JanMitram

Malnutrition in India : What should the private sector do?

2012-01-13T02:28:00.000-08:00

Ihave just finished a trip to India to help contribute to the efforts on endingmalnutrition. The politicians and media were talking about the sparkling neweconomic growth and development figures. There was no such attention given tothe “other” growth and development figures — those related to child nutrition.These figures are less than sparkling. If current rates of progress in reducingundernutrition are not improved upon, India will reach the U.N. MillenniumDevelopment Goal of halving undernutrition by 2043. The target date is 2015.China has already exceeded the target.

Celebrating 9% Growth of GDP

Thereare some glimmers of hope. The State of Karnataka has just adopted a NutritionMission which promises to give focus, coherence and urgency to efforts tocombat undernutrition. There are some initial indications that the decline inundernutrition rates may be accelerating in one of the worst affected States,Madhya Pradesh. More and more international agencies such as the U.K.'sDepartment for International Development have ramped up their focus onnutrition. But there are worrying signs at both the national and State levels.It is at least 18 months since the creation of the Prime Minister's Council onNutrition. It has not met once. The scandal of rotting food grains in the midstof hunger and undernutrition has rightly been getting a lot of media coverage.And we still don't know who in Delhi is responsible for leading efforts toreduce undernutrition.

Duringmy stay I went to Bihar to visit some ICDS Anganwadi centres. The Anganwadiworkers in charge of the centres were inspirational in their attempts to makethe best out of the resources at their disposal. But the conditions in whichthey have to teach and feed about fifty 3-6 year olds, do home visits, andmonitor child growth are testing and undermining. The centres are understaffed.Many are without toilets, washing facilities, clean drinking water, decentfloors or food storage facilities. It is a miracle that the centres have anypositive impact on nutrition status. I visited several AWCs in the mid 1990s.Nothing much seems to have changed. More pressure for change needs to begenerated.

Sohow do we make more noise about undernutrition? During my visit I gave apresentation at a conference on “Nutrition: Reaching the Hard Core” organisedby the Britannia Nutrition Foundation. For me, there are three key puzzles onhow to overcome undernutrition: (a) how to raise the quality and expand thecoverage of interventions such as ICDS; (b) how to make investments in variousrelated sectors (such as agriculture) more pro-nutrition; and (c) how to createan environment where it is hard for anyone to neglect malnutrition.

Mypresentation was on the third area and was entitled “The 7 Habits of HighlyEffective Environments for Nutrition”. The 7 habits are: (1) developing newsurveillance techniques using mobile technologies to allow the government andcivil society to react in real time to the changing nutrition situation, (2)the importance of creative campaigns to reset norms around what are acceptablerates of undernutrition reduction, (3) the need to support and expand the cadreof nutrition champions, (4) the need to learn from success within India (takingadvantage of the federal set-up) and internationally, (5) the potential of a newclass of “commitment indices” which monitor the nutrition commitments ofgovernments, civil society and businesses, (6) the insights to be gained fromadopting the new generation of economic growth diagnostics for nutrition tohelp prioritise and sequence the laundry list of potential nutrition actions ina given context, and (7) the value added of feedback — asking intendedbeneficiaries to score existing services and suggest what to do differently.Too little attention has been given to these issues.

Undernutritionis insidious — it sucks the life out of kids before clinical signs show.Undernutrition requires action on many fronts and hence it requirescoordination and leveraging. Undernutrition requires scaling up of quality. Allof these features — invisibility, scaling, coordination, leveraging — demandleadership. Sometimes leadership just emerges as in Mexico or Brazil or Ghanaor Karnataka. But with so many lives being ended or wrecked by undernutrition,we can't afford to wait. We need to make sure nutrition is not easilyneglected. And that means putting pressure on leaders throughout society tofocus on nutrition. These seven habits will play a big role in doing that.

What should the privatesector do?

Despitethe aforementioned conference being organised by the Britannia NutritionFoundation there was little discussion of the roles of the private sector inaccelerating undernutrition reduction. Is there a role at all? The provision ofnutrition is a prime public good — undernutrition generates negative spilloversfor the current and next generation, is often generated through informationdeficits and affects the poorest — all classic features of a public goodprovided by the state. But that should not preclude dialogue on the question“are there any overlaps between commercial interests and sustainable andequitable improvements in nutrition?” This is a discussion that many are afraidto have — and not just in India. It seems to me that four things are beingmixed up when we talk of the private sector. First, what can business do tomake its core activities more supportive of nutrition? This means going beyondcorporate social responsibility and making sure for example that advertising isresponsible, that legal resources are directed in ways that do not only protectshareholders, that labelling is clear and gives consumers real choice, and thattransparency is high on the business agenda so that civil society can holdbusinesses accountable.

Second,when can business act as a substitute for the state? I am not too optimistichere about the role of business — in the end, nutrition is a public good. Butthere might be things that the private sector can do better than the state.Would the private sector have handled the supply chain management of food grainsas badly as the state seems to have done? Third, when can business be acomplement to the state? For example, while fortification of salt and otherwidely used low cost foods is only a small part of an effective nutritionstrategy, international experience has shown that the private sector is usuallythe best way of implementing it. The fourth and perhaps the most promising areais to work with businesses outside the traditional food and health areas tomake the environment more enabling for nutrition. For example, when renewing acontract for mobile telephone operation, could the state build in requirementsto set up sms services to remind health workers about childhood vaccinations?And could computing companies be engaged to help improve nutrition surveillance?I don't know the answers to these questions. They can only come through adialogue that is sorely missing in India and elsewhere.

Tobe fair to the Government of India, it needs help to combat undernutrition. Itis such a huge burden (43 per cent of children are malnourished) that thegovernment cannot do it alone. Civil society, business, and the academiccommunity have to help. International donors have an important catalytic roleto play. But nutrition is a public good. Leadership has to come from thegovernment. I still do not see it.

(Author: Professor Lawrence Haddad is director of the U.K.-based Institute ofDevelopment Studies and president of the U.K. and Ireland's Development StudiesAssociation.)

Taken from http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/article619677.ece

CSR in Health sector, What industries overlook

2012-01-06T00:51:00.000-08:00

DB Power, A Bhaskar Group Company is planning to establish a30 bed hospital under Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) atDharamjaigarh in Raigarh district in the state of Chhattisgarh, where companyhas been allotted coal block for its power project. The Clearance for coalminesis awaited. Company has demanded 2.5 acre of land for construction of hospitalbuilding from Gram panchyat, According to published reports in News papers.

Construction of such Hospitals is example of CSRworks, going on in this district. it brings some satisfaction. Earlier, TheJindal organization has also build a Hospital in Raigarh which is run by Fortisgroup.

Public Healthcare facilities in district need a boost, as governmenthospitals have repeatedly come under scanner of government itself, for their mode of functioning. Lack of Doctors, Machines, and Operators and have made governmenthospitals last choice of common men, even if he agrees to tolerate crackinginfrastructure and poor hygiene. Nowadays, private healthcare industry isbooming and benefitting by abysmal performance from government institutions.

Jindal Fortis Hospital at Raigarh

However, few such Examples byindustries are also not going to take care of people’s all healthcare needs.Making hospitals can turn-up a drop into ocean, as standalone hospitals cannotreplace crumbling and overburden community health providing system. Healthcareproviders like ANMs, Dais, Depot Holders, MPWs and Mitanins provide invaluable servicein rural and tribal hinterland. Even RMPs, “JholaChhaps” and 3 year MBBS save a lot lives in such areas. They are easy toaccess, Cheap and have faith of people. Strengthening network, capacity andaccuracy of these community health providers shall come under radar of CSR people.

One Parallel Could be drawnfrom the works in education sector by Jindal CSR. They havemade schools of their own, but also appointed social teachers to government schoolswhere teacher student ratio was too high. This made visible difference to quality of educationand also provided employment to local youth.

Similarly in health sector, Puttingparamedical, or BHMS, BAMS doctors (As MBBS are scarce and Costly) on payrollof industry, can strengthen basic health delivery system in CSR areas. (Provided,they stay among people rather than mammoth shiny buildings surrounded by 8 Km longand 10 feet high wall)

A Mitanin, Making Malaria Slides in a village of Ghaghoda block

Most Pockets of Tamanar,Gahrghoda, Dharamjaigarh and some Parts of Raigarh (Blocks where most industriesare doing CSR) are prone to epidemics. Very less is done in those villages to stoptheir recurrence. Sanitation, Hygiene and Nutrition are grey areas in ourdevelopment stories. They pull people to hospitals, sooner or later. A seriousdeliberation by CSR think-tank of all industries needs to be made that, ifhealth sector is your priority, please make hospitals last line of defense, not first.

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By: Manish singh janmitram@gmail.com +91-989261-87810

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Five New AIDS Patient Detected in Raigarh

2012-01-04T19:06:00.000-08:00

Five New AIDS Patient detected in health checkup of High Risk Group (HRGs), conducted by Janmitram, in ICTC this month, including female sex workers and MSM (Male Sexing Male). These patients shall now be referring to ART (Anti-Retroviral-Therapy) centre. The incident emphasizes the prevalence of deadly disease in city and vulnerability of its residents. this detection makes a tally of ten New HIV+ Cases in year 2011.

Raigarh is getting ecologically vulnerable to HIV/AIDS. Many Cases of HIV positive have been detected in last few years. Due to rapid growth of Industries & mining, Migration of People has increased manifold. Huge number of Truckers, Migrant laborers and related people stay in city and nearby areas, mostly without families. This has increased prostitution and high risk behavior. NACO (National AIDS Control organization) and State Aids control society is working with few NGOs to check spread of this disease. JanMitram is working with Female Sex workers and MSM community.

Programme Staff of TI During A meeting

“The number of Female sex workers is likely to be 1500-2500 in Raigarh and nearby areas. While we are regularly Serving 750 odd FSWs”- Says Sougat Mahapatra, Programme Manager of AIDS-TI Programme in JanMitram. Organization has registered over 1150 HRGs till date, 28 of which are MSM. We have stopped further registration as our programme is for 800 FSWs only. We shall approach SACS to enhance our target this year.

Organization provides free condoms to HRGs in proportion of encounters they make in given period. It also ensures Blood Sample Check in every quarter, and treatment of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Few Doctors are empanelled for such services, especially trained for AIDS-TI programme. They do free checkups; fee is later paid by project. Government established ICTC (Integrated Counselling and Testing Center) provides counseling and testing facilities.

PPP Doctors During a Training organized under TI programme

Sweta (Name changed) is Peer educator of programme, actually one from the sex worker community. She tells that HRGs covered in the programme are now safer and well aware. Complete secrecy of identity in this prgramme helps them to come forward and join in. Services regarding STI have given them big relief as a most FSWs have to suffer this, at some point of time. Earlier they have spent from themselves for cure and medicine.

However, all these efforts from NGOs and Government have not stopped emergence of new AIDS cases. It is up to people to take care of their behavior and every section our society should make a deep intro-inspection. Without this, once a sleepy town of Raigarh shall turn hotbed of such diseases in no time.

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A Detail Investigative Story Published by Dainik Bhaskar on 5th January 2012.- Author, Click http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=249031465166065&set=a.249031461832732.56887.152770364792176&type=1&theater to read

Manish Singh- 098261-87810 janmitram@gmail.com

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Convergence Drive in Village Development Programme

2012-01-04T03:52:00.000-08:00

A majority of the villages in the country still face constraints such asaccess to education, health facilities, drinking water, power, roads, Credit,Information and Market. Against this background, adoption of especiallyvillages in backward regions through preparation of VillageDevelopment Plans (VDPs) would go a long way in ensuring holistic and integrated development ofthe villages concerned.

Objective ofVillage Development Plan is to develop the selected village in an integratedmanner. This would include economic development, infrastructure development andother aspects of human development i.e., education, health, drinking watersupply, etc., besides access to credit. The programme is Assisted by National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development-NABARD.

( see http://www.nabard.org/farm_sector/vdp.asp for more information of VDP Scheme)

JanMitramis running Village Development programe at Four Villages of Gharghoda Block of Raigarh Distirct in Chhattisgarh. This programme is to make people in a These villages areDangninanra,Baspipali Tenda and BarounaKunda. Our Reponsibility is Tocreate awareness in the village and play effective leadership role in buildingPeople’s Organisation/ Groups for various developmental activities. MainElement of The programme is to facilitate convergence/integration of variousprogrammes of NABARD, State/Central Government and other agencies in thevillage.

In this connection on 27thDec,2011, A Farmers Meet was organized. Objective of programme was togalvanized development activities and peoples associations. Hon ParliamentarySecretary to CG Govt. and local MLA Mr. Ompraksh Rathia attended the programme.

He declared sanctioning of many infrastructural and livelihood developmentschemes in project villages form his MLA-LAD fund and other govt. schemes. SomePromment Works Are High School Building at VDP Village Bastipali –10 Lakhs, Pulia At Danginara Village – 10 Lakhs, Pulia At mithilapur ( Dangninara ) – 6 Lakhs, PDS Shops in Baronakunda And Tenda Village – 6Lkahs, Boundary Wall of Anganwadis at Tenda andBaronakunda- 4 Lakhs

Abovesaid Works come into-fore during PRA done by orgnisation at starting of VDP inthese villages. Distribution of Seedkits, Vermicompost kits and other farmimplements from Agriculture and horticulture departments. These were distributedagriculture inputs to 150 farmers. The programme was attended by over800 People from SHGs, Farmers, youth, PRIs from Nearby Panchyats and Block, allenthusiastic with galvanizing development activities in the area.

Further, Our team is Striving hard to Improve food production in the area through intensification of rice, increase in net cropped area in selected villages.

Click http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.200134023413420.47293.100002504705724&type=1VDP For More Pics of programme

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Contributed By Ashwini Chouhan, Programme officer -JanMitram +91-98265-82806

One step forward, two steps back

2011-12-26T06:33:00.000-08:00

The Hindu editorial rejects the Govt's Lokpal Bill

Hopelessly ineffectual and constitutionally suspect, the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Bill, 2011 is nothing less than a betrayal of national trust. It is inexcusable that a Bill, substantially weaker than the August 2011 version that was forced to be withdrawn on the widespread belief that it would be fortified in key areas, has been tabled in the Lok Sabha. The whole purpose of the exercise is supposed to be the creation of a strong, effective, and credible mechanism to go after corruption, especially political corruption, which has assumed monstrous proportions in India. The key provisions of the new Bill relating to the selection of the nine-member Lokpal, its anti-corruption functions and powers, and administrative control over India's premier criminal investigation agency mock that purpose.

In the first place, Section 4 of the Bill, which provides for a five-member Selection Committee to choose the chairman and eight other members of the Lokpal, gives the government political control over this process. Secondly, the separation of the power to enquire, investigate, and prosecute set out in the Bill is much worse than the scheme contained in the earlier Lokpal Bill, Section 20 of which gave the Lokpal its own investigation wing. In allowing the Lokpal only an Inquiry Wing headed by a Director of Inquiry “for the purpose of conducting preliminary inquiry into any offence alleged to have been committed by a public servant punishable under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988” and denying it its own investigation wing, the new Bill neuters the anti-corruption watchdog. Allowing the Lokpal “a Prosecution Wing headed by the Director of Prosecution for the purpose of prosecution of public servants in relation to any complaint by the Lokpal under this Act” may look like a step forward. But this cannot possibly make up for the failure to provide for a clean process of independent investigation that is safeguarded from executive interference. At a time when the Lokayukta in a State such as Karnataka has its own investigation wing – something it has used to very good effect – it is retrogressive to withhold this instrument from the Lokpal.

At the same time, the new Bill has sought to keep the Central Bureau of Investigation out of the Lokpal's purview ostensibly on the ground that it should have autonomy over its investigations. Given the agency's record of bowing to the diktats of its political masters, there is no reason to believe that investigations, even those that are Lokpal-referred and Lokpal-monitored, will be free of political interference. The Centre, which has retained administrative control (read: promotions, transfers, etc.) of the CBI via the Ministry of Personnel, knows better than most that he who pays the piper calls the tune. While the proposal that a new panel (comprising the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, and the Chief Justice of India or his nominee) selects the Director of the CBI will go some way in enhancing the credibility of the agency, the opportunity to confer on it genuine independence is being lost.

