Sahanivasa Site Visit

Visited by: Dr. Padmanava Sen (Asha Bangalore, Central Project Team) – padmanava [dot] sen [at] gmail [dot] com

Date Visited: 4th and 5th January, 2014

Overview of the Visit:

(i) On 4th January, had a discussion with Mr Chenniah regarding Sahanivasa, APVVU and Asha’s projects with Sahanivasa.

(ii) On 4th January, accompanied by Ms Surya Rajini, executive director of Sahanivasa, visited 3 High Schools and 2 primary schools in Chittoor District where Sahanivasa Centers are run. Had discussions with teachers, students and HMs (high schools).

(iii) On 5th January, discussed the RTE document and NREGA work with Ms Surya Rajini and Mr P Chennaiah. The need of the hour in RTE is to promote 25% quota in cities’ private schools and improve the infrastructure in Govt schools of villages (& stop the efforts to close down single teacher schools without creating any alternatives)

(iv) On 5th January, visited NREGA site and had interactions with the villages working under NREGA.

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Education Centers

Background: Sahanivasa started the centers in high schools to reduce drop outs (due to migration and lack of guidance) but later extended to primary schools. Over the years, the students, who graduated from Sahanivasa centers and succeeded in life, act as role models and thus a good culture of continuation of education among dalits is being built. The role of union is to make everyone aware of their rights, to stop the migration and to fight for livelihood of underprivileged and dalits/tribals.

Goal: The goal is to assist the students with homework and make sure the students do not drop out. The centers run before and after the school hours. It is usually 7-30 to 9-30 am in the morning and 4-30 to 6 pm in the evening.

Impact: The pass percentage at Class 10 has become much higher in the high schools (100% in some schools).

Gangadhara Nellore High School

The school has 475 students (Class 6- 10). There are around 32 teachers. There are 3 teachers from Sahanivasa who gives tuition support to students in Classes 9 and 10.

Observations: Boys and Girls seat separately in High schools which is a norm however, not sure why there are dearth of benches in the school. The English Medium students are found to be sitting on the bench and Telugu medium students on the floor. The science materials provided by Asha (Rajeev) have been very useful. Also, they receive regular support of books from Sahanivasa. The students have decent English speaking ability (few lines) even though they can read it well. I Interacted with Class 9 English and Telugu medium students. Class 10 students were having half yearly exams. Also, I noticed that there is a great chart that shows the career path for different interests in the teachers’ room.

Fig. The school building and the chart for the career path

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Fig. English and Telegu medium Class 9 Students

Kalepalli High School

This school has 315 students and 15 teachers. Teachers are well qualified, the students are well versed in English than the other school.

Observations: This school has a good computer lab. Also, I have visited their science lab which has a telescope. Their library recently received 1,095 books from Sahanivasa. The HM is very happy about Sahanivasa’s support and proudly mentioned that there is 100% success rate since Sahanivasa got involved.

The requests that came from HM and students are as follows:

(i) Cycles for at least 50 students who come from a distance of 5 km. The buses only cover 2 km of this distance and they have to walk 3 km. So, mostly they cannot attend the tuition support centers in winter.

(ii) There is no boys toilet. There is one for Girls.

(iii) A student with a hobby to read biographies of great scientists requested to give them some English books on role models.

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Fig. HM, Padmanava and Ms Surya Rajini in front of the school ; Computer Lab

Fig. Class 8 Students

Fig. Classes happening outside.

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Vepenjari High School

The school has 250 Students and 13 teachers. Most of them were having exams. However, by the time we reached there the Sahanivasa tuition classes were going on (around 4-30 PM) where they were preparing for exams the next day. The teachers do not beat the students to discipline them. Due to recent awareness campaigns, parents don’t allow that.

Fig. Exams going on for Class 10

Kurchivedu Primary School

There are 36 students in this school and we interacted with them. I have asked them about their aspirations (collector, police, IAS officer, teacher, doctor, engineers). Wanting to be a Collector seems to be most common goal. The tuition center was running that time we visited the school. There was one room in the school and Govt is building one more. There was one girl going to college from this village.

