VILLAGE NUMBER: 11, VILLAGE NAME: MANAMAI

Village team members: Poonam S. Chhabria (Village Coordinator), Abhay A. Bohra, Saumil Uday Mehta and Yasaswini Jonnalagadda

Demographics

Located in the Thirukazhukundram Taluk, near Mahabalipuram, Tamilnadu, Manamai is a developing village, confluent with the technological necessities and the lack of certain basic amenities of a normal life.
Manamai is a home for approximately 3500 villagers and has around 6000 houses. The village is divided into four panchayat wards - Manamai Main, Darkaas, Malamedu and Kizhakazhani. The people are predominantly Hindus with a minority of Christians and Muslims. The village has witnessed turnarounds on the professional and educational front despite a few shortcomings.

Infrastructure

When compared to other villages, Manamai is relatively better in terms of infrastructure. It has well built roads, ration shops, a couple of schools and electric facilities. However, water supply is mediocre and the villagers are not well informed about the hygienic aspects of water storage.

Profession and Past Activities

While in the past, the villagers thrived on agriculture, today the trend has shifted towards other better opportunities such as government jobs, plumbing and working for the nuclear plant at Kalapakkam. A noteworthy aspect is the increase in the number of youngsters who temporarily migrate to countries abroad to enhance their work experience and skill sets.
Educational and informational activities conducted by Great Lakes in the past have helped increase the number of children attending school today. However, the need for an English medium school cannot be undermined as it would empower the youngsters for their future. Other activities conducted in the past include - conduct of an eye check up camp, a tree plantation drive and promoting education amongst the backward sects of Manamai in collaboration with the M.S.Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) and the Hope foundation. The identification of the backward sects - Irula Tribal Members, was done in conjunction with Saraswathi Akka facilitated the introduction.

At a glance - TODAY

Today, on an average, the residents of Manamai own a motorbike, cable network connections, mobile phones and LCD televisions. It is ironical that despite these advances, Manamai lacks basic provisions in terms of an English medium education, regular bus service and medical facilities. Villagers are responsible for their own transport and have to visit Mahabalipuram in case of any health problems. The underground water is extremely salty and muddy which poses a threat to the villager's health. A new panchayat is in place now, elected in 2011 after the dissolution in 2010.

Building Relationships

A month of preparations and meetings culminated into this one day, our first step towards pro-activity in the village of Manamai - The Eye Check up Camp, held in collaboration with the Mahavir International, Chennai, at the village school, for people aged forty years and above.
We had an early day, with the first contingent leaving for Manamai by 8.30 am. The spirit of optimism had hit a temporary roadblock the previous evening as the village chief distanced himself from our event because of reasons which ultimately, none of us could fully comprehend. But, this wasn't going to stop us from conducting the camp which the village elders were looking forward to. For two days in the past week, group after group had gone out during their free time to the neighbouring villages advising the villagers to come for the free eye check up camp at Manamai. The true spirit of the Great Lakers and the impact of Karma Yoga was felt by all of us as members from other groups devoted their precious time and energy helping us, spreading the word about the event in their villages. The very first sight that beheld us was that some of the villagers were already present at the venue! This seemed to set the mood for the things to come. The doctors arrived soon after, along with the representatives from Mahavir International and within a short time the camp was underway.
Two of us took over the registration duties while the others helped set up the two rooms where the check-ups would be done. The first room was used to do the preliminary check up while the more serious patients were sent to the second room. Here, they were checked further to see if their eyes needed to be operated upon. Mahavir International had made arrangements for surgery in Chennai for such patients providing transportation and stay for the latter. Spectacles were also going to be made available to patients needing the same.
As villagers from Manamai as well as its neighbouring areas like Kadambadi slowly started to come over, we took a van to bring over those who were too incapacitated to came over. As the hours passed by we saw the attendance rise from 20 to 50.......... to 100! On a Sunday morning in the middle of the month of festivals! We consider this as an important milestone in our relationship with the people of Manamai.
By the end of the scheduled time, i.e 1.30 we had attended to 157 people, scheduled glasses for 51 people and arranged for 18 people to be taken to Chennai for cataract operations.
All in all it was a great team effort to flag off our first steps to empower and be empowered.
https://picasaweb.google.com/poonam.chhabria/EyeCampManamai?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCPXlsab_87TMBg&feat=directlink
As promised by Mahavir International, they promptly delivered the prescribed spectacles and successfully conducted the surgeries and sent back the respective villagers. We organized a mini camp and distributed the spectacles to the villagers who felt extremely grateful and made us feel so positively overwhelmed. As part of the post operative care, we facilitated 2 reviews which were conducted by the eye hospital at the village. All the villagers who had undergone surgeries attended the reviews promptly, and some of them also requested to have their other eye operated and recommended their neighbours to take advantage of the service we had extended.