Just as problematic is the constitutional validity of some basic provisions of the Bill. The inclusion of minorities among the groups given reservation in the nine-member body is bound to be challenged on the ground that it amounts to a quota being given on grounds of religion. While this issue has little bearing on tackling corruption, the deep and seemingly irreconcilable political divisions it has created, reflected in the manner in which it dominated the parliamentary debate on the Bill, is bound to have a bearing on its passage. Is this a ploy to let anti-corruption legislation fall victim to a wholly extraneous issue – reservation? Will it be allowed to degenerate, as in the case of the women's reservation bill, into a legislative exercise that everyone claims to support but few really want?

There have also been serious concerns on another constitutional front – federalism. While it is hard to fault the principle of having comparable mechanisms and instruments to go after corruption at the central and State levels, the legislative procedure adopted is open to question. Rather than mandating the creation of a Lokpal-like structure in every State, would it not have been in keeping with India's federal structure and regional sensitivities for the central legislation to have model or enabling provisions for constituting effective Lokayuktas in States? Given the strong national public mood against corruption, it is unlikely that State governments would risk going against it.

Unfortunately, the improvements in the new Bill have been overshadowed by the slew of regressive alterations. The inclusion of the Prime Minister under the Lokpal with certain exceptions is a step up from the earlier stipulation that permitted any inquiry only after he or she demitted office. The new Bill brings both Group ‘A' and ‘B' officers under the Lokpal's ambit. While this is short of Team Anna's demand that Group ‘C' and ‘D' officials be covered as well, it is an improvement on earlier drafts, under which the Lokpal's purview was limited to Group ‘A' officers. Further, while the ‘C' and ‘D' categories will be covered by the Central Vigilance Commission, cases relating to them will be reviewed by the Lokpal. The idea of granting constitutional status to the office of the Lokpal would have had traction had the Bill vested the body with the strength and self-sufficiency to make a serious impact on corruption. Unfortunately, a mixture of bad faith and a reluctance to loosen the grip on the handle of power have contributed to the making of a Bill that has caused deep divisions in Parliament and enough disenchantment to fuel a new round of Team Anna-led protests against the Centre. The country is no closer to a consensus on the Lokpal Bill than it was many months ago

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/editorial/article2742291.ece

WHAT'S WRONG WITH CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY?

2011-12-21T01:05:00.000-08:00

Just as the corporation’s history of social and environmental damage dates back to the East India Company, equally the concept of corporate responsibility is not new. While some corporations have taken every opportunity to make profit regardless of the impacts on society, benefiting from the slave trade, colonialism and war, there is equally a history of a small minority of companies taking a more philanthropic approach by (to some extent) considering the needs of employees or assisting the poor18. The creation of cooperatives and mutuals as alternative forms to the corporation reflects the long- standing concerns around the impacts of corporations.

There has never been a heyday when corporations acted for the benefit of society. But the unprecedented power of corporations in recent decades, together with an informed and educated general public, has created a real threat to the legitimacy of the corporation, which CSR seeks to counteract.

Evolution of the concept

The phrase Corporate Social Responsibility was coined in 1953. with the publication of Bowen's 'Social Responsibility of Businessmen', which posed the question 'what responsibilities to society can business people be reasonably expected to assume?'19. Writing on the subject in the 1960s expanded the definition, suggesting that beyond legal obligations companies had certain responsibilities to society20. In 1984, the celebrated management consultant Peter Drucker wrote about the imperative to turn social problems into economic opportunities21.

Throughout the 70s and 80s academic discussion of the concept of CSR grew, but the first company to actually publish a social report was Ben and Jerry's in 1989(22), and the first major company was Shell in 1998(23) .

The first international code of conduct

In the late 70's both the Organisation of Economic Co- operation and Development (OECD), and the United Nations Centre on Transnational Corporations (UNCTC) began developing codes of conduct in an attempt to control different aspects of corporate globalisation. In 1976, the OECD, a grouping of 30 powerful industrialised countries, recognising the complications associated with companies operating across borders, established a set of guidelines to ease the workings of globalisation; setting the 'rules of the game' for foreign direct investment, and creating an atmosphere of confidence and predictability in overseas corporations.

The OECD 'Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises' covered areas such as accounting, tax payments, and operating in accordance with local laws. The guidelines are aimed at countries rather than companies, and compliance with them can be important for gaining listings in certain stock exchanges and export credits.24

The UNCTC code of conduct, however, aimed to regulate corporate abuse rather than to facilitate corporate access to new markets, and unsurprisingly was less successful. The code might have been a useful tool for controlling corporate excess, but the body was dismantled under pressure from corporations and instead merged into the UN Conference on Trade and Development - a body which promotes foreign investment25.

Anti-corporate backlash

The rise in anti-corporate activism over environmental and

human rights issues made a shift in corporate attitudes towards social and environmental issues essential. The 70s and 80s saw major international boycotts of companies investing in South Africa, notably Barclays Bank, and the Nestlé boycott over the company's aggressive milk formula marketing strategies in the global South. This period was typified by confrontational campaigning that forced change from companies by attacking the brand26.

In the 1990s corporate lobbying effectively undermined attempts to regulate their activities at a global level. Instead it achieved an extension of corporate power both logistically, through improved transport and communications, and legally, through international agreements such as the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), and the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), which extended and enshrined rights for corporations27.

De-railing the Earth Summit

The 1992 Earth Summit in Rio was a key moment in the evolution of CSR as corporate involvement succeeded in impeding the Summit's ambitious task to 'find ways to halt the destruction of irreplaceable natural resources and pollution of the planet.'28. During the build up, proposals put forward by Sweden and Norway for regulation of multinationals, based on the work of UNCTC, were crushed in favour of voluntary corporate environmentalism29.

The level of corporate involvement in the summit was unprecedented, with a coalition of 48 companies formed specifically to influence its outcomes. This new coalition, the Business Council for Sustainable Development (BCSD, later to become the World Business Council on Sustainable Development WBCSD) was established by Swedish millionaire Stephan Schmidheiny, at the invitation of Maurice Strong, the chair of the Summit30. The BCSD and International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) took a tandem approach which effectively shifted the debate. From one side the ICC attacked any measures that moved towards corporate regulation, and the BCSD trumpeted the 'changing course of industry' towards voluntary self-regulation 31. This type of strategy has come to typify corporate lobbying against progressive regulation. 32

Shell's PR disaster and the turning point for CSR

The anti-corporate backlash reached a climax in 1995, as the spotlight turned on Shell. That year the company stood accused of complicity in the execution of Ken Saro Wiwa and eight other activists in Nigeria, as well as being hounded by Greenpeace over the decision to sink the Brent Spar oil platform. Shell temporarily lost the confidence of investors and the public.

Shell's annus horribilis was a sign of things to come and woke up many in the business world to the importance of their public reputations and the ability of campaigners to damage them. With their license to operate on the line, a strategy to convince the public that corporations played an important and meaningful role in society was essential. Capitalism had to be given a human face. Step forward CSR.

Shell spent £20 million on its PR offensive to rebuild its reputation33, contracting PR company Fishburn Hedges to co- ordinate its strategy34. Shell published a statement of business principles outlining its core values of 'honesty, integrity and respect for people' 35. The company's strategy focused on the 'magic keys' - ‘openness and dialogue’36, pioneering the practice of producing CSR reports with its 'Profit and Principles - Does there have to be a choice? The Shell Report' in 199837. The report was produced by Associates in Advertising and endorsed by the environmental consultancy SustainAbility38. The involvement of SustainAbility, who had previously been critical of Shell, was key to the re-brand. The production of the report was coupled with a global advertising campaign focusing on environmental issues and a new website encouraging stakeholders to 'Tell Shell', enabling the company to appear to involve the community in its decision-making whilst making no definite commitments 39. The strategy was successful in rebuilding the company's reputation amongst key opinion formers and decision makers40.

So, CSR came as a direct response by corporations to anti-corporate activism and the reputational damage campaigns were able to cause. It represents a success for corporations in resurrecting their public image and colonising the issue space around the social and environmental impacts of business. Tom Delfgaauw, former vice president for sustainable development at Shell, described the company's problems in the mid 90s as 'the best thing that ever happened to us, first because we've come out of it much, much stronger as a company, and second because it accelerated a great many needed corporate developments.' 41

It is doubtful whether Ken Saro Wiwa would share the sentiment, particularly considering the continued environmental devastation, poverty and human rights abuse in the Niger Delta.

The rise of the CSR industry

The 1990s saw CSR become an established industry with major companies such as PricewaterhouseCoopers, KPMG and Burson Marsteller entering the CSR service provision market. New consultancies, such as SustainAbility (1989), Business for Social Responsibility (1992) and CSR Europe(1996), also sprang up over this period, all promising to protect industry from protest42. Specialist university research centres and the CSR conferencing circuit also emerged in the late 90s.43 Similarly CSR evolved beyond simple codes of conduct and reporting to include more extensive dialogue with stakeholders, NGO engagement and 'multistakeholder initiatives' such as the Ethical Trading Initiative (1993) and the Forest Stewardship Council (1998), bringing together companies, NGOs and in some cases governments. Similarly trade unions began negotiating and signing global framework agreements44.

The Global Compact and other corporate codes of conduct

The following years saw a plethora of voluntary initiatives and codes of conduct being developed, by individual companies as well as sectoral codes and international frameworks. Codes included the International Organisation for Standardization's ISO14001 in 199645, the Global Reporting Initiative Sustainability Reporting Guidelines in 1997 46, Social Accountability International's SA8000 in 1998 47, the Accountability AA1000 Assurance Standard in 1999 48, and the United Nation's Global Compact in 1999 49.

The most high profile of these is the UN's Global Compact. The Global Compact was designed by the office of the Secretary General, Kofi Annan, with considerable input from the International Chamber of Commerce (which did its utmost to ensure a 'business friendly' approach). The Compact is a set of nine principles on human rights, environmental sustainability and labour rights (now expanded to 10 with the inclusion of a principle on corruption).

Many NGOs have been highly critical of the Compact as it has no monitoring or enforcement mechanism and so allows companies to appropriate the name of the United Nations to reinforce their reputations without requiring them to change any aspect of their activities50. Deborah Doane, of the Corporate Responsibiility (CORE) Coalition, argues in 'Red Tape to Road Signs' that 'by promoting these instruments as substitutes for international governance institutions, the UN and OECD effectively undermine the ability of national governments to put forward a different approach.'51

Enron and a failed move towards mandatory social and environmental reporting in the UK.

In 2001, the collapse of Enron, once a paragon of CSR, showed just how deeply a corporation’s claims of social responsibility can differ from the reality. As Joel Bakan argues in The Corporation, 'Enron's story... suggests, at a minimum, that scepticism about corporate social responsibility is well warranted.'52

Enron's collapse, and the mistrust of corporations that the whole saga galvanised in the public consciousness, led to some soul-searching within the CSR movement. However, much of the public discussion centred on protecting investors, and the main concrete change brought about by the episode was the introduction of the Sarbanes Oxley Act in the USA. This has tightened up accounting regulations and introduced new reporting standards which include some aspects of non-financial risk reporting, but no substantive change on the issue of companies’ wider social impacts.

The UK government went down a similar line with the Operating Financial Review (OFR), in which all stock market listed companies would be required by law to produce a yearly review of their business operations and future developments and risks. This was to include information on environmental matters, employees and social and community issues, though the content of that reporting would be entirely at the company's discretion. However, in December 2005, Gordon Brown announced that the OFR would be abolished, a decision which is currently being challenged by Friends of the Earth in the High Court.53 Though the OFR was watered down to a point where it meant little more than mandating companies to produce more PR, it would have represented a tentative shift towards mandatory social and environmental reporting.

From CSR to corporate accountability?

The 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) marked the crowning of CSR. Friends of the Earth led calls for a Convention on Corporate Accountability54, instead the summit delivered much the same outcome as Rio, with over 280 'new' partnerships between government and industry announced as 'outcomes' of the summit55, the first time such initiatives have been endorsed in this way. Christian Aid has documented the way in which discussion of the issue of corporate regulation in the summit's agenda, changed from working towards a 'multilateral agreement', to developing a 'framework', to simply 'promoting best practice'56. Amongst activists and NGOs, however, dissatisfaction with the CSR model was clear.

While many NGOs continue to engage with business, the calls for corporate accountability are growing with campaigns such as International Right to Know Campaign in the USA, the CORE Coalition in the UK and other initiatives internationally pressing for more legally binding rather than voluntary regulation.

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http://www.corporatewatch.org/

A million opportunities lost

2011-12-19T23:00:00.000-08:00

Author(s): Richard Mahapatra, M Suchitra, Moyna

Issue: Dec 15, 2011 http://www.downtoearth.org.in

The ruling alliance’s flagship rural employment programme took unprecedented strides in creating water conservation structures across the country, but only to harvest disillusionment. What went wrong? Richard Mahapatra travels to Jharkhand, M Suchitra to Andhra Pradesh and Moyna to Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan in search of answers

People in Limbi village of Madhya Pradesh prefer laying roads. They are abandoning work on water structures because of wage delays (Photo: Moyna)

This is the little known big story of India’s nationwide rural employment programme. In the past five years the programme has sought to create tanks, ponds, wells and revive traditional water conservation structures at a scale and pace not witnessed before in the country. Millions of people in the countryside seeking jobs under the programme embarked on building or reviving 3.4 million water conservation structures, according to the Union rural development ministry. This is unprecedented given that before 2005, all the public wage schemes together created just about two million structures in six decades.

The programme, run under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), assures 100 days of manual employment to any rural household that demands work. Under the Act, creation of water conservation structures is compulsory. As a result, today Indian villages have more per capita water structures than hospital beds, school teachers and policemen put together. Official data shows every village has six-seven such structures. Ask any old-timer in a village, this is more than enough to capture sufficient water for a village’s water security round the year.

More bounty awaits Indian villages this year. States have submitted proposals for 5.4 million more water conservation structures under the employment programme for this fiscal. If taken up, these proposals will more than double each village’s capacity to harvest water.

MGNREGA, credited for the ruling United Progressive Alliance’s (UPA’s) re-election in 2009, has emerged as the world’s largest public wage programme, with a budget that does not have a match in India’s past. In the past five years, the Central government spent close to Rs 110,000 crore on the programme or about Rs 45 lakh for every panchayat. Of this, the spending on water conservation structures was close to Rs 54,000 crore.

Arguably, these structures should have created a huge water harvesting capacity. The programme claims the added capacity is 3.07 billion cubic metres under water conservation and renovation of traditional water bodies, two of the four categories of water-related works under MGNREGA. This can take care of the drinking and cooking water needs of the country. Irrigation channels dug under the programme cover enough distance to make two return trips to the moon (see ‘Potential created’).

*Incomplete works include in-progress/suspended works and those approved but not in progress; Source: Ministry of Rural Development

The country’s poorest and smallest farmers own a major share of these structures because the Act allows people belonging to Scheduled castes and tribes to take up irrigation works on their own land. The community participated enthusiastically in the programme, creating facilities to irrigate close to six million hectares (ha). This almost compares to the country’s total irrigation target for the 11th five-year plan from all sources. During the plan period the government set a target of restoring 20,000 traditional water bodies; MGNREGA has revived more than half a million of them.

This should have been an economic boom for the villages. Every structure gives two benefits: cash as wage and increase in agriculture due to water availability. The National Council for Applied Economic Research in 2009 found that 60 million people were taken above the poverty line because of the programme. This is based on the wage money people got. The rural development ministry claims per household earning nearly doubled between 2006-07 and 2010-11.

Although there is no consolidated ecological and economic impact assessment of the programme, government does make public statements about its “impressive” impacts. D K Jain, joint secretary with the ministry who is in charge of the programme, says, “The 2009 drought was more severe than the 2002 one but the year reported 0.4 per cent more agricultural production. That is the impact of the programme.” Several studies done on small scale indicate benefits from water conservation works, like increase in incomes, groundwater levels and irrigated area.