Fig. The school building and the students

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Anakalle Primary School

There are 26 students (more than the number 20 that Govt wants to close down for). The school has seen some malnutrition problem in its students. Both the primary schools (Kurchivedu and Anakalle) are in the interior of Kalikelli block. The kids in this school participate in extracurricular activities at the center. Also I have met an ex-teacher of Sahanivasa who taught from 1986 to 1996.

Fig. The Students in the school

Feedback about Sahanivasa’s Education Centers:

The education centers in primary schools provide a good place to express themselves and get helped in subjects. The children love the centers. For high schools, they get the much needed support and every HM stressed on the high pass percentage rate due to the centers. So, Boston chapter should continue supporting these centers and if possible, discuss & support the specific requirements of the schools, mentioned in this site visit.

As far the infrastructure is concerned; they are as per Government RTE requirements. The books, uniforms come free of cost. The mid-day meal program runs fine. There is no admission fees charged till Class 8. The only things not provided are Exercise book and Stationery. However, graduation or continuing education after intermediate is a challenge. The problem is when students pass intermediate and go to block level colleges; they need to travel 20 km or so. The Government scholarship of SC/ST (dalits, tribals) is Rs 4000/year that is not enough to cover travel and other expenses. The college students cannot support themselves with some income from tuition either like cities. It will be great if Boston Chapter can think about the issues and make sure most students from the high schools can finish graduation.

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NREGA

Background: Sahanivasa and APVVU have been involved with protecting the rights of dalits and other villagers from the beginning. Even before NREGA act, they were involved in efforts to increase the minimum wages as a group. After NREGA came into effect they started to proactively work towards effectively implementing the act in 8 blocks of Chittoor district. Asha supported an NREGA awareness campaign to train and increase awareness about the law. This project has helped to reach out to a wide audience in the project area.

General picture about the Project area: Chittoor is a frequently drought prone area where scarcity of water is very common. The area is predominantly dependent on agriculture. The farming includes Mango, lentil, peanuts and sugarcane. There are also a lot of Granite mines in the area.

Goal: To make sure, everyone is aware of the NREGA act. To have village leaders on-board with the implementation of the law. To have BDOs (Block Development Officers) on board with the act and its implementation across 80+ villages in Chittoor district. To have Mandal NREGA leaders and young representatives (“mates”) apply for NREGA work on their behalf. Make sure the jobs cards are properly distributed and the NREGA money is paid in time. Also, efforts were made to distribute lands across villagers who do not have lands and (were/are being) exploited by landlords.

Impact: Dailts through NREGA, on an average, have been getting 120-200 days of work per year and other communities have been getting around 60-100 days. Govt gives 120 Rs/1 cubic feet. The maximum /day is Rs.149. Most of all the NREGA beneficiaries are landless laborers who work in fields belonging to land lords. Previously land lords would pay them menial wages of Rs. 50-60/day (State mandated minimum wage is Rs 140). But given that NREGA can now provide stable employment to the Dalits and other marginalized groups, they are able to negotiate a better pay from the land lords for the agricultural work.They want to continue their kids’ education and hopeful not to leave the lands & migrate. Also, Andhra Pradesh has implemented the concept of NREGA mates who work with 20 workers at once. There are mandal leaders and a coordinator for 6 blocks. Also, there are mango garden protectors who used not to send their kids to school for the distance. If additional income is created for them, then they won't mind sending kids to school. So NREGA has created more penetration for education across dalits in that area.

Sahanivasa has created the village leaders, made them aware of the act and worked with the mates selected by Government for 20 villagers each. (Training to the NREGA mates was a part of the NREGA awareness proposal funded by Asha).

Village leaders who have been trained by Sahanivasa look at the overall implementation situation- Is there enough work, are the NREGA payments done on time; are the work tools provided by Government; are the disabled and old people getting jobs under NREGA and are the children taken cared of (usually some old villagers are assigned by Government to

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take care of the kids under NREGA). Also, First aid facilities need to be available near work site. Act says the payment should come within 15 days. But sometimes delay is there up to six months. In such scenarios the village leaders try to work with government and if that doesn’t work they take the route of RTI applications, highlight the failure in media and if needed do a dharna / report to collector. This sort of a working methodology has led to improvements in that area for NREGA situation. In Chittoor district, the collector takes care of 67 blocks.