Other Activities

• Skills empowerment - An organic farming workshop was conducted considering that the villagers were predominantly agrarian and this would expose them to the benefits of organic farming. It would have a dual benefit, as it would help them reduce their dependence on external health facilities and also serve as a mode of income-generation. However, due to the lack of facilitation for marketing the produce, the villagers have not been very forthcoming with respect to this venture.
• Sunday activity
• Outbound activities that include sports events, music and arts classes are being planned. Women from the self help groups have shown interest in activities such as handicrafts making, which could later be put up for sale. We conducted a session, during which we taught the women to make photo frames. They were greatly excited and also went on to make a few of their own. During Diwali, we taught the art of making colourful diyas, that they also picked up very quickly.
• Inbound activities such as personality development, English language and Maths education have commenced. A few of our team volunteers have taken up these activities individually and regularly visit the children and teach them the basics of Maths, Accounts and English. A group of children have been identified who take part in this activity.
• A Science club has also been started, with the initiation offered by Mr. Dhananjayan from the TNSF (Tamil Nadu Science Forum). As part of this, weekly sessions are conducted, where a few games were conducted in order to check the sensory faculties of the children and their coordination abilities. A few experiments are conducted after this, that serve to prove a scientific law / theory. We identified a local coordinator (Divya), who would help to conduct these sessions on a regular basis, at the village. She is herself greatly interested in teaching and science related subjects.

Road Ahead

In order to solve some of the major issues highlighted above, following initiatives would have to be implemented in the future:

• Regularly conducting the Science Forum Sessions.
• Open and set the library to function in order to solve the English language and communication problems.
• Conduct a heritage site visit for the children who attend the educational classes, in order to broaden their perspective on our local culture and history.
• Physical, spiritual empowerment - In association with the Isha foundation (www.ishafoundation.org), yoga and meditation programs would be conducted to highlight the importance of a holistic well-being.

Pictorial representation

https://picasaweb.google.com/poonam.chhabria/EyeCampManamai?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCPXlsab_87TMBg&feat=directlink
https://picasaweb.google.com/103463637268838015884/HandicraftsWorkshop1?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCO2hoPSm6Y-wXg&feat=directlink
Manamai is a very social and hospitable village. The village folks are extremely courteous and generous to outsiders and look forward to expanding their boundaries through their simple yet admirable strength.

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Manamai for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 12, VILLAGE NAME: KADAMBADI

Village team members:Akhila, Anuja, Aravind (Village Co-ordinator), Hrishikesh, Navin

