In “Rural Edge project” we had program called “Village reach”. We conducted this program with some great intentions. Our intentions of this program were to share the information about our project with our candidates’ families and with their village people. Sharing information, sharing training experience with villagers was the main purpose of this training. Your village son and daughter came to the BPO training and what they learnt in the training showing to village people was our program purpose.

For pilot project of “Village reach”, from “E” class we selected Chilakamuki village. It is 23km from Koppal. We have 3 candidates from this village. To pilot project we sent 4 girls from “E” class, their names are Basamma, Shobha, Savita, Ganga and Basavaraj from “A” class. These 5 candidates got selected to do Village reach pilot project in Chilakamuki. We did orientation program on 7^th April 2010.

Candidates Experience in Village Reach program:

First day candidates approached primary school head master for the room of the training. Starting head master told to them that he will not give permission to conduct training in the School. After our candidates requested to him for the room and they explained him what is the purpose of this training. After listening to our candidates headmaster gave permission to them.  First day they cleaned the room which head master gave to them.  They invited village people for the “Gram Sabha”.  Nearly 100 villagers attended the Grama Sabha. They were very interesting to see their village students speaking in English. They dint ask more questions. They asked questions only related the Village Reach program.

In the training 45 students of Chilakamuki attended the village Reach program.  For 3 days our candidates thought English according to our curriculum package. In this our candidates divided class in to 2 classes, one is 1^st standard to 4^th standard and one is 4^th standard to 7^th standard. They handle class smartly. Students asked many questions to our candidates and learnt.  Within 3 days they learnt to speak some sentences in English, like did you have breakfast? When will you come back? How are you? Etc.

According to our candidates within 3dyas village students learnt so many things. We could not think that they can learn these many things within 3 days. In villages there are many talented students they just need one chance to show their talent. Our candidate Shobha expressed to us that, becoming teacher was her dream; by doing this project she full filled her dream, which she was thinking was not possible in her life.  They proved that ill literate can become the best teachers in the word.

Savita our candidate expressed, it was my pleaser to speak in front of village people, which I used think that impossible in my life. Here she got courage to speak with village people and answer their questions. She was very proud about herself for speaking in front of so many people.  

Basamma our candidate expressed, that, it was great opportunity to tell my village people and my family members that education is very important in our life. By this program my parents understood the importance of education and they decided to send my sisters to school and college.

Ganga our candidate expressed her opinion; this was great opportunity in my life to teach to village students. I am dropout. Now I came to your village and I thought English to your village children. I am very happy. I also came out of my stage fear. I am very thank full  to this project.

Our village reach program candidates also expressed that, now they are very confident to speak with people. They also said that we leant how to speak with people in the mass.  They realized that they are capable to take any challenges and handle it very well. They felt that they can take the responsibility of their own village for development.                                                   

Villagers’ opinion:

Village people were very happy by seeing their village students learning English and their own village students that is also dropout from school teaching English in their village. Some opinions of the villagers as follow.

Shankargouda Patil-

He expressed his opinion to our candidates as follow. First day when you people came to chilakamuki I thought what you people will teach to our village students. You people are very young, how can you teach someone else. I thought like this, but you people spoke with all Panchayat members, school head master and you did all the arrangements yourself. I am politician, but still many times I feel fear to speak with others. You people are very confident you spoke with all leaders and did all the arrangements yourself. I am proud about you all. You people did great work in our village.

Huligemma (School student, 9^th standard)-

You people are teaching very well. We don’t understand what our sirs and madams teach in our schools. They don’t bother about whether we understood or not. They just try to finish their syllabus. You people are younger than our teachers, but you thought many things in English to our village students we are proud of you all and happy to see you all in this position. Even I would like learn like you all.

Parents of our candidates- You all are our children. Today you all are teaching to our village students, we are very happy to see you all. You people are very young, but you people are teaching to our village students. Our village students don’t listen to us in our homes, but they are listening to you all and they are following you all wherever you all go. That is really shows that your class in really interesting to them. Our village students properly don’t go to school, but they are coming and sitting in your class that is really great. You all are very young, in this young age you all are doing great work in our village. We are proud about you all. Please continue you great work. 