Well in Dibar Tuti’s farm in Khunti, Jharkhand, collapsed before it was ready (Photo: Richard Mahapatra)

Potential watered down

Shouldn’t the country celebrate this feat? No, say many villages across the country. “My dream crashed with MGNREGA,” says Dibar Tuti, a resident of Salgadih village in Jharkhand’s Khunti district, pointing at a collapsed well in his small farm. Three years of drought had left his farm parched, forcing him to migrate for sundry work. In April, the state government decided to dig 112,307 traditional wells under MGNREGA to overcome drought. Owning a well was Tuti’s dream. He had seen many people walking out of the poverty trap doing vegetable farming. Khunti and adjoining districts are known as the vegetable bowl of the state, thanks to the government drive in late 1980s called Million Well programme that created a large number of wells. Assured irrigation encouraged small farmers to take up vegetable farming. “I thought I would also become rich with a well,” says Tuti.

He did come close to his dream. The gram sabha (village council) approved a well on his land. But the decision came late, in the end of May. By the time the well was sunk up to the stipulated 35 feet, monsoon arrived. Without stone lining, the well collapsed. “I lost part of my farm and the well,” says Tuti.

Like Tuti, the state also lost a great pool of assets and an opportunity to fix poverty. Within a month of showers, the success story turned sour. By the time monsoon arrived most of the wells were not complete and collapsed. The state’s rural landscape is now littered with collapsed wells. “At least half the structures are completely lost. Some of the rest can be revived,” says Ramesh Sharan, an economist who has extensively studied the region’s economy and is also member of the State Employment Guarantee Council, the guiding body for the programme.

*Incomplete works include in-progress/suspended works and those approved but not in progress; Source: Ministry of Rural Development

Revival seems difficult now. There is a virtual boycott of MGNREGA in the villages. In most cases wages have not been paid till date. On October 2, village council meetings took place in Khunti and Gumla districts, like elsewhere in the state. “We found very few people willing to work under the scheme,” says Punita Oraon, a panchayat member of Lakia village in Gumla district. “First people lost a big opportunity to earn more. Then they lost their land. Now they have not been paid wages as well. Is there a reason they will want to work for MGNREGA?” she asks. In Lakia, residents who worked on 35 wells got payment after a year.

Empowering people is the most important feature of MGNREGA but they rarely decide the kind of work to be undertaken. Officials call the shots (Photo: Meeta Ahlawat)

“Late payments were due to a delay in release of funds from the Union government. The price of stones also went up because of the huge demand caused by the extensive well construction,” says Ajay Kumar Singh, the state MGNREGA commissioner. Workers get paid only after the works have been measured and recorded. Only 2.65 per cent of the works in Jharkhand have been measured till date, going by government’s own data. This means wages in case of 97 per cent of works have not been paid.

The potential lost is enormous. Going by the experience of the Million Wells programme, each well could have irrigated 0.4 ha. This means the state lost 45,450 ha of irrigation potential, an impressive figure given that only 11 per cent of the agricultural land in the state has irrigation facilities. “A well irrigates two-three crops even when water is available till March. Our research shows each well would have led to Rs 30,000 annual income per family,” says Sharan.

A year ago a similar campaign to take up pond construction met with a similar fate. Since 2006, Jharkhand has accumulated more than 200,000 incomplete water conservation works. “We have lost a big opportunity,” adds Sharan.

Across the country thousands of water structures, each a potential money spinner, have been abandoned. Reasons vary from wage delay to lack of planning to taking up structures without factoring in the capacity of local institutions. During 2006- 2011 (till September) only around 1.2 million water conservation works could be completed, while the rest are either in progress or suspended. The number of works suspended or in progress has steadily risen since the inception of the programme in 2006, from 0.25 million to 2.54 million (see ‘Potential killed’). Though water conservation works account for 60 per cent of the total permissible works under the scheme, completed water works are just 38 per cent of total completed works. This is a decline of 10 per cent since 2006. Similarly, in case of works that have been approved but not started, water works top the list, with an accumulation of around 4.4 million works by 2011.

Missing annual village plan

But are the 1.2 million completed works yielding benefits? Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh, the first to implement MGNREGA, provides some answers. The district’s record in creating water conservation assets is impressive. Under the employment guarantee programme, an average of 38 water conservation works have been created in each of the distri ct’s 3,384 villages. In the past two years, the district has dug 8.5 million cubic metres of trenches, 30,000 farm ponds and 10,000 percolation tanks, including rock dams. This potential can irrigate one crop in around 70 per cent of the district’s farms. In reality the impact has been very different. This potential has not made farming more attractive. “Unable to bear the stress of agriculture, many farmers are leaving farming and joining labour force,” says Bablu Ganguly, chairperson of Timbaktu Collective, an NGO working on water and soil conservation and organic farming.

The district is one of the driest in the country. It has been fighting desertification that threatens its dominantly agrarian economy. MGNREGA has all the ingredients to stop desertification. It mandates a village plan and a five-year district plan to use MGNREGA to revive village ecology. But stopping desertification was not planned, points out E Somasekhar, former sarpanch of Koduru village in Chilamathur mandal. In fact, Anantapur has not even developed the mandatory perspective plan. This has also affected the water conservation work in many villages. For instance, in the first two years, one of the major works identified was building earthen bunds for water harvesting. Bunds were built even in black soil that cannot hold such bunds. “Such works were taken up many times in the same place without any result,” points out D Ramesh, former sarpanch of Chhayapur village. Though hundreds of rock-fill dams have been constructed, many hold water only for a few days. “When there’s no water, villagers take away the rocks for other purposes,” says A Ramachandra, a farmer in Gandlaparthy village of Raptadu mandal. Some 5,000 such works are shown completed but are of no use.

The most common complaint is non-involvement of the community in planning the structures as stipulated by the Act. Under the Act, each village is required to prepare an annual plan based on local needs. This plan indicates the types of works to be undertaken. When people demand employment their labour is used to take up these works. At the district level, all the village plans get consolidated into a district perspective plan that spans over five years.

One can see a semblance of planning in villages where NGOs are active. “But in many other villages gram sabhas are nominal executives where only 20-30 people participate,” says Ramesh of Chhayapur. None of the village panchayats has prepared the mandatory village plan. In absence of a substantial impact on agriculture, MGNREGA is being treated as a mere wage-earning programme. The aim of MGNREGA is precisely the opposite: to revive a village’s ecology and economy so that it no longer requires the programme.

Lack of people’s participation has negated the programme’s potential, even in districts considered successful in implementation. In Rajasthan’s Dungarpur district, widely acknowledged for effective implementation of the employment programme, people have written it off as just another wage-earning scheme. Ramesh Bohra of Rampur village switched from farming to selling tea, using money earned under MGNREGA. He does not find farming sustainable despite canals and check dams.

This dam in Tangra village of Barwani cost Rs 17 lakh for holding no water. Its shutters were not fixed but on paper it’s ready

From 2006 till August 2011, Dungarpur spent Rs 482.6 crore on 31,614 water structures. Based on the secondary data, Rajasthan MGNREGA commissioner Tanmay Kumar claims between August 2010 and July 2011, the state created 20 billion litres of additional water capacity. This would imply availability of 30 to 50 litres per person per day. Official figures show enough water harvesting capacity built since 2006 to meet 30 per cent of the district’s irrigation need. But the district continues to be declared drought-affected. Cultivable land has increased only marginally in the past five years. Officials blame it on deficient rain but the deficit is barely 50 per cent of the total.

Some like Karulal Kotardh of Deval village believe the impact of MGNREGA has been limited because of lack of planning. “If you study the check dams and ponds created since 2006, they are just blocking water and not assisting irrigation,” he says. In his village two ponds were dug in 2008. Neither provides irrigation as no canals were dug to carry water. Pujilal Damor, another resident of Deval, explains, “There has been so little rain in this area that we have not worked on water structures much.” This year, he says, the district received 20 per cent more than normal rainfall and the embankment of one of the two ponds in his village gave way. This happened because “we are located on higher ground and the mud embankment could not take the pressure”.

In Deval, of the 181 works sanctioned only 70 were those mentioned in the gram sabhas, says Umesh Bandat, the son of the panchayat head. He claims there is no longer demand for water works like anicuts and check dams.

No wage, no interest

In Madhya Pradesh’s Barwani district as well residents gave the thumbs down to the programme. Nestled in the hills of the Satpura and Vindhyachal ranges, the region is criss-crossed by streams and natural storm water drains. But during 2007-10 it reeled under a severe drought. This fuelled people’s interest in water conservation, and MGNREGA was the perfect instrument. In just five years, work on 5,439 water conservation structures were taken up. This slowed the tide of migration out of the villages, but not for long.

Very few people are willing to work under MGNREGA in Lakia village of Gumla (Photo: Richard Mahapatra)

Val Singh of Limbi village in Pati block says five years ago about 75 per cent of the village migrated and this number decreased to nearly 25 per cent following the implementation of the scheme. It is rising once again. “The rise in migration is the result of delayed payments, which are four to six months late,” says Singh. In a village close to Limbi, Sawariyapani, five people left the village in search for work last year. This year that number has risen to 30.

About the delayed payments, Barwani MGNREGA Project Officer Afsar Khanhe says as per rules they need to be made within 15 days but measurement of work, submission and cross-checking of reports, and sanctioning wages take at least 20 working days. This has led to works being abandoned halfway. Official data supports these claims. In the district, 18,704 water conservation works have been reported as ongoing or suspended between 2007-08 and 2011-12. Only 2,734 works have been completed.

Begalgaon is one of the many villages scattered with incomplete works. Its residents say they are rarely taken into confidence before deciding the kind of work or sites. Har Singh of Sawariyapani says that in 2009-10 the gram sabha had requested for continuous contour trenches and cattle prevention trenches to prevent soil erosion and assist water conservation. “Instead, we were told that dug wells will have to be constructed,” says Har Singh.

Demand goes down

India has literally snatched a failure from the jaws of success. The programme’s most important provisions, like community-driven village planning and priority of local needs, have not been pursued seriously. Although the Act emphasises village-level planning for assets creation, there is no mention of making the assets durable and, thus, productive. In fact, MGNREGA does not have any provision for completion of work. It is also a reflection of governments giving precedence to employment over durable productive assets.

Incomplete water structures are of no use to communities. This has discouraged people from taking up water conservation works. Across the country demand for road connectivity works under MGNREGA has increased. The reason people demand more roads than other works is that roads fetch wages quicker and the results are immediately visible as opposed to those of water conservation.

At the national level, the percentage of water conservation works to total works undertaken is declining steadily (see ‘Water structures v roads’). In 2006-07, completed water conservation works accounted for 48 per cent of the total completed works. This has decreased to 38 per cent in 2011-12. Going by the rural ministry data, though water conservation works have been approved in large numbers, work has not started. Such works account for 75 per cent of the approved-but-not-in-progress works. Road connectivity works, on the other hand, have picked up. Only five per cent of the road connectivity works approved have not been taken up. “Roads have become more popular because they are cost-effective and can be outsourced to contractors. This leads to greater possibility of money siphoning,” says Ved Arya, director of NGO SRIJAN, the programme implementing partner, and member of the Central Employment Guarantee Council.

The performance review committee of MGNREGA has compiled data that shows demand for all kinds of work under MGNREGA is decreasing as well. In 2010-11, average employment provided per household was 47 days against the guaranteed 100 days. In fact, the average has reduced in 18 states with high casual labour workforce. Arunachal Pradesh reported 71 per cent decline, while Karnataka reported 33 per cent decline in the past five years despite severe spells of drought. Maharashtra, with large casual labour population and under an agrarian crisis, reported 25 per cent decline.

Government and non-government experts differ in interpreting this data. Government says it is precisely because of the programme’s focus on village development that people have become less dependent on MGNREGA. Others say lack of people’s involvement and the incomplete nature of works have discouraged people from participating in the programme. IIT Chennai that surveyed the programme in Tamil Nadu found that if people’s expectations are not captured in the programme’s implementation, it would not have any participation (read demand for jobs).

It is a vicious cycle. Incomplete work results in disillusionment, and disillusionment leads to more incomplete works.

Why MGNREGA is slow in building assets

Absence of village plans

To begin with, the work plans of the earlier Food for Work Programme, prepared by government officials, were adopted. Communities should draft village plans but in most cases it does not happen. Most water structures are built without any understanding of their catchments or technical inputs. Consequently, the structures do not give optimum results

Incomplete works never completed

This was noticed in the beginning but no one did anything about it. Every year new works were taken up with the same faulty plans and before completing the incomplete works. The labour force available is also limited because demand for work is not so high

No compulsion to complete work

MGNREGA has no provision to finish works. Works are abandoned for lack of labour. Officials blame it on the low ratio of material cost. Works are stopped when material cost reaches the stipulated norm

Wage delay keeps people away

Many people withdraw from work halfway because wages are paid very late. At times it takes months

Irrational wage

Digging wells or tanks is labour-intensive and skilled work but payment is according to the volume of earth dug. So working on water structures fetches wage disproportionate to labour. That is why road construction is gaining popularit

Grasshopper and the Ant : The Story in Indian Way

2011-12-19T07:49:00.000-08:00

Original Story:

The Ant works hard in the withering heat all summer building its house and laying up supplies for the winter. The Grasshopper thinks the Ant is a fool and laughs dances plays the summer away. Come winter, the Ant is warm and well fed. The Grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

Indian Version:

The Ant works hard in the withering heat all summer building its house and laying up supplies for the winter. The Grasshopper thinks the Ant's a fool and laughs dances plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering Grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the Ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering Grasshopper next to a video of the Ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor Grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the Ant's house.

Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other Grasshoppers demanding that Grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter .

Mayawati states this as 'injustice' done on Minorities.

Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the Grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the Grasshopper (many promising Heaven & Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance) .

Opposition MPs stage a walkout. Left parties call for 'Bengal Bandh' in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.

CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among Ants and Grasshoppers.

railway minister allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian Railway Trains, aptly named as the 'Grasshopper Rath'.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the 'Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act'[POTAGA] , with effect from the beginning of the winter..

Arjun Singh makes 'Special Reservation' for Grasshoppers in Educational Institutions in Government Services.

The Ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, it's home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the Grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV, BBC, CNN.

Arundhati Roy calls it 'A Triumph of Justice'.

mayavati calls it 'Socialistic Justice'.

CPM calls it the 'Revolutionary Resurgence of the Downtrodden'

Koffi Annan invites the Grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

Many years later...

The Ant has since migrated to the US and set up a multi-billion dollar company in Silicon Valley ,

100s of Grasshoppers still die of starvation despite reservation somewhere in India ,

....AND

As a result of losing lot of hard working Ants and feeding the grasshoppers, India is still a developing country...!!

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Created by unknown, Contributed by Aashish Singh

ashish.singh@tatatechnologies.com

JISAD-“Guiding youth, Spurring smiles”.

2011-12-09T05:23:00.000-08:00

Acquiring and developing the skills that provided employment is need of hour, especially for rural youth. JanMitram undertakes different skill development for the school drop-outs and existing workers especially in the informal sector. This is done in close consultation with industry, micro enterprises in the informal sector, experts and academia. This year , over 500 youth were trained in different programme assisted by NABARD, State and Central Government funds. Also we implemented Skill development programmes for SBI sponsorship R-seti this year.

Establishment of JISAD

Raigarh district of Chhattisgarh is repidly growing as industrial hub and more than 200 industries in different sectors have set foot in the area. This has also spurred growth of ancillaries, finance and service sectors. Thereby, demand of skilled man power has risen steeply.

A decade back, Raigarh was a backward district and scenario regarding education, entrepreneurship and skills was grim. Since then, it has shown the little development, forcing industries to fetch skilled people from outside. This poses a threat of local unrest in coming times. However, Industries and ancillaries cannot hire all land-looser, affected people who are unskilled merely to meet demand of employment. Industry affected people and general youth has to take-up the opportunities of wage or self employment in other institutions, doing business with industries or getting benefit of their existence by any means. The district needs tremendous number of Computer accountants, Computer operators, Tax return preparers,(Finance industry) HMV and LMV Drivers, Automobile mechanics(Transportation industry), Mesons, plumbers, Electricians, (Construction industry),welders, fitters, Machinist (Ancillaries), Stenos, Security guards and house-maid (Services) etc.

JanMitram Institute of Skills and Development

However, the mindset of youth leans towards white collar wage employment. One has to fight with this mindset and also develop entrepreneurship and skills to counter the unrest growing in peoples mind. The conventional mechanism of skill development viz. ITIs in the district is paralyzed and suffering with own problems. Therefore JanMitram, last year started JISAD- JanMitram Institute for skill development. The JISAD provides Carrier Counseling, Vocational Trainings and skill development services, with a motto of “Guiding youth, Spurring smiles”.

