Economic Growth India Project #1900

Empowering Villages in Rural India

by Seva Mandir

Project Report | Oct 3, 2019
Bridging the Gap...

By Atul Lekhra | Manager- Resource Mobilization

Dear Friend,

The government of India is working very hard to eradicate poverty and illiteracy from the country and in order to achieve this, the government has launched many schemes focusing on sustainable development of underprivileged. Such schemes can be proved a milestone if executed properly. However, implementation of government schemes in a country with a population of around 1.37 billion is a cumbersome task. The lack of awareness, high illiteracy rates, poor governance and corruption leads to the failure of these schemes.

Seva Mandir is working closely with the village communities to bridge this gap in between so that the benefits can reach ground level. With the help of proper communication channels at the village level, Seva Mandir is successful in bringing awareness in communities.

Kumbhalgarh, a world heritage site has been the focus area of Seva Mandir for the past 10 years and the bond between the two has brought an impact on many lives in the area. Seva Mandir provide trainings regularly explaining the government programs and schemes in simpler terms. The trainings demonstrate the economically backward communities about government policies, financial services such as cattle and crop insurance, loan, pension and remittances and the process for availing these policies. The process involves training on application form filling, submission of application in respective department, and regular follow-ups on the application status till the motive is achieved. Team Seva Mandir keeps the applicant involved in this entire process cycle so that they can become independent for similar future tasks.

The impact of these trainings in terms of numbers is incredible. Around 641 applications have been successfully linked with various government welfare schemes in last 6 months. The communities received assistance for many schemes like education at primary and higher levels, health and nutrition for all, insurance for crops production, cattle insurance cover, workplace death compensation etc. As a result, total earnings of Rs. 10,06,100 ($14,209) have been received by locals. This is a big achievement as the people were living in extreme conditions that too below the poverty line. The work of Seva Mandir has made people realize their rights and to take a stand for everything. Now the trained individuals from Seva Mandir have become key resources for the communities and they are encouraging the next generation as well. Apart from this, Seva Mandir keeps track of all latest schemes launched by the government of India and provide trainings accordingly.

We would like to thank you deeply for your continued support which has enabled us to keep supporting people in our villages.

Regards

Atul Lekhra and the Seva Mandir Team

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Jul 2, 2019
Strong Federations Advocating for Social Change

By Atul Lekhra | Manager- Resource Mobilization

Dear Changemaker,

Seva Mandir has always believed and worked towards empowering communities to take accountability of social transformation as the most sustainable way of moving ahead. Seva Mandir has nurtured its village development groups into spaces where people are able to actively participate in the decisions which directly affect their lives.

To further empower these village groups, the groups have been amalgamated into federations. These are multilayered, self-governing community institutions created by Seva Mandir to resolve larger-scale issues. The federations work on the social as well as financial issues of the region and liaise with various government as well as non-government agencies.

Jhadol is 50 kms away from Udaipur and is inhabited by mostly tribal population. Seva Mandir has been working very closely with village communities in Jhadol for over 40 years and that has resulted in strong village groups and federations in the region. The federation meets every month to discuss issues pertaining to their zones (each zone comprising 10-15 villages).

In May 2019 , Ogna zone in Jhadol proactively worked on an issue that helped not only the daily wage laborers of their zone, but for the entire region.

In order to ensure employment in village, government had launched a programme called Mahatama Gandhi Employee Guarantee Act (MNREGA) under which 100 days of guaranteed employment is ensured in villages. However, along with labor, the act also ensures other conditions like availability of a shady area for rest, toilet, crèche for children and first aid kit should also be ensured at the work site.

While working on one of the construction sites for a road, a woman got severely injured on her head. There was neither a first aid kit available nor a resting place on the work site and she had to be immediately rushed to a hospital. Despite terrible blood loss, the woman could be saved but the incident was an alarming situation for the federation. The federation collectively wrote a letter to the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) appraising him about the situation and demanding a medical kit at each work site for the region. The CMO also responded immediately to it and within a month, medical kits were made available at all MNREGA work sites in Jhadol.

In another effort by Phalasiya and Madri zone federations, a very old and regressive social ritual was collective discarded. During the festival of Holi, every year for a period of 15-20 days vehicles on highway used to be stopped by women and children to demand money from passengers. It was very risky and exploitative for people to travel during these areas. The federation members launched a campaign against this practice and discussed it with every village group. This year the number of cases reported dropped by 80% and the federation have committed to uproot this tradition completely by next year.

The federations are slowly transforming to highly active and responsible action groups which are challenging social norms and demanding quality in government services. They will be very instrumental in ensuring development remains ‘by the people’ and ‘for the people’ in the region. The localized understanding of these federations about grass root challenges is multi faceted and empowering them to take collective action can bring profound changes in the lives of people.

