Wisdom of Life

Testimonial

Mrs Shefali Das share her sad moments during Flood, I was at home when the floods came. It was 3 o’clock in the morning on the Sunday of the flood when I woke up. By the time I was out of the house, the water was up to my chest. I waded, trying very hard to find the road. When I get armies with Boat I got courage and finally reached to highland. That’s how I got here. My whole family ran away but we left everything behind. Then, when I first got here, I stayed in the ‘club house’ here in Jathera. But so many people came there after me that I moved to Camp 2. But we don’t have enough shelter here from the rain, and even food sometimes we can’t find.

She Thanks Caritas India for giving support by giving Hygiene Kits which is very much helpful for them.

Shefali DasJathera

Rinku Kumari d/o ArunSaday and Pavitri Devi and Leela Kumari d/o Shiv Saday and Savitri Devi are from RantiMusahartola in Madhubani district of Bihar.They are the first ones to have cleared matriculation in their tola and are studying in Grade XI. When asked about their hardworking daughters, parents of both girls couldn’t conceal the pride and happiness they felt and exclaimed that their daughters were continuing their studies further. The girls too expressedtheir jubilation and determination to not think of marriage until they completed their education. The girls have taken up the initiative of teaching the younger children of their tola and encourage them to go to school with them. Their dedication towards highlighting the importance of education paid off when they realized that a hundredMusahar children from their tolawere enrolled in local Government schools as a result of their efforts. Both Rinku and Leelahave become the role models in their tola.

Rinku Kumari

Community Managed Disaster Risk Reduction a program supported by Caritas India in North East India and implemented by Women’s Development Centre (WDC), Guwahati, in 15 villages under Morigaon district has a lots of story to tell. Of these clubbing strength of the farmers is one among the stories. With the help of WDC the villages have constituted what they call a farmers’ club in an effort to move a step to keep the program moving on with the support from NABARD and government schemes even after the project is closed.

Farmers’ club is a registered body under NABARD where about 10 farmers of a village come together and undertake trainings, activities and planning to augment their farming methods and status after consensus. They can access government schemes and benefits with the aid of this farmers’ club. In the CMDRR project, WDC had initiated formation of such farmers’ clubs to so they can bridge the gap between the Government and the farmers and the latter can access opportunities, more so in the event of a disaster like floods. They conduct trainings, awareness etc. in their villages by informing WDC that acts as a node between the village and the concerned experts/trainers.

The members of the farmers’ club discuss with other people in the village regarding their needs and problems. A total of 13 farmers’ clubs have been registered under NABARD in Morigaon in 15 project villages. These farmers’ club acts as a bridge between the village people and the government and also functions as a Task Force Group in the event of floods.

Jawaharilal Hazarika, president of Nabakharbori Krishak Sangha farmers’ club happily narrated the benefits that the farmers’ club could bring in to the villages after its formation. “We receive heavy floods every year and suffer huge loss of agricultural produce. With the help of the club we have brought free seeds for the village, and procured pump sets on a heavy discount. This is a great help for us as now we have the power to reach the government and access opportunities”, he commented.

Apart from trainings, the farmers’ club performs another significant function- preparing the Plan of Action (POA). Morigaon has 632 villages and 85 panchayats. In this context, a farmer’s club becomes a decentralized structure of taking the concerns of the villages to the Gram Panchayat. While a Gram Panchayat conducts 4 (effectively 1 or 2) meetings every year, a farmers’ club meets regularly once or twice a month and as and when required and discusses their issues together with the rest of the village. Women are an integral part of the process. As put by Kanchanmoni Gohain, District Development Officer, NABARD, “Co-ordination is more important than assistance in the farmers’ club that can result in linkage with many agencies”.

Clubbing strength of the farmers

Bipul Das an Unmarried man from Hojai, Assam, lives in a Small village named Siliguri. Bipul is a physically Challenged person, both the legs are paralyzed since birth. He lives with 9 members in his Family. But the flood affected the entire groups of Villages including Siliguri and unfortunately he and his family had to take rescue at nearby relief Camps.

As soon as the flood reduced, the caritas India team started a relief operation at nearby villages including Siliguri. The family of Bipul Das was provided with all the kits namely: Hygiene kits, Food kits and Shelter kits.

He thanks Caritas India for supporting and Helping with the quality and quantity relief assistance.

Bipul DasSiliguri

Ranu Pandit is a widow leaving in Radhanagar. Ranu Pandit lost her husband 6 years ago due to a deadly sickness. Since then she is been working hard daily as labour and maintain her family. Ranu Pandit has two young daughter, both of them are studying. During this flood her house was severely damaged since it was a kaccha house. She and her daughter had to take refuge at nearby relief camp. But the relief provided by caritas India helps them to overcome the situation after the flood. They received all the items – Hygiene, food and Shelter Kits. They are very much thankful for the team as well as caritas India for helping them in this situation.

