option available to the villagers. Because of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, migration of labour to other places has stopped to some extent. At the island of poverty, ignorance and alienation, we could find many rays of hope also; Individuals striving for betterment of their life, elders with vision for their children and children with wings of fire. But the most promising aspect we could identify were the community led initiatives for betterment of community lives. Some of which are mentioned below.
1. Because of remoteness there was no telephone coverage in the village. The village decided to approach BSNL with offer to provide them the unused community hall to establish an exchange. With constant persuasion, the exchange was established. One of inhabitants got contractual employment and mobile became the first modern symbol of integration at a place where no other telephony network works.
2. Dependence of community on agriculture ultimately depends on rain, despite the fact that panganga river flows hardly one kilometer away and ground water level is sufficiently high. For last two years the Gram Sabha has decided to construct the Dug Wells in fields of selected beneficiaries under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. This is only type of work being done under MNREGS. This ensures employment during lax season as well as creates permanent assets of utmost importance. The farmers reported increase of 40% in farm yield after availability of this irrigation facility.
3. There are many live seasonal nallahas, big and small around the village, through the rain water is run away; terrain being sloppy. The village community after initiated by an NGO has blocked the run away intermittent rain water at dozens of places by simple and costless technique. The plastic waste bags of fertilizers is filled up and sacked to block the flow with help of most important resource available i.e. human labour. This ensures not only ground water recharge but also availability of water for cattle and irrigation for some time.
4. At one side of village there is river and on other side hilly terrain. Any water which falls finds a slope to run away. We witnessed one wonderful idea being implemented in the field of a farmer. The run away water from the corner of field is collected in a pit filled with pebbles and sand for filtration then the process repeated in the adjacent second pit and the transferred to the well.
5. In village Kupti, one NGO has helped the women to organize into self helps. There are five such self help groups running successfully. Though these are mainly saving groups which mainly facilitate saving and then use of such saving at times of need, the kind of confidence and self esteem these have brought amongst tribal and dalit women is commendable. The loan return ratio without fail is hundred percent. Only if banking institutions could come forward to afford the credit to such groups for higher order of livelihood professions.
6. The village under promotion from state government has constituted a 'Village Tanta Mukti Samiti'. This committee of village youth under guidance of elders has ensured that in last one year all the disputes have been resolved at village level itself and peace and harmony has been maintained without intervention of state machinery. The forest is preserved and promoted. The committee has ensured that no alcohol is sold or purchased within village premise and as a result of it violence against women has gone down drastically. The committee has initiated the drive of 'One Sapling Per child'. The village won an award of rupees three lakhs as token of appreciation from district administration.
KUPTI - THE VILLAGE OF TVs, DTHs BUT NO COMPUTERS, HUNDREDS OF MOBILE PHONES BUT NO LANDLINE,ONLY TRACTOR.
India is being branded as knowledge economy and land of computational technology but none of household in Kupti, a village of more than 2200 population has a computer. But almost all households have a TV set and many of them with DTH connection. None of houses in tribal hamlet is pucca but almost all the ladies watch serials like Pratigya and Pavithra Rishtha, after putting in more than ten hours in field and all household chores. People find less time for community interactions but the women and girls know about beauty tips and dance styles.
The telecom revolution in India is witnessed in poverty struck Kupti. When BSNL established the exchange in village, the big farmers got land line connections at their houses but now there is no landline connection but more than one mobile connection at single house.
'The' Missing Link in Government - three typical examples from KUPTI
1.At the very entrance of habitation of village there is a kind of house with two rooms of brick without plaster, doors or windows. The structure was erected in year 2002 to be a rest house of department of forest, forest area being nearby. None knows what actually happened but having spent lakhs of rupees on basic structure the house was abandoned without finishing. Since no one from community has the sense of ownership of the public money, no one cares to bother.
2.The nearest Primary Health Center from Kupti is located at Vanola, a village at a distance of approximately 07 kilometers. At this PHC of more than dozen villages, where there is basic facility to treat poisoning cases, very basic medicines or facility to measure even TLC/DLC, there are two noticeable equipment. The Incubator for children worth lakhs of rupees, supplied more than one year ago and a solar power run refrigerator, supplied more than eight months ago. None of these are in use, for simple reason that none at PHC knows how to switch on and operate the machines; no training has been imparted and costly machines are lying idle.
3.Kupti has a Zila Parishad run primary school up to class four. At primary school and before primary education, pre schooling at aaganwadi center, the enrollment coverage is almost universal. For education beyond class four, there is one private management run but Government Aided School up to class 10. In Maharashtra the schools of such nature are very prevalent. At this kind of schools, since payment to teachers is provided by Government but appointment is made by management as per norms of student teacher ratio, the large number of enrollment means greater number of teachers with attractive salaries. At the primary school out of eight sanctioned posts of teachers, three are vacant but at private management run aided school, there is no vacancy, even with inflated fictious enrollment figures.