Kadambadi has a population of three thousand five hundred with close to two hundred pucca houses and 1000 people having voting rights. It is located in Kancheepuram District, Tamil Nadu and is roughly 5 kms from our college. This village is a Tamil Nadu government recognized tourist spot and the Tamil Nadu Tourism Development Corporation have allocated separate funds for improving tourism in the village. Agriculture is the main source of income for the village and they cultivate rice and paddy and people work in factories in Kalpakkam as daily wage labourers for the rest of the year when agriculture is not feasible. There is a primary Tamil medium school in the village and students have to travel to other places such as Mahabalipuram and Thirukazhunkundram for higher education.
The previous batches have been teaching the childrenof the village some basic lessons in English and they have also conducted health camp and an awareness campaign on AIDS. They also worked with a microfinance company to start small scale businesses since the income from agriculture was not stable.
From our interactions with the villagers, it is evident that the villagers regardeducation as being very important. Hence we started karma Yoga with Career Counselling since we felt that there was no awareness about the various fields of study. We mainly considered budding students who are ready to join college. We also started teaching Spoken English and Computers in the village.
Kadambadi is well known for tourism mainly due to the temple. Sanitation near the temple was very bad and there was no proper disposal mechanism for wastage. We understood that these phenomena might spoil the name of the village. We spoke to the villagers and urged them to contact the government authorities to clean the temple since the place belonged to the government and a complaint has been successfully lodged to the concerned authorities. We also conducted a session on Organic Farming for the villagers and they found it useful and we are planning to do a bigger session this term with the help of Mr.Samy, head of Centre for Culture and Development& Ms. Sabitha for Mushroom Cultivation.
We planned to create a science forum for children in the village. The main idea of this concept is not just to develop knowledge but also to make students question everything and reason properly rather than accepting them at the face value. We started the activities by initiating games which laid emphasis on enhancing their cognitive thinking and analytical abilities. Emphasis was also laid on team building. Thus we decided to impart to them a brief on Indian Democratic system which is the largest democracy of the world and parliament system and organised the mock parliament where we divided them into parliament teams, brought to them the concept of voting system in India. The interaction so far has been very encouraging and we will take this forward.
One of the youth in the village represented the village for the council elections. Though he lost the election, he has been active and he collected funds from the villagers and built a new bus stop and he also distributed books/notebooks to the kids in school. Janakiraman has been a revelation this year. We also conducted an eye camp in the village and we had a good turnout. Almost 100 people turned out in 2- 3 hours and one person was identified for cataract surgery.
We plan to end the leadership experiential project for this year on a high note by conducting one more organic farming session and taking the kids to the Anupuram/Kalpakkam science park.

Link for photos

https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=108327851874855339174&target=ALBUM&id=5623304151972024577&authkey=Gv1sRgCPDFxaDwlqKtmwE&feat=email
Eye Camp
https://picasaweb.google.com/108327851874855339174/EyeCampKadambadi?authkey=Gv1sRgCKzincnP-b_xnQE

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Kadambadi for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 13, VILLAGE NAME: PATTIKKADU

Village team members: Abhilash Mohapatra, Deepika Mennon, Rahul Ray, Rituparna Kashyap, Vikram Naval, Vinod Kumar TA

LEP in Action

Eye Camp

Pattikadu is reminiscent of most Indian villages regarding the villagers' awareness on health and hygiene related issues. Elders suffering from cataract and other eye related problems are a common sight. Even if they realize the importance of clear vision, the villagers generally do not visit hospitals as they feel that it would cause deterrence to their daily activities. Hence, the Karma Yoga team for this village planned and organized an Eye Camp in collaboration with Shankar Hospital and the Rotract Club of Great Lakes Institute of Management.
Organized at the village school, the Eye Camp was attended by around 120 people from Pattikadu and the surrounding villages. Children, working men and women who had taken an hour's leave from their daily work and the elderly, who were accompanied by members of their family - the crowd at the Eye Camp was a representation of the entire demographics of the village. The arrangement chairs, tables and shamiyana, provided by the Panchayat at the school, were helpful in managing the patients. At the end, 15 people were chosen for Cataract operation and the team was able to convince 6 among them for undergoing the surgery. The remaining people declined as they had to spend 3 days at the hospital. After the operation, the Karma Yoga team demonstrated the post-operative care to the patients.
Overall, the Eye Camp was a huge success as it not only consolidated the commitment of Great Lakes for improving the life quality of the people of the surrounding villages but also served as a platform from where the villages could gain awareness on their vision and general health and hygiene.