Prakash and Vithal (Primary school teachers) - In these teachers opinion our training was magic. We are amazing to see our own village students, who were dropout from the school. Today those dropouts only are teaching to our village students. We are really happy to see this and we proud about these students. When we spoke with these teachers they asked us that are you doing any black magic in your training center. How can you train these students within 6 months and make them to speak, read and write in English. They also said to us that, in this “Village reach” 3days program class half of the students are dropout from the school. They don’t come to school, but today they are attending your candidates’ class and learning English. Within 3 days our village students learnt to speak little in English, they are singing and asking some questions in English. We are really happy to see this. Your 3 days training is making our teaching easy. You please extend this program to 15 days to 1 month, it will really give result. They also insisted to conduct training to teachers about English.

This is some feeling of villagers. These are some impact of “Village reach program”. I am very happy to share with you all that drop out from the school, are now teaching to their village children. I feel this is the first time in the world one drop out from the school teaching to others, that is also English and computer this is really great. I really happy to tell you that, I am part of this great work, I feel proud that my candidates are teaching to others. These are some others great work which we are doing in our project in BPO project. Now our candidates are confident, they are able to handle the issues and programs.

To select the candidates we took interview. This is different type of interview, I have newer seen in my life, which I experienced first time in my life. In interview process we gave different challenges to the candidates to check their commitment, their passion to learn. We gave them challenges like learn 10 English words in 5 minutes, count how many bikes are in the campus, clean the bike, dance etc. Many candidates have done this very well and they got selected for the training. Presently we have 155 candidates in 3 centers.

Starting we gave 1 day training at 3 times in different months. In this we empowered them to take their own life responsibility to change their life. We told them that we will support you to learn English and computer, but you have to take the responsibility of learning. We will support you in your learning. This training program made them to take the challenge and to decide to change their life own life.

We had village base training.  In this we train them in some English elements like introducing them self, reading, and writing.

Now I am training girl’s candidates. I have 28 girls in my class room. They all are from different villages of Koppal district. Now one month pass in the teaching I got different experience in my teaching process. In teaching curriculum I participated in psychology sessions like stress management, in this they shared their past experience of their life with me and with team. After this session they felt relax and they started concentrating study. Here I felt trust is very important thing in this session. As problem is part of our life, even all girls have many problems in their life. They all had faced different problems and different situations in their life; because of this they have big hope on this training program.

Before starting the training I got training in teaching and in different subject like how  candidates may behave, how to empower them in studying, how much should we expect from them, what rezones candidate may give about not studying or not doing the home work etc. Even in my training I am facing those issues. Even I am getting different rezones like stomach pain, head ache, etc. Starting month all girls faced problems like adjusting to the new environment, but now they all are adjusted to the SAMUHA campus.

I am very happy to share that all girls are trying to speak in English, now they can understand and can give the answer in small sentences.

We have been taught in school that tobacco is cash crop and many of us believe it. It is worth to finding the truth of the matter. Tobacco is grown in over 125 countries. Tobacco pant is a native of Mexico, Central and South America. There are bout sixty-five known variety of tobacco of which only two varieties are extensively cultivated.

Bidi, cigarate, Hukka, gutkha, snuff etc are different varieties of the tobacco. In India Bidi was first manufactured in Bihar. Later it spread to the other parts. Fist cigarette machine factory was set up in Havana, Cuba in 1853. Later cigarette spread to England and America. After the First World War cigarette smoking increased rapidly in the country. India ranks third in the world in tobacco production. Cigarette smoking has become the popular form of tobacco used internationally. In India Cigarette smoking accounts for about 16% and chewing tobacco for 30%. The remaining percentage of people consumes the other forms like bidis, moist snuff, dry snuff etc.