Ranu PanditRadhanagar

It was yet another scorching day in one of the villages of South Tripura, Kathalia Cheera. Down with high fever, Anojoy Chakma, a 7-year-old boy was brought to the community health volunteer (CHV) Ms. Shyamalaxmi Chakma by his elder sister, as their parents were out in the jhum since early morning.

Shyamalaxmi conducted Rapid Diagnostic Test (RDT) on the ailing boy only to confirm Pv positive malaria. As Pv drugs were not available with the CHV at that point of time, she thought to refer the patient to the Primary Health Centre (PHC).

However, another thought crossed the mind of the dedicated and compassionate volunteer to take an extra stride. She thought, “If I refer the boy to PHC, the treatment would be delayed because the parents are out in the field and would be home by late evening; thereby PHC would be reached the next day only”. She took the boy to the PHC herself along with the RDT kit and thus ensured timely treatment and saved his life.

After a week, Anojoy is back home cured, and is happy and playful as any normal boy of his age!
Under Integrated Malaria Control Project-II, Caritas India is scaling up effective preventive and curative interventions in the seven North Eastern (NE) states in India and covering 48 districts and 5663 villages to save lives from Malaria.

PROACTIVENESS OF CHV SAVED THE LIFE

Mrs. Sabitri Chawra,express that she lived in Natun Basti, Thepelaguri, they suffered a lot during the flood that submerged the entire Village. This village is near to Kapili river, which is just about 800m away, from the village. This family had received flood response relief from Caritas Germany on 12th June 2022 at Thepelaguri. This helped them a lot to tackle with the problems arising during and after the flood. The outcome of the flood relief was very good as well as pleasing, because they could equip themselves with the materials for safety and household/domestic use. After all it helped them lot to protect them. Earlier, before receiving the relief, the family had no access to any of these materials (Tarpaulin, mats, groundsheets, hygiene items, etc) as they are too poor to buy the things. And during flood they had to stay roadside without any of the sheltering materials. And it was a very difficult time for them. But as they had received the materials from Caritas Germany as a response to flood relief 2022, it helped them a lot during the second phase of flood that occured just after few days of relief distribution. The flood totally destroyed their house. Most of their household things were lost in the flood. However, somehow they managed to carry away the shelter kit (tarpaulin, mats, mosquito nets) along with them as they moved to roadside. But the saddest part of this family is that their house got completely damaged. And the Mother and eldest son of this family are mentally challenged. The mother carries a child of about 8 months old along with her. Hence, now, they had no house to shelter themselves and they are residing at nearby monk-ashram near komorakata D-reserve. At present their situation is very crucial as they are suffering from lack of food and drinking water

Mrs. Sabitri ChawraJugijan

“Magha na barse, bhare na khet. Mata na pasre, bhare na pet” (It is said that without good rain, land can not be irrigated properly. Similarly If a mother doesn’t serve then it cannot satisfy the hunger). Said Shyam Bai.

Keeping this in mind, Smallholder Adaptive Farming and Biodiversity Network (SAFBIN) program was launched in the year 2018 to ensure local food and nutritional security for small farm families. Giving a major focus on a gender-inclusive approach, SAFBIN encourages male farmers to create an opportunity for women to be part of the learning process. As a result, 446 women have enrolled as trial farmers to take the small-scale resilient farming practices forward in an expressive way while 826 are getting benefited indirectly. While discussing the integrated small-scale farming system in smallholder farmers collectives (SHFC) planning meeting, smallholders especially women members gave more emphasis on the local food and nutrition security.

“Action is the foundational key to success” finds resonance with Shyam Bai Yadav (45yrs), a resident of Bagrohi village of Shahgarh Block of Sagar district Madhya Pradesh India. The majority of the people residing in this village belongs to the small and marginal farming community. Their main source of livelihood is agriculture.

Shyam Bai lives in a small house with her family who barely met their food requirement 3-4yrs back. Having 2.5 acres of land with the predominant conventional farming system in rainfed conditions it was not so easy to have sufficient food for all year round. Like other rural women, Shyam bai was among to suffer not only from economic poverty but also deprived of many essential entitlements due to lack of proper information and knowledge. Along with her husband Halke Yadav (50yrs) she had to work extra time as agriculture labour to feed her children. Soon after she became a member of smallholder farmers collectives, she oriented with various agroecological practices and botanicals preparation from their farm waste and resources.

“She often comes with me to work in and quietly learning the process of botanical preparation, application, and a few other agro-ecological practices. This has helped me in a great way to keep these practices applied on time even if I am not at home,” shared Halke Yadav, Husband of Shyam Bai.