Science Club

The Karma Yoga team, in association with TNSF (Tamil Nadu Science Forum), has formed a Science Club (Mylaswami Annadurai Thullir Illam) in the village. Composed of 22 bright children from 5th to 9th standard, the Club serves to increase the interest level of the children in Science and learning through discussions, experiments, screening of educational movies and activities like Word Grids, Crosswords and Jigsaw puzzles. It opens up a world of learning which is fun and through which the children can imbibe more than simply through books and classroom lectures. The Karma Yoga team is also planning to organize a Star Show event for the members of the Science Club and the villagers where they will be able to get a closer look at the moon and the stars in the night sky with the help of a telescope.

Pictorial representation

https://picasaweb.google.com/108389433887272820924/Eyecamp?authkey=Gv1sRgCPLm4bvCs6Ld4wE

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Pattikkaadu for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 15, VILLAGE NAME: KUZHIPANTHANDALAM

Work Done in 2010

Employment Generation

After a survey to identify and understand the employment scenario of the complete village, judicious plans to uplift the employability and employment opportunities were planned in the village. Various discussions with the village head, self-help groups, road side shops, cycle repair shop and in few ad-hoc households were conducted to understand the scenario better. Every household is found to be earning around Rs. 3000 per month. Unanimously, everyone is happy with their employment opportunities in and around the village. Though, there are very few households that are suffering due to lack of bread winners. Assistance from Microfinance firms to facilitate them with credit opportunity so that they can earn their daily bread and employment cash generated in the village was attempted.

Health & Sanitation

Medical aid is generally dependent on the main health-center in Thirukazhukundram. However, basic first-aid knowledge in case of emergency was a huge concern. There are few people in village who are aware of how to administer first aid. Through organising health camps such a problem was addressed.

Education

The focus was on the secondary level education in the government school. It came to understanding that the school is running short of faculty and the headmaster has requested our assistance. After taking into consideration of our time, we have taken the responsibility to equip the class X students for their board exams in mathematics. We also conducted awareness sessions for class XII students in the village.

Energy Conservation

We have taken a survey about the energy usage practices of the villagers in terms of electricity and cooking gas. There is scope for the villagers to reduce their expenditure on these aspects. We educated them on better energy conservation practices.

Work Done in 2011

Organic farming

We wanted to do something concrete in the village. After having successfully launched an organic farming awareness session in the village it was time to do a demo session for the farmers to show them the benefits of organic farming and create an organic farming movement in the village. We have created awareness amongst the farmers in the village of the basic advantages of organic farming and have also got the consent from farmers for giving a small part of their land for this purpose. We have around five farmers who are willing to try out organic farming as of now.
We are in talks with Mr Sami, Organic farming evangelist, to conduct the demo farming sessions so that more villagers can see the benefits and adopt organic farming. This we feel would be major movement in the future. Even if we are able to convert a few of the farmers to adopt organic farming, it would be a major step in the right direction since there is immense potential in this area.

Tailoring Centre

On our interactions with the villagers there was one prominent need that we could identify - a need for empowerment of the women folk. They were eager to do something but were unable to find the required opportunities. The best way to empower them we decided would be to train them on a particular skillset and then open up employment opportunities for them to gain financial freedom.
This led us to zeroing in on tailoring as a viable option since we could procure sewing machine through Rotaract Club and also train them with help from NGOs. We went ahead and set-up a tailoring center where we had two sewing machines set-up at a central location in the village. Anyone in the village would be able to use the machines on a time sharing basis. We have for the initial few months identified a trainer from within the village itself. Going forward we have decided to rope in professional trainers and subsequently create business opportunities.