The JISAD is now entrusted to conduct all skill development and vocation trainings of JanMitram. This year JISAD conducted many in house and External Training this year.

NABARD Assisted SDP on lac handicrafts

In last few years, JanMitram has successfully promoted lac handicrafts in Raigarh district. Over 300 SHG women and youth have got training in this trade and most of them are working successfully. Raigarh integrated shellac association and JanMitra Marketing and consultancy limited, are providing handholding and marketing support to these trainees.

With time, it was felt that product range is limited and also many of artisan need improved training and equipments, for achieving better finishing. Nabard came forward and sanctioned a skill development programme for thirty trainees in Chhote gumda and Bade gumda villages. (also see http://janmitram.blogspot.com/2011/07/success-stories-from-lac-handicraft.html)

The training curriculum consisted making of jewelries, application of dyes and moulds, making new colures etc. The training went on for 45 days. DDM –NABARD regularly visited the programme and finally all the trainees were awarded with certificates.

Distribution of Handicraft Tool kits to Lac Handicraft Artisans

Distribution of Handicraft Toolkits: It is worth mentioning that DRDA Raigarh assisted all handicraft artisans by providing toolkits to all lac handicraft trainees. The toolkits were supported by BRGF livelihood component. Block Development officer of Gharghoda attended the programme and distributed toolkits to all beneficiaries. APO-ZP Mr. D.K.Makwana , I/C of BRGF programme also attended the ceremony.

Computer Accountancy Training

Computer Accountancy is a potential trade for wage employment in given scenario of Raigarh. Therefore 50 educated unemployed youth from rural areas were taken for training in these trades.

The training was assisted by DRDA under BRGF-Capacity building component. The traiing was tow months long and trainees learnt basic accounting, Tally based accounting, Tax calculation etc.. This was followed by apprenticeship in local chartered accountants’ offices.

Heavy industrial vehicle driving training

Contraction and industrial activities are increasing in Raigarh and nearby areas. There are about 300 JCBs, 200 Dozers, 50 Hydra, 35-50 pokleins in Raigarh, Tamnar and nearby area. These vehicles are Very costly and need careful operation. However, no training facility for drivers is available. Unskilled drivers are accident-prone and most of the time brings damage to costly heavy-duty machines. Therefore there is a good demand for trained drivers.

JISAD initiated the training with assistance of DRDA’s BRGF scheme. M/S dynamic Engineering, Sole distributor of JCBs in Chhattisgarh, collaborated with programme. 50 schools dropped, unemployed youth joined the trainings

Industrial Vehicle Driving Course is a huge success

Theory and practical session went on for one month and then apprentice with JCB owners was provided. Poor student also got assistance for obtaining HMV driving license.

MFI Sangwari Training

Microfinance is a growing business in rural areas. Microfinance agents need to know group approach for thrift; saving etc. they also need to learn motivation of Self help groups, Joint liability groups, common interest groups etc. we found it a unique wage employment orientated trade.Therefore , training for 50 youth and elders, having inertest for social service were chosen from all over the district and with this eight weeks training, learn the group handling technique. Theory and practical went side by side.

After training two month apprenticeship was given inside JanMitram, under Sanjivani Programme (Discussed earlier.) this not only provided employment opportunity to trainees, but also a village resource person to SHGs at village level.

Computer operation – MADA Pocket Scheme

Computer literacy has become essential for youth to get wage employment in most of sectors. MADA pocket scheme, which is developmental scheme of CG government for some specific tribes, is running in selected villages. JISAD has conducted computer operation training in two villages this year.

The programme was coordinated by District employment officer. This ninety days training trained 20 student in basic computer operation, especially MS-office and some other regular software.

R-SETI Trainings: Government of India is started comprehensive skill development initiative in collaboration with banks. Rural Self employment training institute has been started in the district under this initiative and State bank of India is hosting it in Raigarh. JanMitam is chosen partner for implementation of training programmes. In this year, following trainings were conducted with SBI-R-Seti. Details of training carried out by JISAD in collaboration with R-SETI are hear-under.

Motor Winding and pump set Repairing

Skilled servicemen for Motor winding and pump set repairing are unavailable in rural areas. These causes loss of time and maony for farmers. Under banner of SBI-Rseti, JISAD conducted a training for same in which 37 rural unemployed youth participated. Residential arrangement for trainees was made.

Training conducted by skilled resource person and arrangement for regular test, Certification and apprenticeship were made.

Dairy Farming

Agriculture and allied activities still hold key of rural economy. Dairy activity is prominent livelihood option having tremendous potential. Therefore, SBI sponsored Rural self employment training institute took a batch of 30 young animal rearers, chiefly from pussure and baramkela block for weeklong course on dearly farming.

Trainees learnt about cattle-feeding, rearing, Economics and many different aspects of dairy. One day exposure visit was also organized at Jindal Dairy. The training started on 23^rd Dec. and concluded on 30^th December.

H. Advanced mobile repairing

In this age of rapid communication, Mobiles are almost universal in people’s hands. Therefore, skill for repairing of mobile handsets is good source of self employment. Under banner of R-Seti, JanMitram conducted advanced mobile repairing training, started on 28^th march. A total of 21 youth coming across the district participated in the training.

A month-long training covered the handset technology, common faults, repairing, replacement, software downloading and many more issues enabling candidates to provide satisfactory service to clients. Beside, all the trainees got linked with successful mobile repairing shops for apprenticeship.

Based on Annual Raport of 2010-11

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Santosh Pandey ( Director- JISAD) Contect : 09926644990

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SP Singh Memorial Scholarship : New Initiative of JanMitram

2011-12-09T04:19:00.000-08:00

JanMitram is running variety of programme in field. Each and every member and volunteer of JanMitram feels empathy with poor and deprived people. Our primary focus is combating poverty; however, it is sometimes necessary to help people in those areas which are not out primary focus. Education is foundation of a successful life. We have seen many youth and girls dropping out of education due to financial constraints. Therefore, the managing board decided to establish a fund for providing scholarship to student belonging ultra poor families.

JanMitram Scholarship for ultra poor

Four categories of scholarship were decided. For Boy’s higher and professional education i.e. MBA, BE, Medical etc, The S.P.Singh Memorial scholarship is started. Mrs. Janak Dulari Scholarship is for girls in same category. Both scholarships are established on name of parents of organization’s Secretary, Mr. Manish Singh.

Shri K.G.Goswami Scholarship for boys and Keser Goswami Scholarship for girls are founded in school education category. Both are parents of our President Dr. M.G.Goswami.

This was the first year of scholarship and four students got assistance for Engineering collage fee. In School Education Category 74 Student assistance for Fees, uniforms, Books etc. one Handicapped was provided wheel chair to facilitate his collage visits.

JanMitram Institute For Skills And Development: Profile

2011-12-09T03:45:00.000-08:00

Founded	2009 ( as a Division of JanMitram)
Location	JanMitram House, Indian School Road, Kelo Vihar, Raigarh, India 496001
About	Skills Deveopment of Youth and development interface

Description	The JISAD–JANMITRAM INSTITUTE FOR SKILL AND DEVELOPMENT was established to realize specific vision of JanMitram, To enable rural poor for recognizing opportunities available in our great democratic nation and getting hold on them. The institute concentrate solely on development of capacity among youth and rural leaders, including women. JISAD also proceeds thorough knowledge sharing & technology dissemination towards socioeconomic development. The institute provides interface for academician, policy makers, implementers and professionals and organisations to built a new environment for sustainable and inclusive development.
Mission	Vocational Trainings : Development of technical and life skills, Skill Uprising of Rural Entrepreneurs & people’s associations Development interface Vision Building : Seminars and Workshops Knowledge Sharing interface Rural Management Capacity Building of PRIs Project Planning / Micro planning Services Resource Material Development Monitoring and Evaluation Survey and data analysis Assessment studies
Awards	Not yet, As We do not submit applications for them
Products	Major Trades of Vocation Training Handcrafts – Lac, Wood , Bamboo, Bell metal Food preservation and processing Agro based and allied activities Tailoring and fashion technology Two wheeler and diesel mechanic Light, Heavy and earthmover driving Accountancy – Manual and Computerized Low cost housing material production NTFP and forest produce – Trade and processing

Email	janmitram@gmail.com
Phone	+91-7762-225413
Website	http://www.janmitram.in/new/

The truth about farmer suicides in Chhattisgarh

2011-12-09T02:57:00.000-08:00

A group of citizen journalists in Chhattisgarh is finding out why four farmers in the state are committing suicide every day, and why the government continues to deny this. They found that in a single district, Durg, 11 farmers had committed suicide due to debt, while 52 labourers took their lives for “economic reasons”

Why does India need a bunch of city-dwelling computerwallahs to discover that farmers in its villages are committing suicide in alarmingly high numbers? Does it tell us something about the health of our other institutions as well?

The journey that led to this discovery started at a Dream Chhattisgarh meet in December 2007. The Dream Chhattisgarh meet is an annual event of the Internet-based citizen’s journalism group CGnet.

Generally, people connected to the Internet are city-dwellers with limited understanding of the world of farming. This is true for most members of our group too.

To dream of a better future for Chhattisgarh it is important to understand the issues surrounding the profession that sustains 80% of the state’s population.

And so, at Dream Chhattisgarh meets, the first session is usually on agriculture; last year, farmers and agricultural experts were invited to inaugurate the meet at Champaran.

No, this is not the Champaran of indigo farmers where Gandhi experimented with his first satyagraha in India in 1917 (though it is a coincidence that the indigo farmers of Champaran, Bihar, were from the Kurmi caste and many farmers in Chhattisgarh’s Champaran too are Kurmis).

This Champaran is a village in Chhattisgarh, around 60 km from the state capital Raipur.

Chhattisgarh is not Vidarbha

At the meet, farmers described their pathetic condition to CGnet members. “The situation of the farmer is so bad today that a labourer working for me can eat a cauliflower,” one of them said, “but I must be satisfied with the stubs that we earlier used to feed to the animals.”

The issue of farmer suicides also came up.

We wanted to invite a specialist from Vidarbha to speak about what Chhattisgarh could learn from Vidarbha about farmer distress, and, perhaps, avoid making the same mistakes. But no one was able to join us from Vidarbha.

During the discussion, experts told us that they had never heard of any farmer suicides in Chhattisgarh. They had read a few news items on farmer suicides in Madhya Pradesh and how that state was amongst the top five states with respect to this issue. The figures for Madhya Pradesh included Chhattisgarh.

Participants also discussed an article by P Sainath, published a few weeks before the meet. The article referred to a study by Professor K Nagaraj of the Madras Institute of Development Studies which states that over 2,000 farmers commit suicide in Madhya Pradesh (including Chhattisgarh) every year.

The meet concluded that most of these suicides were probably happening in the cash crop areas of Madhya Pradesh, as we had never heard of any farmer suicides in Chhattisgarh.

The agriculture sub-committee of CGnet decided to explore the matter further.

The investigation begins

A Google search with the words “farmer suicide” and “Chhattisgarh” yielded the same P Sainath article discussed at the meet which gives the farmer suicide figures for Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh jointly.

Was there no separate data on farmer suicides in Chhattisgarh, I wondered.

A call to Professor Nagaraj revealed that the data was indeed available and could be obtained from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).

Nagaraj said: “There was no Chhattisgarh when I started the study in 1997. And after 2000, when the data for the three new states of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Uttarakhand were made available, I simply added them to the parent states of Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar for my convenience.”

So, were the figures for Chhattisgarh never investigated on their own?

A visit to the NCRB showed that, contrary to our assumption at the Dream Chhattisgarh meet, out of the 2,000-odd farmers who had committed suicide in undivided Madhya Pradesh, more than 1,200 were from Chhattisgarh!

The next week, I expressed my shock over this revelation in my weekly column in a local Chhattisgarh newspaper: ‘Four farmers commit suicide in Chhattisgarh every day, says the NCRB. Are the figures fudged?’

The next morning there was an article on the front page of the same paper ridiculing the figures. ‘Everybody loves a good fraud: The untruth of farmer suicide figures in Chhattisgarh’ was the title of the piece.

The article claimed that a survey done by the author had come across only six cases of farmer suicide in the state from the year 2000, when Chhattisgarh was formed. The author observed that many farmers had committed suicide but that the cause had nothing to do with livelihood.

Laughing at these claims, P Sainath told us: “If one farmer is committing suicide annually in Chhattisgarh, then the state must be a heaven! I would advise farmers from the US and Europe to shift to Chhattisgarh.”

More articles debating the issue followed.

The arguments presented claimed that Chhattisgarh was not Vidarbha. Farmers did not grow cash crops here; paddy does not need that much investment. So, farmers were committing suicide for non-farming reasons.

Jacob Nellithanam, who has been working with farmers for a number of years, contradicts this argument by saying: “Paddy is a cash crop for the farmers of Chhattisgarh.”

Meanwhile, the police chief of Chhattisgarh told the local press that the figures quoted were bogus and asked for proof.

The National Crime Records Bureau in Delhi responded: “If the figures are bogus then please ask the government of Chhattisgarh why they are sending bogus figures. We do not have any offices in the state; we publish what we get from the State Crime Records Bureaus.”

Why are farmers so prone to suicide?

I found the figures too disturbing to let go of the matter.

Professor Nagaraj had gone as far as to say that, according to his study, police records show only landowners as farmers. In reality therefore the number of farmers committing suicide would be greater than that reflected in the data.

The number of landowning farmers in Chhattisgarh, according to the economic survey of 2008, is 32.55 lakhs, which is a little less than 15% of the state’s total population. But farmers constitute 32.2% of the total number of suicides in Chhattisgarh.

What is it about a farmer’s livelihood that makes him twice as vulnerable to suicide as any other profession?

CGnet decided to investigate some cases on the ground.

The three cases we picked up from the local newspapers had not been recorded as farmer suicide cases in the police records. But all were directly linked to farming distress.

Highest rate of farmer suicides

Dr Yuvraj Gajpal, a CGnet member and post-doctoral student in Canada, calculated the farmer suicide rate per 100,000 population for the states and found, to his astonishment, that Chhattisgarh tops the list every year!

Around 6.49 farmers committed suicide in Chhattisgarh per 100,000 population in 2006. Maharashtra is a distant second, with 4.28, and Kerala third with 3.37. After that comes Andhra Pradesh, with 3.24, and Karnataka with 2.57.

Dr Gajpal wrote an article asking why farmer suicides in Chhattisgarh were not getting the attention they deserved, despite the fact that the state has more farmer suicide deaths per 100,000 population than the four states that have received so much attention on the matter.

We linked up with Professor Srijit Mishra of the Mumbai-based Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research who has been asking the same question in his research papers for years.

Unlike Nagaraj and Gajpal, Mishra calculates the number of farmer suicides per 100,000 male farmers; he calls it ‘suicide mortality rate’.

Mishra wrote: “Whichever way you calculate, Chhattisgarh remains in the top five states as far as farmer suicides is concerned. But it is puzzling why neither the media nor the politicians have taken note of it.”

These articles managed to convince some leaders of the opposition Congress to raise the issue in the Vidhan Sabha.

The chief minister replied: “I have checked with all the collectors. No farmer has committed suicide in Chhattisgarh due to debt. Not the issue but the people writing about it need to be investigated.”

Discussing agriculture is a dangerous business

These threatening words were just the start of the suppression of the right to know the truth.

Applications under the Right to Information Act with the police yielded no results. Instead, I began receiving calls to “stop politicking in the name of journalism”. And my column was stopped on charges of writing “lies”, though it was unclear how the editor suddenly discovered they were “lies” after two years of carrying my articles every week!

It only strengthened my resolve to get to the bottom of the matter.

We started working like detectives; a simple story was turning out to be a crash course in investigative journalism.

Finally, through a circuitous route, we managed to get some figures from the State Crime Records Bureau.

The figures tell us that farmer suicides are concentrated in the paddy-growing districts of central Chhattisgarh; the tribal districts of the north and south have less than half the number of farmer suicides compared to the central region.

Was additional income from the forests saving farmers in the tribal region?

Districts with a higher suicide rate were the same as districts with the greatest fertiliser use. Is there a connection?

We realised that much of the resistance to our investigation centred around the argument that linked our claims directly to Vidarbha and farmer suicides resulting out of large loans taken for cash crops. Since the farmer in Chhattisgarh had no large loans, he was not committing suicide!