Dalit can work upto 360 days under NREGA but block level people complains about shortage of funds to employ them for so many days. Dalits can get around 130-200 days. Non-dalits get close to 100 days (max) – 40, 60, 80 days. No compensation has been given yet in that area. The awareness campaign will go on with distributing pamphlets and working with the village leaders who can read/write (mostly village youth) and make them more aware. The type of work they get – tilling, silt transportation, Mango gardens (seeds provided by Governmentt but they get the profit of selling the mangoes), gravel, levelling cutting for the bushy lands (Government has given lands to the dalits and the dalits have the titles/patta for those lands).

Visit Observations:

(i) NREGA work across villages are observed. The work mostly involves Canals, tanks, ground preparation. In a specific site (probably 20 ft by 20 ft) people were working and silts are being procured. The silt from each site is 80 truckloads and 40 truckloads are can fertilize 1 acre land. One such site can employ a group of 10 for 4 weeks. It makes the land more fertile (6 inch silt from the surface) and also serves as water storage.  

NREGA site visited is in Kalikeri block since in many places, the work is stopped due to PONGAL (Festival season in Andhra). Summer time, migrations tend to increase so more emphasis is given on NREGA work in summer (April onwards).

(ii) Discussions regarding loan- Before money-lenders or Landlords used to give money in 5% interest monthly basis and the person who took the load was always burdened to give free physical labor and can’t save anything. Now villagers take loans from Government for education and health purposes at no interest. Also, they received 0.5 to 3 acres of land from Govt thanks to pressure created by the union. Also, when asked most of them said they do not want loan and repay the 500-5000 loans they have from the Govt Banks/PO.

(iii) Everyone has Job Card, Aadhar Card, Post Office Book, Smart Card (NREGA). However, given smart cards are based on finger prints, some old people can not avail it properly so they will go to collectors/ BDO office and will get that in person.

(iv) The annual income has become 1.5-2 times that of before and that will help them to realize their dreams of getting children educated.

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(v) Even if act came into play in 2005, since 2012 NREGA work has been regular in the project area. The work does not only involve manual labor, it also includes caregiving for kids (for old ladies) and other works.

(vi) The group leaders, mandal leaders have been very effective in documenting their work, making them aware of their rights in NREGA and pushing Govt officials to provide the platform to avail the # of days promised. Also there are regular NREGA training.

Fig. NREGA ongoing work and discussions.

Padmanava, Ms. Suria Rajani chatted with the villagers about the NREGA implementation in the area. The conversation was audio recorded by Padmanava. The Transcript of discussions with villagers is below:

(Translated from Telugu by: Rajeev Annaluru)

Conversation with Villagers

Padmanava along with Suria Rajani went and spoke to villagers in Chittoor district about how NREGA is working and how the Sahanivasa has been helping them.

This is a raw transcript of how the conversation went.

Gattappa sir (One of the coordinators in Sahanivasa) took NREGA training initially. He then travelled around villages in various mandals of Chittoor dist and provided training to all the local level leaders, coordinators and NREGA mates (Govt appointed NREGA group leader).

Question: What were the things mates were trained on?

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How to form work groups, how to take work measurements measure, who will provide the work tools, how to get job cards, health care facilities for any work injuries, day care facilities for kids of women workers, number of days work can be given, daily wage provisions etc.

Suria Rajani: What has been the change due to NREGA.?A group of people speak up: People used to migrate a lot to Hyderabad, Bangalore etc. A lot of people have migrated back because they get work in village tanks, fields etc

Padmanava: what is the change since 2012 to 2013?Various people answer: In the past two years1) In 2012 law was changed to increase the maximum number of allowed work days from 100 to 150 days.

2) As a consequence of NREGA, daily wages in the market for agricultural workers has increased from an average Rs 50-60/day t0 Rs. 100-120 / day. For women wages have gone up from Rs.35/day to Rs.100/day.