Orphanage

We selected orphanage 'Boys Home of Hope' as our main teaching centre. This orphanage consists of around 50 children from all age brackets. These children go to nearby govt' school and their expenditures are all run by donations. We thought of delivering the values and knowledge to them which is not taught in the school. We made them play various educational games, showed them movies to discover what advancement science has taken, career counselling, special computer teaching classes and many more. Our main focus was to make them aware of the outer world and groom them rather than just teaching them. We happily state that we achieved our target in delivering what we promised to them.

TNSF

TNSF conducts regular training programs for its Science Club Coordinators from all over the district once every couple of months. This training program helps the coordinators to equip themselves with necessary inputs to make the Science Clubs more content-rich, interactive and relevant. On similar grounds we invited Mr.Dhananjayan from TNSF to our village for conducting sessions for kids at the orphanage with which we have been involved since the inception of our Karma Yoga Project. The first session was conducted in the orphanage and for all the students. Then specific sessions were conducted for specific students according to their age groups. These sessionshelped to remove the fear of math and trigonometry from the minds of the students. The session was very encouraging for us as we saw great participation from the students. Since then Mr.Dhananjayan has been a regular visitor to our village and the kids love interacting with him. We have not just restricted ourselves to act as mediators between him and the kids, but also tried to enhance our learning through our interaction with him. We have tried to adopt his way of teaching and since then it has become not just interesting for the kids but for us as well. We are discussing with TNSF to have many more sessions and come up with a structured program for the kids which would help to keep a check on the improvement made by the kids.
Additionally find below links for photos on Facebook profiles of KY team members during visits and events conducted in Kuzhipanthandalam village in 2011-12:

1. Sriram Varahan : http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150855323535707.741181.605955706&type=3
2. AniruddhSukhwal :http://www.facebook.com/aniruddh.sukhwal/photos
3. VaibhavMehrotra :http://www.facebook.com/mehrotravaibhav/photos
4. VikramChoudhary :http://www.facebook.com/vikram.leoboy/photos
5. TusharArora :http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=t.628155861&type=3
6. ShrutiTamrarkar :http://www.facebook.com/media/albums/?id=1183745318
7. RituparnaKashyap:http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=522133894&sk=photos
8. NitishSalian :http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=t.591550202&type=3
9. Hitesh Hiran :http://www.facebook.com/hitesh.hiran/photos

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Kuzhipanthandalam for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 21, VILLAGE NAME: KUNNATHUR

Village team members: FT12215 Guruprasad Ramnath (Village co-ordinator), FT12240 Prathiba Venkataraman, FT12255 Shraddha Pandya, FT12259 Siddharth Radhakrishnan

Work undertaken in the village from 2009 till date

• English Speaking classes for Women
In 2009, our team of students was actively involved with the women self-help group. Given that most women work at various places, our team identified one of the needs of these women is to understand and converse in English. A team of English teachers headed by Mrs. Durga Ramkumar, was approached. The teachers readily accepted to extend their helping hand in getting the village women trained in English. Regular classes were conducted from then on in a systematic way, ensuring that no student dropped out of classes. The classes were continued until the basic lessons were learnt by the women, making them feel more confident about themselves.
• Improvement in School infrastructure
• Set-up of IT Infrastructure
The IT Department of Great Lakes in collaboration with the principal of the primary school in Kunnathur continuously supported the IT infrastructure in the school. Starting from protection and maintenance of the computers in the school to offering study material in the training and mastery of Microsoft Word and Excel, our team along with the IT department was involved in setting up the basic IT infrastructure at Kunnathur Primary school.
• Stationary and basic amenities
Our team along with the school have been working hard to improve the availability of stationary materials for the children at a subsidised cost. Having understood that the school children do not have access to basic stationary that is required for students, our team contacted some suppliers and arranged for stationary items for the school.
• English education for the children
A detailed survey in the village revealed that English education in the schools has been a persistent challenge. Given the limited number of seats in the good schools of Kalpakkam, the children of our village do not have access to quality education in English. Our team is hence involved in conducting regular English sessions for the children, apart from the other activities undertaken in the village



