Empower Women Farmers in India

Dear Friends,

Greetings from Seva Mandir.

Wishing you a very Happy, Prosperous and Wonderful 2014. Thank you friends for extending peace, love and support to all of us in 2013. We look forward to another great year with you. Year by year, our association is getting stronger. Thank you very much for adding happiness in so many lives.

Today I thought of sharing with you some more positive recent developments related to our dal mill (lentil processing) project.

The dal mill was commissioned with the view of adding value to the pulses, cultivated by the farmers in Kotra and in turn giving maximum returns to the farmers. Over the years, we have taken small steps towards achieving this objective. The past three months have seen many developments in the operations of the dal mill.

The numbers of clients have increased in the past three months. As also, we have started receiving bulk orders from our clients. Sahkari Upbhokta Bhandar, the largest government departmental store in Udaipur has started procuring dal from us. They have already purchased 2000 kilograms of dal from us and we are expecting fresh orders in the upcoming months. The latest addition in our list of clientele is The Lalit Laxmi Vilas Palace hotel in Udaipur. This is one hotel in Udaipur which is frequented celebrities and the affluent class. The fact that this hotel has entered into a contract with Nala Bachat Samiti for purchasing tuar dal testifies to the superior quality of dal produced by the farmers in Kotra. We are also in talks with Hotel Udai Kothi in Udaipur and hopefully we can strike a deal for supply of dal in the coming month.

Meanwhile, changes have taken place at the administrative front in the dal mill. The general body election had taken place after 3 years in the month of December in which a new panel of 11 core committee members were elected who will represent each of the six villages from which they belong. A meeting of the core committee will be held every month and issues related to operations of the dal mill will be discussed. The dal mill after breaking even in the last financial year, is for the first time running at a net profit of almost Rs. 30,000 according to half yearly financial report for FY 2013-14. Accordingly it has been decided to distribute net profit among the farmer members on the basis of their patronage in the dal mill.

A moisture meter will be installed in the dal mill which will enable in accurate measurement of the moisture content of the pulses and help us in ascertaining the correct selling price for the different varieties of dal.

The dal mill has hoisted visits from varied luminaries like Prof. Abhijit Dasgupta, an economics faculty at South Asian University which is promoted by SAARC. He is conducting a research on agricultural interventions by NGOs conducted by IFPRI and the dal mill will appear as a case study in the same. The dal mill was also visited by Mr. John Pheasant, an eminent legal professional from U.K. and his wife, Mrs. Felicia Pheasant, an educationist. The dal mill also hoisted a visit of 26 students from TISS (Tata Institute of Social Sciences, India) in the month of January whereby the students came to learn about the impact of livelihoods interventions on the lives of rural people.

Once again thank you so much for your continuous support.

Have an awesome year ahead.

Warm regards,

Atul Lekhra

Links:

• Seva Mandir's website