We were in fact not claiming that the situation in Chhattisgarh was the same as in Vidarbha; we were only asking for deeper investigation. Our request was being buried in irrelevant arguments.

Farming: a loss-making business

Our understanding of the seriousness of the issue is based on our exchange with a paddy farmer in Chhattisgarh who said: “Economic deterioration is being measured against incomes. A farmer growing paddy in Chhattisgarh has hardly any income these days. Agriculture is a loss-making business and is being sustained by the sale of assets!”

Farm scientist Sanket Thakur explains: “If you calculate the cost of labour at a minimum wage, then the production cost of paddy should be at least double the current support price.”

In most areas of Chhattisgarh, the wage rate is around Rs 30 per day. That is how the farmer saves some money. But with growing input costs, profits drop every year.

In places closer to cities, where one pays Rs 80 in labour costs, farmers make huge losses and survive only by selling bits of their land every year.

“This continuously decreasing income creates a feeling of hopelessness,” Thakur says. “Many times, this translates to suicide. You may find random immediate causes for a farmer’s suicide, but if you explore deeper, most of the time it is farming distress which is the main cause.”

Who is lying, the CM or police records?

Meanwhile, a CGnet member was busy collecting the police records for 24 thanasin the district of Durg. We were shocked to find 11 cases of farmer suicide on this small list. The cause of suicide was “debt”. Against the backdrop of the chief minister’s statement that no farmer in Chhattisgarh was committing suicide due to debt, we had expected the police records to match this claim.

It may be noted here that:

Durg is not the district with the highest number of suicides in the state.
The list available with us for Durg district is not complete.
The figures available are for 2004 only although the state has been in existence since 2000.

If this sample were extrapolated to the entire district, the figures for farmer suicides due to economic reasons would be higher.

Apart from the 11 farmers who committed suicide due to debt there are 21 cases on the list where cause of death has been listed as “economic reasons”.

The list also has the names of 52 labourers who committed suicide due to “economic reasons”. And, six labourers who committed suicide due to debt. It is indeed likely that, in rural areas, labourers are farm labourers who have taken land on lease from rich farmers; this is a common practice in Chhattisgarh. Many of the causes on this list are ambiguous and need to be examined by a competent agency. Mental and physical illness, tension, fights -– all could be linked to farm distress, says Sanket Thakur. Then there is the glaringly large number of cases where the cause has been listed as “unknown”.

We are trying to collect similar data for other districts too. We understand that suicide is a complex issue, possibly beyond the analytical capabilities of a citizen journalism investigative team.

In search of Gandhi

The 1916 Lucknow session of the Indian National Congress passed a resolution demanding the appointment of a committee by the British government to enquire into the agrarian crisis in Champaran. But the Congress in Chhattisgarh is satisfied with a statement from the chief minister saying that “no farmer has committed suicide due to debt”.

After the Lucknow Congress, Gandhi went to Champaran to lead the firstsatyagraha in India that resulted in the formation of the Frank Shy Committee to investigate the crisis. Gandhi was a member of that committee. The recommendation of the Shy Committee resulted in the passing of the Champaran Agrarian Law of 1918.

History tells us that what started in Champaran in Bihar resulted in India getting independence.

Will what’s happening in Champaran in Chhattisgarh lead to a better life for the Chhattisgarhi farmer?

(Shubhranshu Choudhary is a founder-member of the Citizens Journalism initiative in Chhattisgarh, CGnet [www.cgnet.in])

InfoChange News & Features, January 2009 http://infochangeindia.org/agriculture/features/the-truth-about-farmer-suicides-in-chhattisgarh.html

Sustainable agriculture reduces distress migration in Orissa

2011-12-09T02:39:00.000-08:00

Thanks to intervention from MASS, migration from Orissa’s Bargarh district has reduced considerably as villagers have been encouraged to start their own kitchen gardens, keep goats and chickens, and set up seed and grain banks, thereby adding to their income from agriculture and reducing their dependence on unscrupulous moneylenders

Tularam Amari and his wife Padma Amari, who live in a remote village in Orissa, want their youngest daughter Meena to become a teacher. Meena is currently studying in Class XIII. “We want to make her a teacher,” the couple say confidently.

Just two years ago, when husband and wife used to migrate to Hyderabad and other places to make bricks and eke out a livelihood, they had decided to put an end to educating their two girl-children, Dileswari and Meena.

Tularam and Padma believed they were destined for a life without dreams, until, one day, they decided firmly to change things. It was at this critical juncture that volunteers from the NGO, MASS (Manav Adhikar Seva Samiti) persuaded them to take up vegetable farming. Today, the couple earns about Rs 1 lakh per annum from agro-based farming and poultry. They live in Temriamal village, Jharbandh gram panchayat, Paikmal block, Bargarh district, Orissa.

Migration woes

The experience of working in the brick kilns of Hyderabad is still alive in the couple’s memory. Padma says: “When we had to come back from Hyderabad after finishing work, towards the end of the season, neither the owner nor the sardar (middleman) squared our payment. And they did not arrange our return tickets. With no money in hand, we started for home. I was not sure how I would manage my two children en route. It took nine days to get to our village in Orissa. We travelled by train some of the way; the rest by foot. I had some broken rice with me to feed ourselves on the journey. My younger daughter kept asking for better food; the elder one would tell her that as their parents had not got their wages there was no money in hand to buy good food.” Padma wiped her tears away as she recalled those dark days.

People from Adibasi Padia, a hamlet in Kechodadar gram panchayat in the same block, also used to migrate to Ayodhya, Hyderabad and Kali Nagar (Andhra Pradesh) to make bricks. There are some pockets in Paikmal block where people have always migrated out of the state to meet their livelihood needs. Mostly, they migrate to the brick kilns of Hyderabad, Chennai and other such places.

This kind of migration is called debt migration, where labourers are given an advance to commit labour for seven to eight months in the brick kilns. Generally, the unit of labour in brick-making constitutes one male, one female, and a child. This unit is called ‘pathuria’. Advance money to the tune of Rs 15,000-Rs 25,000 is given to a pathuria. Because of the advance money, labourers work in semi-bonded conditions in the workplace. They face a lot of exploitation due to weak inter-state labour laws and their vulnerability in the destination states. Indeed, physical and mental harassment in all possible forms is characteristic of such migration. Despite this, people are forced to migrate due to lack of sustainable employment opportunities in their home district.

Revival of agriculture

MASS volunteers showed Tularam Amari how to cultivate the two acres of land they own to make it a viable unit. With a little support from the village self-help group, the couple dug a well on their land for water. They built a new house which is a little away from the village. Because they lived on the land they were able to pay full attention to cultivation. From a mere half-acre of vegetable cultivation, the family made a sustainable earning. Now, they harvest ladies fingers, cauliflower and cucumber and make a good living selling them.

“In fact, we have taken a holistic approach towards reviving various sources of livelihood for people, using local resources,” says Adikand Biswal of MASS. In the beginning, women were asked to form self-help groups (SHGs) at the village level. They were persuaded to save some of their income on a monthly basis. A collective saving by members supplemented by external support from the NGO created a small pool of money to meet people’s immediate cash requirements. People borrowed money at a low rate of interest from the SHG and bought paddy seed for farming. They also invested in goat-keeping, chicken farming and other forms of animal husbandry.

Investment in agriculture gave good returns, while returns from animal husbandry added to people’s incomes, enhancing their sustainability. With MASS’s help, people began to explore various government schemes for agriculture. With seed support from the government, they started kitchen gardens and experimented with vegetable farming. This served to enrich their daily diet. There was a time, recalls an old lady in Adivasi Padia hamlet, “when male members of the family would go out of the village to do daily labour, and the wives waited with the children for them to return with rice so they could prepare food for the day. On most occasions, the women of the family would starve to feed their children and male members”.

Premsila Bhoi was the first to experiment with the kitchen garden model. Today, it yields her a rich harvest and is financially remunerative. Last year, in 2010, she sold vegetables worth Rs 7,000 (with an almost negligible investment) grown on a small patch of land alongside the house. Many people in the area have since developed kitchen gardens.

Goat-keeping too has proved remunerative. Kain Bhoi has six goats, each of which she sold for Rs 6,000. Similarly, Prabha Bariha sold six goats within the last two to three years and made Rs 36,000. Most of the money was spent on food and on other consumption requirements.

Apart from a revival in agriculture, the villagers have also set up grain and seed banks to reduce their dependence on moneylenders, locally called sahukars.

Grain and seed banks

Some villages in the area have started grain banks with the purpose of storing foodgrain to use in the lean season. Earlier, during the monsoon, people would have no foodgrain stocks resulting in dependence on moneylenders who would charge a monthly interest rate of 10%. This dependence on borrowing led to a vicious cycle, as, after the harvest, almost all the villagers’ income would go to the moneylender to repay debts. Effectively, therefore, people were unable to enjoy their own harvest and were forced to seek work nearby or migrate out of the state. After the introduction of grain banks, where people contributed a portion of their harvest to the community-managed bank, stocks were available during the three rainy months of June, July and August. On one occasion, says a villager, the rain continued for eight long days forcing people to remain in the village. The sahukar(moneylenders) came to the village with rice, available at a high rate of interest. But the village had accumulated enough grain to sustain itself. No one took rice from the sahukar.

Likewise, seed banks were set up where a portion of the harvest was kept as seed for the next farming season. Earlier, it was the sahukar who would provide seeds; now people take it from the seed bank. The concept of grain and seed banks has helped restore people’s dignity and self-respect by dispensing with the need to borrow from unscrupulous moneylenders.

Reduced migration

Interventions like these have improved the distress migration scenario in the block, although migration has not been wiped out entirely. According to the available figures from two panchayats -- Jharbandh and Bartunda -- the quantum of distress migration has dropped. Of the total of 1,877 families in these two panchayats, 277 families migrated out of the district to work in 2009-10. In 2010-11, the number came down to 220 families. These are based on data collected by the NGO from the migration registers maintained in villages in these two panchayats.

Children’s education

Inter-state migration takes a heavy toll on children’s education. Tularam says: “Continuity of children’s education was almost impossible owing to a seven to eight month stay out of the state when we were migrating. We decided to discontinue the children’s education. But now things have improved. Our older daughter appeared for the Class X exam, but did not pass. She is planning to appear again. And our younger daughter is in Class VIII.”

The additional income has not only helped further the education of migrant children, it has also impacted on the education of children from non-migrant families. Now almost all the children of Adibasi Padia hamlet attend school. “The improved self-sufficiency has particularly impinged on the education of the girl-child, which was neglected earlier,” says Lata Sahu, a grassroots activist from MASS. In fact, this comprehensive model of development has brought about a visible change in people’s economic and, consequently, socio-cultural lives.

(Pradeep Baisakh is a freelance journalist based in Bhubaneswar, Orissa)

Infochange News & Features, November 2011 http://infochangeindia.org/agriculture/features/sustainable-agriculture-reduces-distress-migration-in-orissa.html

Mr Nilekani, can you now feel Team Anna’s frustration?

2011-12-09T02:21:00.000-08:00

Dear Mr Nilekani

Two and a half years ago, when you were appointed to head the Unique ID project, we celebrated it – for many reasons.

For one, it signalled that the Manmohan Singh government, fresh from its election victory, was ready to do business. Just the fact that it had handed over the responsibility of implementing so important a project of assigning a national identity card to every Indian, which had implications for everything from national security to the effective implementation of social welfare policies, to someone who had a proven track record in corporate excellence and could harness the power of technology suggested earnestness on the government’s part.

We had long been inured to seeing luddite netas and babus monopolise the policy and implementation space in government without a long-term vision or a sense of operational efficiency. Although there are instances of technocrats working the levers of the creaking bureaucratic machine and raising the bar – the name of E Sreedharan springs to mind – they were the exceptions that validated stereotypical notions of governmental inefficiency.

The induction of stellar professionals from the private sector, with a record of working in challenging corporate environments, a 360-degree view of a dramatically changing world and high standards of personal integrity counted, for us, as a fruitful harnessing of our national resources. We had hoped that your success in the unique ID project would inspire many more corporate titans with a track record of building great institutions – Deepak Parekh, perhaps, or S Ramadorai – to get involved in policymaking and implementation, and that they would be welcomed by the system.

Today, those hopes have been compelled to take a reality check.

Yesterday, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance rejected the National Identification Authority of India (NIAI) Bill, effectively giving your unique ID project a kick in the butt.

For sure, panel members had forceful arguments to make in defence of their rejection of the Aadhar Bill: politicians and special interest groups have unsurpassed skills when it comes to sabotaging or slowing down legislation that serves a greater common good. Witness the unending drama about bringing an effective Lokpal Bill to check corruption, which has dragged on for decades. It needed a mass uprising, channelled by Team Anna, to finally get politicians to focus their minds – and even today they are still up to their dirty tricks to weaken the Lokpal.

We’re sure you find all these political and bureaucratic games intensely frustrating: you signed on to oversee this project in the belief that you were serving a larger national cause. And yet you find yourself boxed in and stymied by petty turf wars between politicians and bureaucrats. And even the Prime Minister, whose whole-hearted backing you appear to have, is unable to create enabling conditions for you to get the job done.

We share your agony and your frustration.

We only wish you would also share some of the frustrations of us common folks who too have been banging our heads against the stone walls of the government and the bureaucracy. I specifically allude to the frustration of Team Anna, which you appeared to belittle in an interview not so long ago.

At the height of Team Anna’s fast in August to get a strong Lokpal institution in place, you went on air and ridiculed Anna’s campaign as “naïve and simplistic”. You argued then that while a Lokpal was necessary, Team Anna had been “drinking the Kool-Aid”. You then hard sold your unique ID project as being a better device to combat corruption at the grassroots level, where the common folks interact with the government.

And although you said you empathised with people’s frustration over corruption, you argued that Team Anna’s protest was not justified. In every other way too, the overarching tenor of your comments suggested that you were batting for the government – and offering politicians an alibi.

“When a very serious parliamentary body (the parliamentary standing committee) has taken it (the Lokpal Bill) up for consideration, why are we not working through that system?” you asked rhetorically. “I have visited Parliaments in the UK, the US and France; I’ve met with top leaders across the world. The standing committee procedures are second to none. Let us respect that.”

You even suggested that the widely held negative perceptions about politicians were unfair. “I’ve been in public life for two years and my respect for politicians has gone up . I think they are extremely hardworking,” you said. “We have to respect our politicians.”

I dare say that after what the parliamentary standing committee and the politicians have done to slow down or sabotage your unique ID project, your estimation of them is somewhat different.

Remember, Mr Nilekani, this is what is happening to someone of your stature: you had everything going for you – a high profile, well-earned respect, the prime minister’s public backing. You’re convinced in your heart that what you’re doing is vitally important for the nation. And yet, you’re being slowly checkmated by the political system. If they could do this to you, imagine what they can do to powerless nobodies who are banging their heads against a system with entrenched vested interests.

Imagine the frustration of Team Anna, which is an outsider to the system, widely reviled by politicians for daring to challenge the corrupt system on which they thrive, and which has no political backing. And yet, when it goes on protest to pressure the government into acting, you called it “naïve and simplistic”.

I trust that after what happened to you, you have a better understanding of the frustrations of Team Anna.

Mr Nilekani, not all is lost. You can still redeem yourself in the eyes of those who yearn for a strong Lokpal Bill. Anna will be on a fast once again on Sunday to protest the continuing efforts to dilute the Lokpal Bill.

Come and join us. Let’s share stories of our frustrations: you can tell us about the obstacles to the unique ID project, and we’ll tell you why we are on the streets once again.

And together we’ll find a way to get the system to listen to all of us.