The inhabitants of village, which is located 165 km away from district head quarter, lack many symbols of modernity in village. The livelihood is dependent on mono crop of cotton, which suffers immensely for want of irrigation facilities. Farming and farm labour are the only option available to the villagers. Because of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, migration of labour to other places has stopped to some extent. At the island of poverty, ignorance and alienation, we could find many rays of hope also; Individuals striving for betterment of their life, elders with vision for their children and children with wings of fire. But the most promising aspect we could identify were the community led initiatives for betterment of community lives. Some of which are mentioned below.
1. Because of remoteness there was no telephone coverage in the village. The village decided to approach BSNL with offer to provide them the unused community hall to establish an exchange. With constant persuasion, the exchange was established. One of inhabitants got contractual employment and mobile became the first modern symbol of integration at a place where no other telephony network works.
2. Dependence of community on agriculture ultimately depends on rain, despite the fact that panganga river flows hardly one kilometer away and ground water level is sufficiently high. For last two years the Gram Sabha has decided to construct the Dug Wells in fields of selected beneficiaries under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. This is only type of work being done under MNREGS. This ensures employment during lax season as well as creates permanent assets of utmost importance. The farmers reported increase of 40% in farm yield after availability of this irrigation facility.
3. There are many live seasonal nallahas, big and small around the village, through the rain water is run away; terrain being sloppy. The village community after initiated by an NGO has blocked the run away intermittent rain water at dozens of places by simple and costless technique. The plastic waste bags of fertilizers is filled up and sacked to block the flow with help of most important resource available i.e. human labour. This ensures not only ground water recharge but also availability of water for cattle and irrigation for some time.
4. At one side of village there is river and on other side hilly terrain. Any water which falls finds a slope to run away. We witnessed one wonderful idea being implemented in the field of a farmer. The run away water from the corner of field is collected in a pit filled with pebbles and sand for filtration then the process repeated in the adjacent second pit and the transferred to the well.
5. In village Kupti, one NGO has helped the women to organize into self helps. There are five such self help groups running successfully. Though these are mainly saving groups which mainly facilitate saving and then use of such saving at times of need, the kind of confidence and self esteem these have brought amongst tribal and dalit women is commendable. The loan return ratio without fail is hundred percent. Only if banking institutions could come forward to afford the credit to such groups for higher order of livelihood professions.
6. The village under promotion from state government has constituted a 'Village Tanta Mukti Samiti'. This committee of village youth under guidance of elders has ensured that in last one year all the disputes have been resolved at village level itself and peace and harmony has been maintained without intervention of state machinery. The forest is preserved and promoted. The committee has ensured that no alcohol is sold or purchased within village premise and as a result of it violence against women has gone down drastically. The committee has initiated the drive of 'One Sapling Per child'. The village won an award of rupees three lakhs as token of appreciation from district administration.
KUPTI - THE VILLAGE OF TVs, DTHs BUT NO COMPUTERS, HUNDREDS OF MOBILE PHONES BUT NO LANDLINE,ONLY TRACTOR.
India is being branded as knowledge economy and land of computational technology but none of household in Kupti, a village of more than 2200 population has a computer. But almost all households have a TV set and many of them with DTH connection. None of houses in tribal hamlet is pucca but almost all the ladies watch serials like Pratigya and Pavithra Rishtha, after putting in more than ten hours in field and all household chores. People find less time for community interactions but the women and girls know about beauty tips and dance styles.
The telecom revolution in India is witnessed in poverty struck Kupti. When BSNL established the exchange in village, the big farmers got land line connections at their houses but now there is no landline connection but more than one mobile connection at single house.
'The' Missing Link in Government - three typical examples from KUPTI
1.At the very entrance of habitation of village there is a kind of house with two rooms of brick without plaster, doors or windows. The structure was erected in year 2002 to be a rest house of department of forest, forest area being nearby. None knows what actually happened but having spent lakhs of rupees on basic structure the house was abandoned without finishing. Since no one from community has the sense of ownership of the public money, no one cares to bother.
2.The nearest Primary Health Center from Kupti is located at Vanola, a village at a distance of approximately 07 kilometers. At this PHC of more than dozen villages, where there is basic facility to treat poisoning cases, very basic medicines or facility to measure even TLC/DLC, there are two noticeable equipment. The Incubator for children worth lakhs of rupees, supplied more than one year ago and a solar power run refrigerator, supplied more than eight months ago. None of these are in use, for simple reason that none at PHC knows how to switch on and operate the machines; no training has been imparted and costly machines are lying idle.
3.Kupti has a Zila Parishad run primary school up to class four. At primary school and before primary education, pre schooling at aaganwadi center, the enrollment coverage is almost universal. For education beyond class four, there is one private management run but Government Aided School up to class 10. In Maharashtra the schools of such nature are very prevalent. At this kind of schools, since payment to teachers is provided by Government but appointment is made by management as per norms of student teacher ratio, the large number of enrollment means greater number of teachers with attractive salaries. At the primary school out of eight sanctioned posts of teachers, three are vacant but at private management run aided school, there is no vacancy, even with inflated fictious enrollment figures.