There are over 260 million tobacco users in the country today. Each day 68,000 to 82,000 adolescents from low and middle income countries enter the pool of tobacco users every day against 14,000 to 15,000 in high income countries. Every ten seconds, another dies as a result of tobacco use. This translates to nearly 10,000 deaths every day and 5 million deaths annually (WHO) .About half of all smokers who are killed by tobacco die in middle age. On an average, these smokers who die in middle age lose about 20-25 years of life expectancy.

While the net profit of tobacco per annum is estimated as 24,000 crore, the cost of training tobacco related disease is estimated as 27,700 crore in India. Over two million children below fourteen years of age are engaged as laborers in the highly hazardous tobacco industry, most them as bonded laborers. Curing tobacco consumes an estimated 200,000 hectares of woodland each year in India. By the governments own estimates in Karnataka, 1,20,000 tonnes of wood is used just for curing.

Tobacco is a major risk factor for about 25 diseases. Smoking shortens life span. It is expected that tobacco users will lose, on an average, 22 years of normal life expectancy. The average India bidi contains 330 mg of tobacco while the average cigarette has 1 g of tobacco but the contents of nicotine may be higher in the bidi.

30% of all cancers can be attributed to tobacco. Smoking is a known cause of death from cancers of lung, oral cavity, larynx, oesophagus, stomach, kidney, bladder, and pancreas. Tobacco contains more than 4000 chemicals. Yet is only one part Nicotine, which is responsible for the addictive role of tobacco.

Tobacco is addictive but possible to quite so we all have to decide to quite. It will save our health and environment.

One of the modules of Deshpande Fellowship Training happened was Eco-tourism for the period of a 5 days, from 23 September to 27^th September 2008. In my life eco tourism would be the most remembering tour. We enjoyed a lot in the eco tourism. We visited Honnemaralu, situated in Sagar taluk, Uttarkannada District. We were guided by Mr. Swami and Mrs. Nomito who are of running an NGO called “The Adventures –A wilderness School”. This is an NGO which is working on conservation of forest through eco tourism model. As per the guidance from Adventure Team we did not use plastic, mobile and other electronic things. This was totally tension free and informatic tour.

First day we had interaction with Mr. Swami, Mrs. Nomito and other staff.  We enjoyed swimming with the help of life jacket in the Sharavati back water. This was my first experience of swimming. In the beginning I was afraid a lot to get into the water, I felt it as a matter of life and death. But with the help of guides and friends I could able to enjoy the water sports. This gave me courage to take challenges and risk.  We all fellows enjoyed a lot in the water. After that Mrs. Nomito made us to play some trust worthy games, that time we learnt that how teamwork is important in the organization. Everyone should trust each other and should maintain that trust, and then only the organization can develop.

Second day it was 24^th September ‘08 we learnt paddling and swimming. These were my most exciting moments. In each boat 4 fellows did paddling in the back water of Sharawati. While doing paddling I felt that I am in new a world .By doing paddling my confidence level increased and I gained grip on that activity and I realized that, practice will make human being perfect. The night was planned at one of the island, and we went there in boat by paddling by our own. We spent night in tent and enjoyed camp fire and food in the island.  

On the third day we went to Keladi. It is one of the most famous historical places in Karnataka. In this village we visited Venkatesha Joshi’s house and had delicious lunch in their home. After having the orientation about Rameshwara temple we had opportunity to see kindarjogi program. I realized that this type of programmers could be an effective media to convey the message and educate people regarding several issues.

We had stayed In Ramnaik’s house in Kanur village on the third day night. The 4^th day of Eco tourism started at 9-30 am from Ramnaik’s house of Kanur village. Morning we had breakfast and we started trekking. Jagadish and Triveni took the responsibility of leading the fellows in the trekking. In this we went through agriculture field, forest and Shola forest. Fellows got bitten by leeches. In between the trekking we stayed in the home of Mr. John at Mundaval, here we took little rest, and we had a tea and started moving towards Kanur fort at evening. This fort built by Queen Channabhairadevi of Gerusoppa kingdom. She started first International trade in India, by this she use to get gold coins. The resource person Mr. Nagaraj Jain said that to protect these gold coins and war instruments she built this fort. Still we can see the ruined monuments of ancient fort, temple. There are three interesting things about this fort firs thing is it is situated in a very safe place, no one can recognize it from long distance. The second thing is it has 7 entrances; no one can enter in to the fort easily. Third thing is there is very scientific method of water conservation.   Here we can see the excellent methods Gerusoppa kings to conserve water.