Yours-in-solidarity

An Indian

http://www.firstpost.com/politics/mr-nilekani-can-you-now-feel-team-anna%E2%80%99s-frustration-151494.html

जिंदगी न मिलेगी दोबारा

2011-10-26T21:32:00.000-07:00

जब छोटा था, तो पिताजी के सामने जाने की हिम्मत नहीं होती थी। वह जिस कमरे में बैठते, उस कमरे से बचता था। पिताजी से बात कहनी होती, तो मां का सहारा लेता। वह हमारे बीच में डाकिये की भूमिका निभाती और मेरे लिए वकील बन जाती। उनसे जिरह करने का साहस मेरे फरिश्तों में भी नहीं था। यही हाल मेरे दोस्तों का भी था। पिताजी मुझसे बेहद प्यार करते थे। लेकिन यह कभी उन्होंने कहा नहीं और न ही मैंने यह कभी जानने की कोशिश की। यह रिश्ता दोनों तरफ से मूक था। इसमें एक अजीब किस्म की अजनबियत थी। वह बोलते कम, हुक्म ज्यादा सुनाते थे। मेरी जिंदगी के सारे फैसले वही करते। मानने के अलावा कोई दूसरा रास्ता नहीं था। लेकिन मेरे जवान होते ही दुनिया बदलने लगी। पिता दोस्त बन गए। उनके सामने बैठना, उनसे गप्पें मारना सामान्य-सी बात हो गई। हम स्कूल की फीस मांगने में झिझकते थे, आज के बच्चे डैड से रिलेशनशिप पर बात करने से नहीं सकुचाते। पीढ़ी बदल गई, रिश्ते बदल गए। हमारी पीढ़ी में रिश्ते समूह से तय और निर्धारित होते थे। परिवार बड़ा था, व्यक्ति छोटा। रिश्तों में बराबरी नहीं, एक हायरार्की थी।

ऐसे में जब मैंने पिछले दिनों जिंदगी न मिलेगी दुबारा फिल्म देखी, तो रिश्तों का एक नया संसार दिखा। समूह नहीं, व्यक्ति दिखा। न परिवार बड़ा, और न व्यक्ति छोटा। दोनों बराबर। व्यक्ति परिवार के सामने सरेंडर नहीं करता। बेटा और बाप, दोनों को पता है कि जिंदगी सिर्फ एक बार ही मिलती है। और उसे अपने तरीके से ही जीने में मजा है। फरहान खान पूरी फिल्म में अपने पिता से मिलने की ख्वाहिश लिए अपने दोस्तों के साथ स्पेन जाता है। उसके पिता और उसकी मां के बीच जवानी के दिनों में एक रिश्ता बन गया था। उस रिश्ते ने फरहान को जन्म दिया। लेकिन पिता नसीरुद्दीन शाह शादी के लिए तैयार नहीं थे, जबकि मां को प्रेमी के साथ पति भी चाहिए था। नसीर ने शादी पर अपनी ख्वाहिशों को तरजीह दी। उन्हें पेंटिंग्स बनानी थी। दुनिया देखनी थी। अपने हिसाब से जिंदगी का मजा लेना था। फरहान उनकी जिंदगी को सीमित कर रहा था। उनके सपनों को धूमिल कर रहा था। लिहाजा वह अपने रास्ते पर चल पड़े और घूमते-घूमते स्पेन जा पहुंचे। इस दौरान फरहान की मां ने एक दूसरे शख्स से शादी कर ली। फरहान उन्हें अपना बाप मानता रहा, लेकिन जिस दिन उसे असलियत पता चली, वह अपने असली बाप से मिलने को मचल उठा। मां ने समझाया, पर वह नहीं माना।

नसीर अपनी दुनिया में मस्त थे। उन्होंने कभी यह जानने की कोशिश नहीं की कि बेटा कैसा है। एक पल के लिए भी वह बेटे के रिश्ते में नहीं बंधे। वह बड़े पेंटर हो गए। उनकी अपनी अलग दुनिया थी। फरहान की तड़प जिंदा रही। वह स्पेन में अपने पिता को खोजता है। फिल्म चलती रहती है और उसकी तलाश भी। आखिरकार वह अपने पिता से मिलता है। दोनों अकेले। सिर्फ नसीर और फरहान। भावनाओं का कोई ज्वार नहीं। आंसुओं का कोई रेला नहीं। फरहान जानने को बेताब कि क्या कभी उसके पिता को उसकी याद आई? कभी उससे मिलने को उनका दिल तड़पा? नसीर बहुत संतुलित...स्थिर...शांत, कोई नाटकीयता नहीं। कहा, तुम मुझे सलमान कहके पुकारो। वह आगे बोले, तुम्हारी मां शादी करना चाहती थी और मैं अपने सपनों को छूना चाहता था। दोनों के बीच कोई रिश्ता नहीं बनता था। फरहान थोड़ा निराश होता है, भावुक भी। लेकिन वह भी स्थिर है, शांत। कोई नाटकीयता नहीं। नसीर फिर कहते हैं, न मैं तब तुम्हारी जिम्मेदारी लेना चाहता था और न आज। नसीर ने एक वाक्य में रिश्ता बनने से पहले ही रिश्ता तोड़ दिया। हिंदी फिल्मों की तरह फरहान की आंखों से आंसू नहीं निकले। न उसने अपने पिता को कोसा। न कोई गिला, न शिकायत। न अमिताभ बच्चन की तरह नाजायज होने का दर्द। वह बाहर चला आता है। दोस्तों से मिलता है। सब कुछ सामान्य। वे सड़क किनारे रात गुजारते हैं। फरहान को नींद नहीं आती। रितिक रोशन सुबह उठता है। फरहान को देखता है। फरहान उससे कहता है कि मुझे सलमान के पास नहीं जाना चाहिए था। यानी उसे अपने पिता से मिलने की कोशिश नहीं करनी चाहिए थी। वह आहत है, लेकिन कंप्लेन नहीं करता। न अपने पिता को कोसता है। वह खुद से नाराज जरूर है, लेकिन अपने पिता की 'इंडिविजुअलिटी' को वह स्पेस देता है। उनके फैसले की इज्जत करता है।

पिता-पुत्र का यह रिश्ता हिंदी फिल्मों के लिए बिल्कुल नया है। जायज और नाजायज से परे। अमिताभ बच्चन की दर्जनों ऐसी फिल्में हैं, जहां नायक शुरू से अंत तक अपने को जायज ठहराने की जद्दोजहद में जीता है। त्रिशूल के अमिताभ और संजीव कुमार का संबंध। अमिताभ की नजर में उसके पिता ने उसकी मां के साथ धोखा किया। पिता को सजा मिलनी चाहिए। अमिताभ बदला लेने के लिए संजीव कुमार का कारोबार चौपट कर देता है। अमिताभ कुंठित बेटा है। रिश्तों के चक्रव्यूह में पिता की मजबूरियों और उनके निजत्व का उसके लिए कोई मतलब नहीं है। समाज बड़ा है, रिश्ते बड़े हैं। व्यक्ति और उसकी ख्वाहिशें छोटी हैं। फरहान कुंठित नहीं है। उसे अफसोस बस इतना है कि उसने क्यों किसी के प्राइवेट स्पेस में दखल दिया।

उसके मां-बाप को अपनी तरह से जिंदगी जीने का हक है और उसे अपनी तरह से। मां-बाप के बीच के रिश्ते को उसे नए सिरे से डिफाइन करने हक नहीं है, न ही उसे अपने को अपने पिता पर थोपने का अधिकार है। वह उनसे पूछता जरूर है, वह उसे अपनाएंगे या नहीं, बाप-बेटे के रिश्ते का नाम देंगे या नहीं? लेकिन यह एक व्यक्ति का दूसरे व्यक्ति से संवाद है। पुरानी दुनिया में रिश्ते 'डिफाइन' नहीं होते थे, वे 'डिफाइंड' थे। उन पर सवाल नहीं होता था। उन रिश्तों को तोड़ना अपराध था। त्रिशूल का अमिताभ यह सहन नहीं कर सकता कि उसका पिता उसकी मां को छोड़ दे। मैंने अपने पिता से कभी सवाल नहीं किया कि उन्होंने मेरी जिंदगी का कोई फैसला क्यों ऐसे किया? मेरे रिश्ते में सवाल पूछने का अधिकार नहीं था। वह 'टेकेन फॉर ग्रांटेड' था। नए समाज में कुछ भी 'टेकेन फॉर ग्रांटेड' नहीं है। न जिंदगी और न रिश्ते। पिता और बेटा, दोनों की अपनी-अपनी जिंदगी है। उसे अपने हिसाब से जीना है। अब किसी बेटे को अपने बाप के सामने जाने से डर नहीं लगता। फरहान और जोया, रिश्तों का नया संसार दिखाने के लिए शुक्रिया।

Shared from : http://khabar.ibnlive.com/blogs/16/643.html

Living Dumbledore’s Way

2011-09-17T16:46:00.000-07:00

Seven novels of Harry potter have got phenomenal success all over the world. I am fortunate enough to read all of those. Millions like me have gone through fantasy, born in JK Rowling’s mind. Like epic movie of Indian cinema “SHOLEY” each and every character in Harry Potter series has a purpose, and leaves a lasting impression over readers mind. At a glance, the series tells the tale of fight between Harry and Voldemort, symbolizing good and evil forces. Rowling carefully picks her character and intuit some specific feeling with them. For Ron and Hermione its faith, for Hagrid its glee, for petunia, Vernon and duddly its pity, loath for snape and his sticky hairs and fear for voldemort .

If we look around in our world, it is full of Voldemorts, Snapes, Veronon, Malfoys and they make formidable alliances. You also find Ron, Hermione, Hagrid, Wiselys and Longbottom in plenty, but they rarely make alliances, because everybody struggles to become himself a Potter. We love getting other people's help in our fight, but reluctant to give when asked for same. This is why a nexus between evil minds lasts long and alliance between good natured people lives short. If it ever becomes successful, then be assured that some Dumbledore is there.Therefore, when Dobaldore comes in scene, reader’s heart swells with respect.

Dumbldore is Headmaster of Hogwards, Biggest wizard of all times. He was offered post of “Minister of Magic” many times, but he refused such high position only to nurture young wizards at Hogwords. Unlike of those pigmys in our world who sit in high chairs, get exponentially high of what they deserve.

He is owner of Elder wand. Very shrewd and knows everything from the beginning, what reader and Harry Potter come to know at end. He keeps vigil watch, sent silent help and lets feel harry and friends that they made it. He lives by his famous saying “It is not our abilities that show what we truly are. It is our choices.” He saves Harry from many of threats, counsels him in every juncture, yet never imposing a decision. He lets harry choose his way. He shapes Harry’s life, his character, yet from a distance. He loves harry, cares him, but never mentions this. The reader and harry feel his love deep inside.

But harry is not getting special treatment. He loves each of his students in same way. Be it Ron, Hermione, Finigan, Longbottom and even Draco Malfoy. And most important, it was Dumbledore who visited an orphanage to bring Tom riddle at Hogwords. He cares them all.

Tom riddle alias Lord Voldemort is no less powerful. He is immortal with his hurcruxes. He can kill with one spell “AVEDA KADAVERA”. He is feared and rules with iron fist. But one thing Harry has that voldemort don’t- "Purpose". Seeking power for sake of power no not purpose-he tells Potter. Harry fights along with friends, Voldemort with slaves. Harry finds courage, because he has purpose. Harry wins because he has FRIENDS and he has TRUST. It was not just Harry’s win; it was a win of Dumbledore’s legacy. Thanks havens Dambaldore was not a shiksha-kermi just pretending to do what he is paid for.

But Dumbledore’s legacy does not stop on how he mentors his student. It was him who finishes first two hurcrux. All this he did without sending to Press release to "daily prophet" or interview to Reeta Skeeter. He drinks the mystery potion himself, plans his own death in a way that helps to tight net around Voldemort. “to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure” he says.

He keep good job done and makes no fuss. “We must all face the choice between what is right and what is easy”- he says in “goblet of fire”. In today’s world, Dumbledore is rare and endangered species. Our children find no such mentor in school, society or even in family. Even in offices and Parliaments lot of Voldemorts, Malfoys and Fudge are sitting on high places. Most of Children and juniors follow their footsteps, and get rewarded. This becomes there way for whole life.

Lot of disillusioned potters are out there friends….... Why not try to become Dumbledore for at least one Harry. And if you go trying for more... I assure you, it will not make Harry's army. It shall be Dumbledore's Army.
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By: Manish Singh ritumanishsingh@gmail.com

WHERE SHOULD MY ASHES GO...?

2011-09-12T12:49:00.000-07:00

One of finest actors of old times, Shammi Kapoor passed recently. The “Forefather of Rebels” wished his ashes to dispersed in Dal lake of Shrinagar, so it was done.

Shammi’s image in our generation’s mind, comes from Chitrahar songs. The TV had recently gone RANGEEN and all family sit together to watch it around 8 PM. Shammi’s evergreen songs from An evening in paris, Kashmir Ki kali, Teesri manzil etc were regularly repeated . It was hard to believe that lofar kind of his style overjoyed my father, when the same tried by brother was strongly desisted.

Anyways… His last wish reminded me of Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru. I heard that He wished to his ashes should dispersed over lands of india “The BharatBhoomi” and so was done with help of airplane. It also reminded one short story by Fredrick Foresyth in which a heirless tycoon, when detected with cancer, sells all his property to purchase load of platinum. Then the precious metal is turned into coffin. All of this was done with due secrecy. Then he make his will that his body should be cremated in sea, in a particular coffin kept in his garage. This way, he ensures that he keeps all his worldly wealth with him, even after mortal life. Perhaps Shammi and Nehruji also wanted to keep all there wealth forever with them. What their wealth was, I wonder.

Taking the easy one first, I thought of Nehruji. Son of a wealthy lawyer, he spent his earlier life in roads and jails. Later he rose to thorny throne of power. In Personal life, he had very few things to cherish. Wife died and daughter divorced, sitting at home. He must have found solace in making India a cohesive and prosperous country. So, India and its land was the final choice to get associated forever. His soul will rest there in peace. So, he asked for it.

It also leads answer to Shammi’s case. His biggest hit movies were shot in Kashmir. His iconic “Zulfo ka rang sunhara” ends with his falling in Dal Lake. This song might have been ringing in his ear in entire life. He may have kept white beard below his bald head, but that handsome boy shaking head and singing romantic songs would have appeared every time he looked into mirror. He must have spent good time around Dal Lake, with his wife Geeta Bali mimicking his filmy Andaj in real moments. He cherished those memories of Kashmir, and Dal Lake. He knew his soul will rest there in peace. He also asked for it.

These great men, achieved peak of their respective field. They rebelled, made own path and succeed. But there last wishes make me to think. In this life, while we endlessly battle with Bread, Blackberry, Bureaucracy and Biwi, do we possess some cherished memories? Do I have real passion for something or have associated with some place that gives my soul final rest. Do I really have strong sense of association with any of world offerings? If not, didn't I wasted my worldly existence this long?

This world may or may not remember me after my demise, but I ought to remember some of its offerings. i don't want to leave this world empty-handed. So, in my remaining existence, I’ll strive not only to achieve, but also to enjoy, associate and relish. To depart with such memories deep in my soul.

So friends, my ashes shall not go to Allahabad, it will be somewhere else ….!!

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By Manish Singh ritumanishsingh@gmail.com

It’s all about Choices

2011-09-05T23:46:00.000-07:00

I completed my graduation in 1998. In those days, every graduate was supposed to sit in civil service examination of state or union. Some did this for own ambitions, some to follow the suit and some to keep their folks happy. Co-study and Coaching culture had propped up in our small city. One fine day, I also found myself landed in such a coaching institute.

It was run by some “very experienced, Civil Service aspirers”. It means, and most of faculty also sits in same exam they were coaching for. And it was indeed a successful coaching center. Many of my seniors, junior and fellow student cracked various examinations. Some time even a faculty managed to cracked some and left institute, leaving us in dilemma whether to be happy with his happiness or feel sorrow for loss of a good faculty.

One good practice was that successful candidates were called upon to give a lecture, and inspire us with their success. When some would-be IAS, Deputy Collector, DSP, Sub inspector, Teashildar, Sells tax officer, Excise officer came. Atmosphere was electrifying during speech. All students come in assembly, and fix mesmerized eyes to successful man. I remember when one very respected senior came with all Police Inspector outfit embossing-“DESHBHAKTI- JANSEVA”. We Listened their voices, telling about successful methods, tales of hard work, long study hours. They all, dedicated success to teachers, friends and family. We all wanted to become like the person before us.

Fourteen years later, Arwind kejriwal hit headlines for his anticorruption movement with Anna Hazare. Mr kejriwal, would someday have celebrated his selection in Indian Revenue Services. This service gives opportunity to sit on very high positions. More comfortable then IAS, which has to take pains of law and order, development, people, politicians, and had to perform a fairly large variety of functions.