We would like to thank you for letting us meet our commitments in the field. All this has been possible due to your consistent support and trust in us.

Regards

Atul Lekhra & the Seva Mandir Team

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Apr 4, 2019
Commitment of Village Community for Development

By Atul Lekhra | Manager- Resource Mobilization

Dear Friend,

We are thrilled to announce that GlobalGiving has awarded Seva Mandir with 5 achievements (Effective Organization, Staff Favorite Organization, Top Ranked Organization, Vetted Organization, Site Visit Verified Organization) making us a top-ranked organization for 2019!

All thanks goes to our dedicated supporters that we are able to keep accomplishing more every year and changing people's lives for the better. We can't thank you enough for your support and we look forward to another successful year!

Jardaya is a small village situated 27 kms away from Kumbalgarh in Rajsamand district and is inhabited by 150 tribal families from Bhil community. People rely on multiple livelihood options for earning their daily bread. Major source of income for the people in the village is through daily wage labor where they migrate to nearby states or work in marble mines nearby. Animal husbandry and agriculture are other options for income. But as the land is very undulating and eroded, the land that is available for cultivation is very less and people cultivate in very small fields. Dependency on monsoons and water scarcity further restricted their production from agriculture. As a result, the economic condition of the majority population is extremely appalling and ensuring clean drinking water always remained a major life struggle for many.

Seva Mandir initiated its work in this village in 2002-03 through activities like well deepening, land leveling, soil and water conservation etc. Although these efforts were limited to only sixty- six families of the village then, the results of these works motivated the whole village to join hands and come together for overall development of the village and conservation of its natural resources. Seva Mandir helped to create democratic and community ownership in all development works through several capacity building events and dialogues with the village. Gradually the local community came together to establish systems of community ownership and equitable benefit sharing mechanisms for all.

In 2008, through Seva Mandir’s facilitation, a village development committee was democratically elected by the villagers and it started working on issues of common land and water management. Through regular village meetings and mass awareness, Seva Mandir was able to work on drinking water, land rehabilitation and conservation of common pastureland land in Jardaya. It was extremely difficult for the committee to motivate people for coming together because many of villagers had illegally encroached the community pasture land (grassland) and were adamant on not vacating the site. After lot of meetings and repeated dialogues, the committee was finally successful in removing most of the encroachments except ten. The committee threatened them that they will file a complaint with the police if they are still not leaving the site after which they were finally able to vacate them and build a boundary wall for the pasture land. This land is now providing fodder/grass benefits worth two lacks of rupees (Approx. $3,000) every year to the whole village.

Villagers also voluntarily contributed in constructing soil and water conservation structures like stone check dams and trenches in the village so that ground water levels can be improved. While working on the pastureland, gradually a very strong sense of community belonging and leadership evolved in the group. There were initiatives for plantation in the pastureland and the committee made rules for management and security of the site. They employed a guard for guarding the premise and made rules for penalizing any rule breakers for any disturbance on the site.

The committee then moved forward to take up and tackle other issues in the village and persuaded Seva Mandir to provide guidance and support for clean drinking water facilities. They also started approaching the local governing bodies – the Panchayats for various issues. As a result of their efforts five drinking water tanks, two child day care centers for ensuring early childhood nutrition and development, a community hall and a health center were constructed in the village through Seva Mandir and Panchayat (local government body). The committee has been itself monitoring the quality of services in all these centers.

With more than 72 toilets and bathrooms constructed with the help of Seva Mandir, Jardaya has also been actively promoting government’s ‘Clean India’ campaign from the forefront. The village committee ensures the maintenance as well as regular usage of these toilets by the villagers.

These continuous and motivated efforts have helped in improving ground water level situations, removing illegal encroachments for community benefit and the village is moving towards comprehensive development. 8 other nearby villages were motivated after their work on community pastureland developed community pastureland sites in their villages. These interventions have led to the development of regions as a whole and these villages have not faced any water scarcity or grass scarcity situations in recent years as compared to the other villages. Jardaya village group has not only become one of the most active and vigilant communities Seva Mandir has ever worked with but also one of the leading examples in our work area to motivate nearby village committees to strive for same.

Jardaya village group has also been awarded Ummedmal Loda award in 2018 for its incredible work at grassroot level in nature conservation and promoting community ownership of the resources for a sustained period of time. Village groups like these give us the motivation to continue working for our cause and reiterate our belief in the extraordinary power of common people.

Thank you for your support and for the confidence that you have placed in us. None of this would have been possible without you.

Regards

Atul Lekhra and the Seva Mandir Team

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