 Late evening we came back to home of John. In night all fellows had discussion with swami sir and another resource person   Mr. Nagaraj Jain.  Fellows shared their experiences with others.

In this eco tourism I came to know that how can we save our nature with less intervention, what is our role in this, we are talking about globalization but how to stop that, these are some important question everyone should think about this. I came to know the new intervention where social Entrepreneurs can do.

In this campaign I had good experience and as well as bad experience. Some people supported generously and some didn’t, because it is very difficult to believe unknown people in the matter of money because it is the money which they earned with hard work.

Fellows divided in to 5 groups in each group 4-5 members were there. Pramod, Paramjeet and Sanjiv were part of my work in the group. First day we went to railway station for found rising. In this we collected money in the platform of railway station and in trains. In this I came to know found rising is very big work, we need lot of skills and techniques for fund raising. In this each group used their own strategy to collect the money and fellows collected nearly 63,000Rs. Fellows sent this money to Chief Minister Relief fund.

1. Economic reason

2. Lack of space

3. They wont think this is a problem

4. women’s are not able to tell their problems inf rent of the family head, this showes that women’s are still not able to raise there voice for their problem. 

5. lack of awarness about health

these are some important resons i found in this village.Because of this open defecation Most of the woman’s are facing the problems but still they are not able to tell their problems to  head of the family.  women’s are facing many problems because of  open defecation, those are,

1. It is affecting women dignity

2. Women facing psychological stress

3. They have to go for defecation in the early morning or in the  night, this is affecting there health.

4. They are westing lot of time to go open defecation

5. Risk-Insect baiting

these are some important problem which are facing by Bagadgeri women. According to me every women who is going for open defecation in every village may be facing same problems, which need to solve.

Village study of Kuradikeri

Introduction:  In my village study, first I went to Ganjigatti. After this, in my second village study, I went to Kuradikeri, which is in Hubli Taluk. Here I stayed at Shri Basawaraj Angadi’s house, as  he is our resource person. This was a very interesting village study. India is a developing country, but still it is facing many problems. As a result, we need to solve the problems of villages, and only then can India develop. In this village study, two people were placed: myself (Savita Kallayyanamath) and Chinnbabu. We stayed there for three days, from 21^st July to 23^rd July. On the morning of the 21^st, we reached Kuradikeri at 10-30, and we got a good welcome from our resource person and from that day only we started our work.

Location :  Kuradideri is in Hubli Taluk and belongs to Dharwad District. It is 18km north of Hubli. The villages around Kurdikeri are Surshettikoppa, Kamplikoppa, Karadikoppa

Demography:  Kurdikeri has a population of 3,500 and there are around 450 families. There are 334 children in the whole village. In this village, there is a total of 9 handicapped people. Also, Kurdikeri has one school and two Anganwadies.

History of Village: Kuradikeri has a very interesting story behind its origin. This village was started by one brother and one sister who came from Kukanur to Unakal, and from there they went to Kuradikeri and started staying there. Since these people came from Unakal, their surname came to be Unakal only. Initially in this village, there were 2 vaddar families, 2 kurabas families, and 4 unakal families. At that time, the village name was Hampeholeyolalu but afterwards it changed to Kuradikeri. Behind this also one story is there: there were 3 sisters, of whom one was blind. Two of the sisters were staying in other villages, but the blind sister was staying in this village. Thus, the village name changed to Kuradikeri, which means blind village.

People of the Village: Kuradikeri originated from the people of Unakal, so most families belong to this surname. People of different castes live in this village, like lingayats, vaddars, kurubas, talawars, and Muslims. They engage in different work depending on their cast, though most people are doing agriculture.