An IRS has power to twist anybody’s arm anytime he wants, and had to deal with people, only willing to compromise at ANY COST. Such a nice job, and he Quit. Why...? Instead, he chose a bumpy path to fight for RTI, Lokpal and people’s cause.

On other side, I heard disturbing stories of successful friends from coaching. One Deputy Collector got suspended more than once for wrong reasons, still unmarried, stories of his extracurricular activities are also in air. That "Deshbhakti-Janseva" Sub inspector suspended for taking bribe. One suspended for killing innocents in fake encounter for claiming promotion. One more lady who rose to become judge, was sacked for rampant corruption. One sell tax officer, had accepted bribe many times from my colleagues. even a lady tehsildar, trapped for taking bribe and now sitting ideally at home. When I read this in newspapers, tried to remember faces of these people, in old times. Then I wanted to be one like them. Today, I doubt if can I can say same thing...

My friends made their choices, and Mr kejriwal made his. Because it’s all about choices we make.

PS: Readers may have been thinking that I didn’t achieved anything in that coaching. Well, it’s not entirely true. I chose, chase and proposed my wife in that coaching. So, now happily married with two kids. Again, it’s all about choices we make!!!!

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By Manish Singh- ritumanishsingh@gmail.com

Indian's Alteregos

2011-08-30T08:11:00.000-07:00

A Common indian has many faces. and mostly it behaves according to situation or environment. I can quote one example, take Metro Rail in Delhi. If you have travelled in it, you might have seen its system and operation. All stations are neat and clean and all coaches are will maintained. The people travelling in these trains are the same who travel in Indian Railways. Have you ever tried to analyse why and how it happens.

It is clear there is nothing wrong with the people. It is the system which force them to live accordingly. There are many such instances. In the recent movement, even the administration has appreciated that in their career they have never seen such rally/mob to keep the premises so clean. So our people are OK. It is the system which make them good or bad. Once while I was travelling in train from Baroda to Delhi, some youth sitting were discussing, now we have lost our patience, its impossible to do anything for development in our colony. One old gentlemen (sleeping on the upper birth) came down and said, “Are you aware about Sher Shah Suri? During his time there was no lock. People never used to lock their house. Because, everyone know if caught, their hands will be cut off. Yes, you may not be able to change the system now, but don’t ever think that this system will continue for ever. May be after 50 or 100 years but it will change. Those who lived their life during that time never had ever thought that people in our generation shall have to live this life when nothing is safe.

Therefore, we should be optimistic and do our duty to bring about confidence in the people and advise them to work for the cause honestly, sincerely and dedicatedly. There is nothing permanent and impossible

Don’t Throw Stones

2011-08-27T23:27:00.000-07:00

Mistrust is being created over Anna’s Draft by saying it keeps NGOs out of purview of lokpal. It needs to be clear that it surely covers all bodies and officials who use public exchequers’ fund (say taxpayer’s money or Govt. Fund) come under Janlokpal THAT INCLUDES NGOS TOO.

It could otherwise be taken as that “FOREIGN FUNDED NGOS SHALL NOT COME UNDER LOKPAL, THIS IS WHAT ANNA’S TEAM WANT BECAUSE THEY ALL HAVE NGOS AND PERHAPS FOREIGN FUNDED.”

Things need to clarify. Many NGOs get funds for foreign agencies. Before that, they get nod from central government and registered under FCRA. All these funds are monitored under FCRA act, need to be audited annually and submitted to GOI home affairs ministry. Such accounted funds are annually (even monthly as in CG) checked by LIB, Special branch etc. again by Registrar, Income tax Deptt. In addition funder’s own country’s ombudsman checks in their way. So there are already multiple systems in place. However, to kill anna’s integrity, fuss is being created that he doesn’t want NGOs under purview of lokpal.

First understand the meaning of NGO. Nowhere in our constitution or litigations, term NGO is ever mentioned. It is a broad term in use by UN after WWII, for organizations those are not controlled by government (subtext – working for welfare, harmony, rights etc). But one can (read Govt. if it want to..) take all people’s association - registered under societies, trusts, cooperatives and companies act, are NGOs. So from Reliance to IPTA, Amul to Tirupati Devsthanam Board, and FICCI to Shiskakarmi sangh all are NGOs. These do not take fund from government hence they are out of purviews of Janlokpal. If you want to bring otherwise funded NGOs (read foreign funded), every private body will come.

But In our folklore, NGOs are those who get “Theka” from government. They should come under lokpal and Annas draft has brought them under Locpal. Aruna Roy’s bill includes foreign funded NGOs, and annas team has not contradicted it so far. As NGO, We also do not have objections. If there is nothing to hide, let come 5^th, 6^th,…100^th agency to check, recheck and re-rechecks.

Remembering Subhash

2011-08-24T03:27:00.000-07:00

Our Friend and Supporter Mr Subhash Agrawal (Subhash Printing Press ) Passed Away Yesterday. He was only 45. We Express Our Condolence to his family With heavy Heart. We shall always remember him as loyal friend and faithful supporter of JanMitram. May god give him place in haven.

Remembering subhash.
Subhashji was in good terms with my father, later became a friend of mine despite a long age gap. Short, Bald head figure with a mischievous smile, always came to our office unannounced, Wasted my Time laughing on his own jokes.He owned a printing pres and our NGO mostly have something to print. Receipts, Voucher, Registers, Pamphlets and flex,his magic nose always sniff something to print. "Give it to me, I'll print, forget payments. give whenever you have".In NGOs, where funding are always uncertain, What more i have asked for.

He took work,and forget it as i was supposed to do for payments. As the event day approaches, we shall remind him and he will say- "just tomorrow", and tomorrow never came. Then i'll put a person specifically to ring him (one person is actually designated for this) 15 times a day. the printed materiel will then delivered JUST in time. he was punctual on that.

A Very Resourceful man, fun to be with ( if not in office), Young with heart regardless of his graying hairs and bald head, Subhashji is not forgettable for JanMitram Guys. I guess he must be sitting with my farther some where in heaven, May be laughing on his own jokes and telling inside stories of all his friends and foes.

A Mischievous man with hearth of gold, Subhsh Bhai- I'll Keep your memories in deep of my heart. ALWAYS.........

Manish Singh
Secretray , JanMitram

Robot Prime minister

2011-08-19T22:52:00.000-07:00

आज सांसद में प्रधान मंत्री का बयान टेलीविज़न के जरिये देखा और सुना बड़ी निराशा हुयी .पहली बार मैंने किसी आदमी को रोबोट कि तरह बात करते देखा वो हैं हमारे प्रधान मंत्री,भावहीन चेहरा जैसे उन्हें जो बोलना था वही बोलेंगे यहाँ तक कि अपने विरोधिओं (जो शोर मचा रहे थे उसे जबाव तक नहीं दे पा रहे थे न तो उनकी तरफ देख रहे थे)और दूसरी बात जो कई सांसदों ने ये कहा कि सांसद सर्वोच्च है.उन्हें लोकतंत्र कि परिभाषा नहीं मालूम है कि लोकतंत्र में लोग यानी जनता सर्वोच्च होती है .सब पढ़े लिखे लोग (लालू को छोड़ कर)कैसी अनपढ़ जैसी बात कह रहे थे.जनता ने सांसदों को चुना है अपने हित कि बात करने अपने सिने पर मुंग दलने नहीं.कपिल सिब्बल बार-बार ये कह रहे थे कि कुछ लोग सांसद कि सत्ता को चुनौती दे रहे हैं मैन कहता हूँ सांसद कि सत्ता का क्या अर्थ है ये जनतंत्र है यहाँ जनता कि सत्ता है .फिर इतने सारे लोग कुछ लोग नहीं हैं.शायद ये बताना जरुरी नहीं कि कैसे जनता ने जब-जब आँखें खोली है कई लोगों को सड़क पर ला खड़ा किया है.

From : http://vinayprahari.blogspot.com/2011/08/robot-prime-minister.html?spref=fb

Coserving Nature and livelihood- Story From Charmar

2011-07-19T01:40:00.001-07:00

Charmar a tribal village situated 15 KM far from Gharghoda Block headquarters; reflects its beauty within its name Charmar, which derives from a jumbled word “Char” i.e. a tree having tiny fruit like berry & “Mar” means having a lot of. The village is surrounded by forest & non forest trees. Cent percent of the villagers are belong to tribal community and dependent upon agriculture, daily wages & forest based products for livelihood. Women of the village are daily wage laborers.

A Self Help Group namely Indira SHG was constituted under SHPI-II programme by one Hasit Gupta, activist of Janmitram Kalyan Samiti. The SHG is headed by President Nammukhi, Secretary Damayanti and included by active members like Champa, Malika, Udiya.

After came into being, Indira SHG was looking for a suitable business to run. In the mean time they came to know about Lac cultivation and its benefits from neighboring SHGs of village. Later on the SHG obtained all information related to Lac and availed required equipments & raw material like Lac breeding seeds (pest), insecticides from RISA (Raigarh Integrated Shelach Association). Accordingly the process of Lac cultivation was started. And in only 2 years the SHG earned around 60-70 thousand rupees by selling LAC. As a team effort, profit goes to the account of SHG. In return the members are taking individual loan and initiating their own business.
Now Indira SHG is in close coordination of RISA for processing raw Lac to Chauri and then sell it in market. In this connection RISA is purchasing raw Lac from them directly.

Among other members of Indira SHG Champa, Nammukhi are doing vegetable business, Malika sells Murra (By Product of rice), Udiya has a cycle repairing shop. Other members are associated with cultivation.

In pleasure Damayanti differentiates days before and after formation of SHG with the benefits they are getting in terms of loan whereas they were lending money with high interest from landlords. Women who were shying before to go outside now used to visit Banks, Govt. /Non Govt. offices for several purposes. This unity has brought a lot of strength in them to step outside and get aware of many schemes. You can often see them posing for women’s right. The members are promoting their own business too that stabilized their financial strength individually. Apart from above they talk of social reformation in village and trying to eliminate superstition, blind believes etc with the help of Mitanin. They are more cautious about health & education that reflects from their looks.

By adopting new technologies, their production level has been increased compared to traditional method which was reducing the life span of hosting tree, either resulting less profit or even zero. This condition led the farmer to stop the business. But it’s a different scenario now, after taking training on scientific method, the villagers are applying new techniques like rowing & removing Lac stick (insect) from the hosting tree, spraying insecticides, pruning & harvesting in proper & timely manner. This is giving them good profit.

Its for Pinkey

2011-07-19T00:01:00.000-07:00

Ahalya, a pious woman gets up before sun rise and performs her daily routines supplemented by worshiping god & goddesses. She is very honest to her work that keeps her energetic and enthusiastic to do more. This nature led her to take training on Lac Handicraft while in leisure.

Uttarabali a friend of Ahalaya let her know about Lac Handicraft Training to be undertaken in her village Chhotegumda. She collected all information in relation to join the training Programme. Then she enrolled her name and took training. Ahalya completed the course and topped among all trainees for her honesty and sincerity during training.

4 to 5 thousand rupees income in a month surprises the family members of Ahalya. Now they encouraged Ahalya for it. Ahalya is so happy to carry out this small industry and growing day by day. Her daughter Pinki is a school going girl and Ahalya possesses a lot dream for her.

New horizons for Dushila

2011-07-18T23:57:00.000-07:00

It was not less than a dream for Dushila’s to out step home and visit Rajasthan which is 1600km far from her small village Badegumda. Dushila availed this opportunity under Lac Handicraft Programme.

Dushila is a wise woman although she is less educated. Dropped school in early childhood days Dushila got marry to a marginal farmer Mr Lekhram Gupta of Badegumda village. Lekkharam’s 8 acres land has been lying uncultivated and sub-judies under court since many years. This suffering was causing woe and agony in the conjugal life of Dushila. By cultivating borrowing land the couple managed to live.
Dushila never sits idle and always tried to earn something. This willingness led her trained in Lac Handicraft products. She got expertise in making exclusive lac items like Dulhan, Rani Sets since she taken training on LAC Handicraft held at village Chhotegumda. In this regard, all Tools & Raw Materials is provided by the Training Organizer (RISA) an unit of Janmitram Kalyan Samiti, Raigarh.

At present Dushila is earning upto 3 to 4 thousand rupees per month by sitting at home. She has either option to sell these products directly in the Market or to RISA (Raigarh Integrated Shellac Association). As a result, now she is contributing less and more in financial requirements. Recently she has bought a golden ring amounting Rs.7000/- for her daughter’s and wishes more for her marriage.

Small Hands, Big Dreams

2011-07-18T23:47:00.000-07:00

Kumari Mahima & Chandrama are sisters, living in a family of 10 members, with their parents, grandparents and other siblings. The earning from 1 ½ acres of land is hand to mouth for the family. This situation led both sisters dropped school. Where basic needs were outreached, desires & wishes had no room. Living an underestimated life both sisters were concealing their desires like Dresses, Cosmetics, Jewelry etc.

In the mean time, friends of Mahima & Chandrama intimated them about Lac Handicraft Training in their own village Chhotegumda. In curiosity they expressed their eagerness for taking training. Henceforth both sisters enrolled their name and completed the course with much pump & gaiety.

Products like Paper weights, Mobile Pen Stand, Plates, decorative items & other stationary goods proved them exceptional among other trainees. Except making traditional products like Bengals they brought new dimension in Lac products. Introduced new range of variety by putting their own intellectual. Good finishing in the products made them unique and popular.

Nowadays they give 5 to 6 hours for making Lac items being at home and earned up to Rs.4000/- to Rs.5000/- per month. Contributing less and more in family expenses. Apart from giving time to it they extend hands in domestic works. No more financial constraint is there to fullfill their desires now. They often go to different occasions, Melas(festivals), Markets and visit cloth shops, cosmetic shops to buy dresses, jewelry, cosmetics like fairness creams, talcum powders, hair bands, clips and many more.

Success stories from Lac handicraft

2011-07-15T05:35:00.000-07:00

In India, West Bengal and Rajasthan is hub of lac handicrafts. Thousands of craftsman works in remote villages, most of them are traditionally linked with business. Many artisans have learnt these skills from their parents and forefathers.
In Chhattisgarh very few people are associated with this business; most of them having ancestral roots form West Bengal. They chiefly prepare ladies ornaments and sell it to local shops and wholesalers. Though the profit eared is not enormous, but is adequate for sustenance. Lack of fashion consciousness, new designs, packaging and business promotion skills are bottleneck that curb the opportunities of business and development of these people.
JanMitram is engaged in livelihood enhancement of these artisans. In year 2010, it conducted a skill development programme on lac handicrafts. The three month long training Started in September 2010 and completed on November. Thirty women of Village chotte Gumda and Bade Gumda participated in this programme.
This training successfully ignited new ideas, concepts and introduced new designs and products. Organization assisted successful trainees with marketing and financial linkages. Periodical visit of master trainer in village was ensured to constantly improve the quality and quantity of production.
Organization has also tried for convergence of some other scheme for benefit of artisans. All these trainees were provided with free tool kit from DRDA Raigarh. Many of the women went on exposure visit to Jaipur to survey market possibilities, under BRGF scheme.
For ensuring market linkage, organization has put people who provide raw material at doorstep. Also, orders are conveyed and products are collected on regular basis. Organization has empanelled many shopkeepers and traders all across CG and some form Rajasthan that ensure regular demand of lac articles.
The programme has successfully strengthened livelihood options, as this trade can be done round the year. Also women can earn while using leisure time, witout hampering her household or other works . Some successful cases are given hereunder.

1. SMT. KUSUM KURRE

Kusum Kurre was a common household woman, married to an alcoholic person. She is mother of five children. Despite this huge responsibility, Physical & Mental torture of her husband put her family in a lot of woe and agony. Few year back, she finally decided to take divorce. The Court judgment went in her favour and marrigr broke. she leter came back to her Parent’s village Chhotegumda along with her children. But there was no breadwinners in the family . her father was ailing and she never wanted to be dependent on her parents .

In speculations to overcome the pitiful life, a close neighbour of her namely Vimla Gupta who was already undergone training on Lac Handicraft, told details about it. Though it’s a new concept for Kusum but she decided to undergo training after heard the story of Vimla. Her parents looked after her children while she was going for training and this timely help managed her to complete the training programme.