With this enthusiasm, she could increase not only the farm components from four (4) to six (6) but also increased in type of crops and varieties which make her farm more resilient to cope up with climate shocks. i.e. field crops (wheat, black gram, green gram, lentil, peas, jwar, flax seeds, mustard), cattle (cow and buffaloes), small ruminants (goat), fruit trees (mango, guava, lemon, papaya, drumstick) mushroom, and almost 10-12 types of vegetables. Apart from this, she also gained hands-on experience in making vermicompost, Matka khad, Cytozin practices, Dasparni ark, Lamit ark etc.

Following the low-cost agroecological practices and other measures, she could manage to have sufficient food for round the year her family. She is now a lead trainer among women who keeps orienting in SHFC meetings by sharing her journey and motivating women to make their farm more diversified.

“Yes, there is an improvement in the nutrition status of my family, though it is not possible for me to measure it. However, the diversification of the food basket and the regular intake of green & fresh (nutrition-rich) vegetables have improved our health. Delightedly she said. 

Smallholder Adaptive Farming and Biodiversity Network (SAFBIN) program is co-funded by Caritas Switzerland and Caritas Austria and implemented by Caritas India through its implementing partner organisations Jabalpur Diocesan Social Service Societies (JDSSS) and Manav Vikas Seva Sangh (MVSS) Sagar in Mandla, Sagar and Vidisha districts of Madhya Pradesh in India.

Promoting Gender-Inclusive Future through SAFBIN

Ranju was standing beside the school wall watching people queue to receive their relief but her name was not in the list. At an age of 26 she had become widow with a mother of one-and-a-half-year-old daughter. She only thinks about her daughter’s future.

Her house was washed away in the flood and now the mother and child lives with her husband’s relative at Dezoo Chapori village in North Lakhimpur, Assam. She helps in house work but always worried as anytime they can ask her leave the house.

“We wanted to raise our daughter by giving her quality education but our dreams remained as dream”, exclaimed Ranju. She used to stay happily with her husband Madhav Prasad Sharma and daughter in their house close to the river but never thought that the same river will take their house one day.

“Madhav had a medical shop which was their only source of livelihood. After his death, the shop is closed and whatever income used to come has stopped,” narrated Ranju with tearful eyes.

Every one affected by flood has their own story of pain which only brings back the moments of deprivation, confusion, hurt, loss and psychological trauma.

Ranju came to know about the complaint box installed at the distribution point for grievance redressal, so she dropped her application in the box mentioning her case for support. The village committee along with Caritas India personnel reflected on the application and considering her vulnerability had decided to extend emergency relief support to her.

“I will use this money for the admission of my daughter in school and reconstruct my house” said Ranju. She further plans to reestablish her husband’s closed medical shop to become independent so she can provide good education to her daughter.

The complaint redressal mechanism of Caritas India during emergency is an effective step to invite community to submit their confusion, complains and feedback for redressal and improvement. It not only creates space for community to express their views but also brings accountability, transparency and participation.

Every day after distribution of relief materials, the village committee and Caritas India personnel sits with the community and open the complaint box to hear the issues and unanimously decide for its redressal.

I will use this money for the admission of my daughter in school and reconstruct my house

A ‘Musahar’ girl from Bihar broke the age-old barriers of education deprivation. Literacy rate among musahar’s is only 3 percent and falls below 1 percent for the women who are subjected to exploitation, violence, and sexual harassment since ages.

Reena, a shy and simple musahar girl from Bedwaliya village was no different when aspired to get educated to lead a better future.

Even after all the hardships she managed to get promoted to class 6 but her joy ended when due to sudden sickness and lack of public health services had to dropout from the school.

The next entire year was even more difficult for Reena and her family as she neither could attend the school nor able to assist the family in earning their livelihood. Once a little better, her family did not send her to school in order to make up for the income lost during her illness.

Reena is now coming to an age where most of the girls of her age get married but due to lack of finances she had to continue working to bear the expenses of her marriage. By the time Hamari Pathshala reached her tola, almost three years had passed since she had been to school and she had forgotten what she had learnt.

Today, Reena is married and taking bridge course to cover the gap in her studies for appearing in Bihar Board Open Schooling and Examination. The counselling and educational support provided by Caritas India Hamari Pathshala project made this possible for Reena and many other musahar girls. The project gives special focus on the development of teaching modules and training of facilitators to improve the system of education in the targeted community.

Reena and many others are receiving educational benefits and able to teach other children of her community. She wishes to continue her studies even after her marriage till her “Gauna” (a practice when the bride is finally taken to the in-laws’).

Supported by Millennium Alliance, the project with 18 months of its intervention has infused positive communication and reinforcement to build self-confidence and independence in musahar community towards education.

The project has reached out to 392 musahar girls from which 129 girls were mainstreamed into local schools. The intervention has helped 165 girls to avail RTE benefits such as school uniform allowance, books and scholarship.

REENA IS 15 YEARS OLD NOW

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