Livelihood: Most of the people of Kuradikeri engage in agriculture, and this is main source of their bread-earning. Additionally, landless people work in other people’s land. Some people are doing some other work, like tea shop business, pan shop, or carpentry work. Nowadays, most of the young generation goes to Hubli for work because they believe earnings from working in the field are not enough for their life. Rather, if they go to Hubli and work, they can earn 100Rs per day. The women’s of Kuradikeri rear cattle, and this earning is helping in their life.

Resources of Kuradikeri: The people of Kuradikeri have 2000 acres of agricultural land, some of which is irrigated.  In the village, a total of 100 bore wells are there, as well as five ponds,   named Hirekeri, Kirekeri , Kempageri, Unakal, and Kallanchi katti. These ponds have some water, but this water is not used for drinking.  For drinking water, the village gets water by bore well, and there are ten public water taps. People make livestock for human beings and  for the animal also for the animal they use to stock fodder and for human different type of grains like they are maintaining their livestock  this stock they are maintaining for one year and this grains  they use for next year crop  irrigation.[DMM1] 

Life of the Villagers: In Kuradikeri, some people are rich, some are middle class, and most  people are poor. For the poor, their lives depend on agriculture. According to me, women’s lives in Kuradikeri are very independent because women do some economic generating work, like buffalo rearing, agricultural work, and small business. Because the women of Kuradikeri are contributing to their own economic condition, they are becoming stronger, joining SHGs, and changing their life styles.

Social Relationships in the Village:  In the village, the social relationships are very good. All people live together and help each other, but still the caste system is in the village and different castes of people live in different areas. The area names are recognized on a caste basis and some people still work according to their caste. All castes of people go to each other’s homes, but in giving hospitality, some discrimination is still going on. Overall, however, people work together for the well-being of the village. Many SC/ST women are SHG members, and they go to the homes of all people in the village, which shows the village’s good social relationships.

Vulnerabilities of the Village: Most people in Kuradikeri depend on agriculture. As agriculture depends on rain, if there is no rain then people are suffering a lot. In some months, like January, February, and March, there is no work in the fields, so some people go elsewhere to work and return in the rain season. In the village, I felt that sanitation problems are more, and because of this, the beauty of the village is spoiled. Health facilities are also a problem, and the people of the village have to go about 18km (to Hubli) to get treatment. The PHC is also far from the village: one must take two buses so to get to the health facility, which is very difficult for the people of Kuradikeri. One RMP doctor is in the village.

Development Situation: In the village, some development activities are occurring. Five NGO’s work in Kuradikeri:

1.      Agriculture Management Education (AME) – This NGO is provides agricultural education to farmers.

2.      Sujala Watershed Project – This NGO is working on check dams, ponds, and field horticulture

3.      Karmani – This NGO works on health issue and holds some free health checkup camps

4.      The Deshpande Foundation – This NGO is working on clearing kitchen air through smokeless chullas.

5.      BAIF – This NGO works on agriculture, and is the first NGO to enter Kuradikeri village. Since the beginning, BAIF has made tremendous changes in the lives of villagers, especially in their agriculture activities and income generation. This NGO worked here from 1997 to 2005, and it caught my attention, as still people are remembering this NGO for its great work. 

In my eyes, I saw this village as a developing village, and still it has some problems, such as health facilities, sanitation, and agriculture. To resolve these problems, action is needed. However, villagers are busy and satisfied in their life; they have a daily work routine. Regarding agriculture, bullocks are part of the villager’s life, and they see bullocks as a god.

The farmers of the village are very hard workers. Much of a day’s time is spent in the field and the wives of farmers also go to the field to work, thereby showing equal participation of men and women. Farmers take great care of the bullocks because these bullocks helping them in the agriculture. The women of the village, in addition to participating in agricultural activities, also take care of the family. Gender issues exist, as women have to serve men.

We had a meeting with an SHG group named Ulavi channabasaveshavar, and we had great time with them. The women shared their experience in the SHG and talked about how this development project helped in their life. This was a good experience for me. Talking about villages and village problems is very easy, but really working in the village is very difficult. First we have to feel their life, and then only we can understand a villager’s life. According to me, this village study made me feel their life.