After completion of training Kusum got all necessary tools and raw materials and started making artifacts. She makes Bengal, Buckle, jewelry items. A dimension was supplemented her trade when she underwent an intervention programme to Rajasthan to promote Lac business, orgnised by janmitram. Her expertise and skill in Lac Handicraft is recognized and commended at state festival of Chhatishgarh, as well as by NABARD, Raipur, where she was set up a stall for 9 days. She usually ern 3000-4000 Rs a month.

Now Kusum is not only known as a successful Lac Craftswomen but also an Anganwadi worker in her village. Both are going hand in hand effectively. Glimpses of success reflect from the face of Kusum, who is leading a happy life with her children.

2. VIMLA GUPTA
Vimla Belongs to a small village Chhote gumda . She committed a mistake in young age that hunted many of her coming years. She gave birth to an adulterine child, The man she had relationship later refused to marry thus, she faced social exclusion. People misbehaved her, and she lived in misery. Uttra-Bali Gupta, A Local worker of JanMitram asked her to join training of Lac Handicraft which was soon to be started. She enrolled and attended training. The training was organized at the Anganwadi Centre of village Bade-Gumda, where she got trained under the guidance of skilled trainer.

She was a fast learner. In this training month, she learnt making Bengal, Jewelry etc. after training she started a small production unit in her. She was then linked with RISA (Raigarh integrated shellac association) which is a section 25 company, formed under guidance of janmitram and working for benefit of NTFP collectors and lac growers in the district. RISA not only makes availability of the required raw material but also purchase these items from the makers and sell it in many places. She earns 2500-3000 Per month and earning are increasing steadily which her flourishing skill.

Now Vimla is not only known as a potential Lac craftsman but also live with dignity and pride in her village. This income has made her able to send her son to a good school . with newfound courage she is willing to fight against the injustice happen to her. She has appealed before the court of law to prove her innocence.

3. SMT. LALITA DANSENA

Resident of village Badegumda Smt Lalita Dansena has strong determination to stand independently and make her family financially well, induced Lalita for taking training on Lac Handicraft.

Due to lack of employability in village and traditional constraints in family, Lalita was unable to engage herself in available works like wage laborer etc. The growing children and fewer income of family supplementing her worry for which day to day life became more difficult to live in. when heard of handicraft training, she discussed it with her sister-in-law, who motivated her. With the consent of their family both of them decided to undergo training.

The Training helped her to generate income and enabled her to contribute in family expenses. She Make lac handicrafts at home sell them either to RISA or directly in market. Recently Lalita assisted her family with 15 thousand rupees, for getting agriculture inputs for farming.

Nowadays Lalita is Happy with this small business and stand tall with a determination to bring prosperity in her family. She thanks all those people who assisted her including her sister-in-law who encouraged to take-up this business.

4. SMT. PARAMESWARI DANSENA

Parmeswari is a born-artist, skilled in many household trades like sewing; embroidery & stitching etc have had an interest in learning new things. She was eager to have hands on training when she came to know that Training on Lac Handicraft.

She got involved whole heartedly in training and quickly specialized in bangles and jewelries. Having 6 members in family, she has a quite busy day-schedule; however she wakes up at 5 am each morning to make the quota of handicrafts of that day. She now earn 1500-2000 PM and contributes to her family’s income.

She never feels tired of telling her story, anybody who cares to listen. This work not only led her to prosperous life but also provided strength to have a say in family decisions. Recently she acquired new TV and DVD for her family out of this small business. “This is my first purchases of my own money” – She grins.

PURNAMASI GUPTA

In the ripe age of 58, Purnamasi Gupta has witnessed many ups and downs of life. Living in a small thatched house at Badegumda, Pusnmasi tells her story. Coming from a landlord family, she had 5 siblings. One was the time that he had over 100 acres of land and a prosperous farmer. Her father lost all ancestral property in gambling that compelling them migrates at Raigarh. There, they started making Papad, stitching clothes for livelihood.

Few years back, His father deceased, living a small that house at bade gumda as last refuge to purnmasi. She comes back to Badegumda after 24 year. Never married in her life, Purnmasi is a courageous woman. She stands still and never loses her heart although being in misery. In the mean time one brother died and another left home and missing now. Being the eldest among all, Purnamasi has to upkeep all his siblings and their children. Her nephew is apple of her eye and she wants him to have good education and bring back good days again.

Oldest among other trainees, Purnamasi Gupta made herself the cause of inspiration for showing enthusiasm and honesty at training class. Furthermore she pursued many families to allow their women to take training on Lac Handicraft. Then and there she never looks back. She visited many places to attend Lac related programme and sale camps. She was the one who interacted with Smt. Golma Devi, Hon’ble Minister of Art & Craft, Rajasthan. Now she makes around 3 to 4 sets of Bengal in a day and earns upto Five to six thousand in a month.

Memorizing the painful past, Purnamasi gets emotional by expressing her pleasure for being a Lac beneficiary. Lac Handicraft business gave her a meaning in life to stand again. She could have been lessen her difficulties if she got the Lac Handicraft Training much before, she says.

KUMARI RUKMINI MANPAHRE

Kumari Rukmini Manpahre, an only child of her parents, lives in village Chhotegumda. Poor financial condition of the family made her experiencing in engaging herself in daily wage labour at Brick Factory. Lessons were learnt from past experience and she decided to develop her own business instead of doing daily wage at others. The journey of becoming a Lac Handicraftswoman from a daily wage labour at Brick Factory influenced Rukmini’s life.

Rukmini’s father is one among other 7 children of her grandfather who left only 4 acres of land behind. After equal distribution nobody has chance to live life of a farmers. Rukmini’s famely had no option other than daily wage at Brick Bhattha along with her parents. Workplace offerd an abusive surrounding,

In the meantime, Janmitram was about to organise training programme on Lac Handicraft . Rukmini’s friend Uttarabali informed her regarding the benefits of taking training on this trade. Thereafter a participatory meeting of potential trainees was conducted at the Anganwadi centre, where Rukmini get aware about the concept of Lac Training and decided to undergo training. She expresses interest to her parents who seems to be reluctant first but Rukmini’s wish prevailed. She joined training programme and completed the course. Soon after, she started making decorative plates, bengals, mobile stand, jewelry and stationary goods.

Recently she made a profit of ten thousand rupees from State exhibition festival, Raigharh, where she put a stall on Lac products. The products of Rukmini were commended by the District Collector at the Festival.

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INFECTIOUS IMPATIENCE

2010-04-12T09:22:00.000-07:00

Reliance storm story: From Business News India

Nobody has ever built an industrial empire from textbook principles alone. Often, it is very basic guiders behind great corporate success stories. Infectious impatience is one such Mukesh Ambani's mantra, which also explains the rapid rise of Reliance.

Make money without investing INFECTIOUS IMPATIENCE. These are the two magical Reliance words that have seen it grow from a single Dhirubhai Ambani-created industrial entity into multiple megacorps, now spearheaded by split brothers Mukesh Ambani and Anil Ambani. When a company scales up to this amazing level in only few decades, it leaves you scratching for an answer: How did they make it big, this big? After all, what they did could have been done by many of their corporate rivals. The people they got, the machinery they bought, the strategy they adopted were all within the reach of many of their smaller and bigger competitors when they were at the modest level of entrepreneurial operations. What did they do differently that took them to where they are today?

For an answer, there had to be something that set them apart and it couldn’t have been anything big known in terms of strategy and approach. Most such successful companies have — we have all known — deep down one or two very basic guiding principles of operation. And, that takes them to the heights that they reach, powered by the distilled success mantra.

The stupefying attainments of Ambanis’ ventures have always intrigued industry watchers and reams have been written on what made them tick. But most seem to have missed the point that it wasn’t any big business formula, but, at times, only innocuous-sounding two-word guiders that propelled them.

Recently, after Mukesh Ambani piped Aziz Premji as the richest Indian, I was going through some archives and, while doing so, hit upon a speech that Mukesh Ambani delivered at the Stanford University. In that speech, he spoke of “infectious impatience” and how it has helped the company get the work done in half the time it would take most others to achieve.

Here was a clue to the great Reliance story. In Mukesh Ambani’s catch-phrase — “infectious impatience” — is hidden the whole company’s approach to conduct of business — how it defies the stereotype standard practices to create its own out-of-the-textbook space; how it is open to creating unspecified, own rules of the game for quickly attaining what they want to.

Impatience is an outcome of restlessness. Restlessness is the outcome of an incubated idea. Once the idea virus gets in, it leads to restlessness and action. The ideated person may even yell, shout and scream over others to actualize the conceived idea. The shouted upon person will pass it on to the others in the chain. The impatience of one person gets enlarged and, next, the entire associated work force gets reverberating and the work gets rolling faster than it would have otherwise.

While most companies — which compulsively value order, punctuality and discipline — would be loathe to tolerate such restlessness and impatience, the Ambanis saw the productive side of the seemingly negative fallouts of employee restlessness and encouraged people to get on their toes for the job. They always have this knack of breaking the mould and creating an environment for achievement, which doesn’t always follow the standard and accepted rules. That’s what has made Ambanis, Ambanis.

They see the connect between disruption and creativity and developed a system to mange it for huge gains.

Ambanis: United in ties, divided in business

Why Mr. Ratan Tata is poor then Warren Buffet..?

2010-04-11T07:20:00.000-07:00

Why Ratan Tata isn't World's Richest Man

TATA Group is running 96 businesses and out of which 28 Companies are publically listed on the various stock exchanges. Tata Group is world’s top 50 Group according to Market capitalization and Reputation.

Have you ever thought why Ratan tata’s name is not in the list of billionaire’s club? why Ratan Tata is not a billionaire on the Forbes magazine list of billionaire people of the world?

The reason is that, TATA Group’s 96 companies are held by its main Company “TATA Sons” and the main owner of this TATA Sons is not Ratan Tata but various charitable organizations developed and run by TATA Group.

Out of which JRD TATA Trust & Sir Ratan Tata Trust are the main. 65% ownership of TATA Sons which is the key holding company of the other 96 TATA Group Company is held by various charitable organizations.

So this 65% ownership ownership of Tatasons Limited is not reflected on Ratan Tata’s personal Financial Statement but on the various charitable organizations. and this is the reason why Ratan Tata is not in the list of Billionaire club.

if we put this 65% ownership of Tata Sons in Ratan TATA’s own personal financial statement then Ratan Tata’s Net worth can become more than $70 billion. and that’s much more than the Warren Buffet’s Current Net Worth of $ 62 billion, the world’s richest person according to Forbes magazine 2008.

However, it doesn’t mean that Ratan Tata is poor. In one interviews he had told the reporter that, “I have my own Capital”. He is the chairman of Tata Group so obviously he earns lots of money every year as a bonus, remuneration and salary. However, Ratan Tata’s Net worth is not $ 1 Billion.

He is not a billionaire on paper. but in reality he is the richest person of the world. His net worth in reality is more than Bill Gates and Warren Buffet. SO the good thing about Tata Group is that, They do Charity out of their Money…

And that is the reason TATA Group has generated so much of Goodwill over last 5 generations.

Entrepreneurs that changed the face of India

2010-04-02T22:09:00.000-07:00

Indian entrepreneurs are making waves all across the world. Indian business firms are making acquisitions abroad and spreading their tentacles in various corners of the world. Indian Entrepreneurs have proved all doomsday prophecies wrong and on the contrary have flourished under globalisation. Here is a brief profile of famous Indian entrepreneurs. The list is long and never-ending. Here are 10 of them (in alphabetical order) whose endeavours have inspired the entire nation:

1. The Great Indian entrepreneurial Spirit:
Entrepreneurship is a critical element of a growth economy, and India is poised to unlock a entrepreneurial boom through the next 10 years. The beginnings are already in place, steps have been taken in the right direction. The License Raj worked very hard for very long to kill the entrepreneurial spirit in India, but historically Indians certainly have been very enterprising. This entrepreneurial streak runs in almost every Indian. The result is before our eyes. We salute this Great Indian entrepreneurial Spirit!

2. Azim Premji:
Chairman of Wipro Technologies; Richest Indian for the past several years; Honored with Padma Bhushan in 2005. Azim Premji is Chairman of Wipro Technologies, one of the largest software companies in India. He is an icon among Indian businessmen and his success story is a source of inspiration to a number of budding entrepreneurs.

3. Dhirubhai Ambani:
Dhiru Bhai Ambani built India's largest private sector company. Created an equity cult in the Indian capital market. Reliance is the first Indian company to feature in Forbes 500 list. Dhirubhai Ambani was the most enterprising Indian entrepreneur. His life journey is reminiscent of the rags to riches story. He is remembered as the one who rewrote Indian corporate history and built a truly global corporate group.

4. JRD Tata:
He had the honor of being India's first pilot; was Chairman of Tata & Sons for 50 years; launched Air India International as India's first international airline; received Bharat Ratna in 1992. JRD Tata was one of the most enterprising Indian entrepreneurs. He was a pioneer aviator and built one of the largest industrial houses of India.

5. M.S. Oberoi:
Founder of the Oberoi Group of Hotels; Honored with Padma Bhushan in 2001, M.S. Oberoi can be aptly termed as the father of the Indian hotel industry. Rai Bahadur Mohan Singh Oberoi was among the first to recognize the potential of the tourism industry, its ability to contribute to India's economic growth and generate direct and indirect employment. He worked tirelessly to put Indian hotel industry on global tourism map.

6. Dr. Monkombu S. Swaminathan:
He is an outstanding world statesman and visionary in the agricultural and natural resources arena. Trained as a plant breeder and cytogeneticist in India, the United Kingdom, and the United States, he is acclaimed as the "Father of the Green Revolution in Asia." In India they say, "Gandhi gave us freedom, Swaminathan gave us food." He is the recipient of all three of India's civilian honors: high, higher, and highest. Dr. Swaminathan's achievements have led to dramatic increases in crop yields.

7. Narayana Murthy:
One of the founders of Infosys Technologies Limited; Chosen as the World Entrepreneur of the Year - 2003 by Ernst and Young, Narayana Murthy is the Non-Executive Chairman and Chief Mentor of Infosys Technologies Limited. He is a living legend and an epitome of the fact that honesty, transparency, and moral integrity are not at variance with business acumen. He set new standards in corporate governance and morality when he stepped down as the Executive Chairman of Infosys at the age of 60.

8. Rahul Bajaj:
Rahul Bajaj is the Chairman of the Bajaj Group, which ranks among the top 10 business houses in India. The Bajaj Group has diversified interests ranging from automobiles, home appliances, lighting, iron and steel, insurance, travel and finance. Rahul Bajaj is one of India's most distinguished business leaders and internationally respected for his business acumen and entrepreneurial spirit.

9. Sunil Mittal:
Chairman and Managing Director of Bharti Group, India's largest GSM-based mobile phone service provider; IT Man of the Year Award 2002 from Dataquest and CEO Of the Year, 2002 Award from World HRD Congress. Sunil Mittal can be called as originator of cellular phone revolution in India. He is the founder, Chairman and Managing Director of Bharti Group and runs India's largest GSM-based mobile phone service.

10. Verghese Kurien:
Known as the "father of the white revolution" in India; Winner of Ramon Magsaysay Award; Awarded with Padma Shri (1965), Padma Bhushan (1966), and Padma Vibhushan (1999). Dr. Verghese Kurien is better known as the "father of the white revolution" in India. He is also called as the Milkman of India. Dr. Varghese Kurien was the architect behind the success of the largest dairy development program in the world, christened as Operation Flood. He was the chairman of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. (GCMMF) and his name was synonymous with the Amul brand.

Why Jan Mitram Exists

2010-01-04T09:32:00.000-08:00

Dont Ask what your country have done for you.. ask WHAT I HAVE DONE FOR MY COUNTRY.

The first decade of 21st century, Indian intellect has got un-precedent recognition, all over the world.However, This glittering face embodies a grim picture. Poverty is the biggest challenge. We have 260 million Indians living below poverty line and 80-million lake roof above their head. There can be an endless debate to find who are responsible; government, bureaucracy, individuals, leaders or the system. But, introspection is needed before rising finger in any direction. The big question is “ what I have done for my country and for fellow citizen.” We did this introspection four years ago, and Janmitram came into existence. The organization is striving to enhance people’s life, in a small part of nation.