3) In NREGA a worker works an average of 5 to 6 hours (8 AM - 1 PM). Each person digs 1 cubic meter of soil and gets paid Rs 120 per cubic meter. In comparison in agricultural work in landlords fields on an average each worker works from (6 AM - 6 PM) Some people who are strong dig more but their max pay is Rs 149/day.As per law In a day each person can earn a max of Rs 149.

4) Women get to take care of kids / household since they can come back by afternoon.

5) Earlier they had to take a lot of loans from landlord for day to day expenses. Now they don’t take any loans to meet their day to day needs. (interest on loans given by landlords is Rs 5 per Rs 100 per month)Side Note: That's equivalent to 60% APR.

6) Along with NREGA Govt started SHG (Self Help Groups) for women through which loans can be taken. These are No interest loans. Loans upto a max of Rs.50,000.

What kind of works do you do in NREGA?Bunding, silting, mango plantation, work in the fields etc.

What sort of issues do you discuss in your union meetings? 1) land issues. They identified 48 acres of govt land. They are working with govt to get this land given to dalits.

2) The group has mobilized 34 drinking water pumps through the Indira Jala scheme. Pump had to be drilled to 600/700 ft.

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3) They also talk about agricultural seeds and related issues. Seeds have been given by the union to marginal farmers (Drought resistant seeds which don’t need pesticides or urea)

Are your kids going to school? Everyone is in school. (More than 20 children go to high school. After 10th class Kids go on to +12 and Degree College in nearby town)

In the meanwhile one of the coordinators checked the passbooks of the villagers to see if the NREGA entries are been entered properly. He sees Rs.5000 in one woman's account. Mrs. Suria Rajani asks, what are you doing with this money.Woman says: Education of kids and loan repayment.

Side Note: NREGA Salaries are given as direct deposit into Post office account on a weekly basis. There is a job card given to each worker that allows them to get the jobs. They are also given a smart card (like a debit card) using which they can withdraw money from their account.

Padmanava asks: Do you have a hospital nearby? Answer: Yes

One woman asks Padmanava a question: Are there any villages like ours near Calcutta? How does NREGA work?Padmanava: Near Calcutta, people general get about 50 to 60 days of NREGA work.

Feedback on NREGA initiative:

To summarize, the NREGA project supported by Asha has created a great impact in the villages. The enforcement of NREGA act and awareness among villagers was possible due to the Mandal leaders. The important thing to note is that once they get used to 70-80 days of work and believe this as their right, they won’t accept exceptions from Government. So the knowledge transfer has bigger impact than initially thought. While villagers are financially more stable, villagers can focus on education of their child and overall, the quality of life is improved.

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Sahanivasa RTE Proposal

Feedback on the RTE proposal: In Andhra Pradesh, there is a negative campaign going against Government Schools and private schools are promoted more in urban areas. This is creating instability in village educational ecosystem as well. While in urban areas, focus can be to enroll underprivileged students into primary schools under 25 percent quota given the scope of government schools is quite limited, the focus of education in Rural areas should be strengthening Government School System.

Improving Government schools under RTE should be the focus of educational NGOs and the overall awareness of the rights can only make this mammoth task easier. Wherever this ecosystem is created, the students and community overall benefitted immensely. Sahanivasa wants to implement this need of hour and this proposal if supported to should create a great impact among the beneficiaries.

Month wise action plan (Month number denotes project sanction months):

Expected Results of this project:

1. Government will drop the idea of closing the existing primary schools in 7 mandals unless students fall down to less than double digit number.

2. The data analysis submit to government on the school infrastructure facilities will be made enquiry by the government and submit proposals to provide facilities.

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3. It is expected at least 25% of 320 primary schools will get the facilities within two years of time.

4. Annually it is expected at least 30 students are enrolled into private schools.5. All the 10 hostels will have water and sanitation facilities and they will be given

proper sleeping facilities by the government. 6. Parents committees become strong and involve in negotiations with mandal

education officer to coordinate the enrolment of primary school children into private schools on regular basis even after the project period of three years.

7. Other likeminded NGOs who have been collaborating with us, both at district and state level extent solidarity in our interventions and also expand the activities in their respective project areas.

8. It is expected the district administration initiate negotiations with the private schools in all over the district to follow the RTE regulations.

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