• Institution of Science Club for the Village Children
The Sir CV Raman Science club was instituted on 26.01.2012, for the promotion and education of science among the school children. The science club has been instituted in a small building near the Dr. Ambedkar statue of the village. The club consists of approximately 300 books, educational charts and simple experiments and is now formally registered with TNSF (Tamil Nadu Science Forum). TNSF personnel visit the village on a regular basis. The activities of Science club includes regular workshops, experiment sessions, lectures, sky shows using telescope etc. 40 students are currently registered with the club. Our team of students was successful in motivating the villagers to start and take over the club. A seed capital of Rs. 1500 has been collected by the villagers for the village science club. Expansion of the club by way of additional stationery and experiment-kits is underway. The chief co-ordinator of the science club from the village is Mr. Janakiraman. He resides at the Ambedkar Street, Kunnathur



Inauguration of the science club - Kunnathur


Science workshop with TNSF member
• Empowering Women self-help groups
Taking the women’s self help groups further in the path of empowerment, our team decided to impart skills that would help them earn a living. After many discussions with the women in the village, it was discovered that the women had a natural flair and inclination for tailoring. Hence, a tailoring teacher was identified near the village, who agreed to tutor the women at a low cost of about Rs.200 / month, entitling them for classes 5 days a week with 2 hours of training per day. The classes are expected to start from the beginning of March 2012. It was also found that some women were inclined towards cultivation and trading of garden plants. Resources have been identified that have agreed to train the women in this skill and also buy the plants from them. The actual trade is also expected to start from March 2012.
• Reaching out to farmers
A lot of excitement was generated in the village during initiation of talks regarding Organic Farming. The primary driver for this initiative is the high cost of agricultural inputs, which is thinning down the margins of the farmers. Our team of students identified an expert in organic farming to be the primary guide and facilitator for this initiative. The expert met up with farmers of the village in a formal panchayat and the meetings seemed quite fruitful as it also drew a lot of interest from the villagers. Following the discussions, it was decided that organic farming would be started on a small basis, to get accustomed to the procedure. Watermelon was of primary interest. The leader of the farmers group agreed to give an acre of land for the initiative and also benevolently agreed to pursue this on revenue sharing basis. Action is underway; the practice is yet to start on the fields. We hope to motivate the farmers on these lines so as to see a substantial effort in this regard at the earliest.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Kunnathur for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 22, VILLAGE NAME: Neikuppi

Village team members: Shripad (Village Co-ordinator), Sriharsha, Sanchit Kishan and Jayawardhan

We had started our Experiential Leadership Program called Karma yoga project at Great Lakes in April 2011 by understanding the geography, economic and education system of the village we have adopted namely Neikuppi which is about 4 KM from our institute. In the early days, regular village visits helped us understand the villagers better.  We had started our series of empowerment activities with a street campaign for Environment day. This awareness rally attracted many children cyclists of our village. During one of our other visits, we saw many students, predominantly primary school students from standard one to five struggling with their studies and many unemployed graduates. We saw an opportunity of positive inroads into these lives. The activities for school students started in the below fashion:

1. We established a strong relationship between us - the Karmayogis and the potential followers
2. This was done by intense and regular interaction with the students and villagers
3. The interaction started in the form of a 5 day workshop module for primary school children
4. The module for school students was designed so as
1. To kindle creativity – Art competition that included drawing, sketching, painting
2. To educate – Videos on universe, Space stations, Mission Apollo, Indian defence systems
3. To Motivate – Sports activities, motivational videos
4. For learning – English classes, Math classes
5. A similar module for some of the Engineering students included career counselling sessions by the team

After accomplishing this module execution our objective for the visit was to segregate the village into convenient to address kind of subunits based on its demography and then start addressing the real needs of these subunits and not just their mere wants. We also needed to identify the point of contact in each of these groups and by analyzing the needs of each of the groups set a goal statement. The below was the outcome.

1. Group 1 – School Kids : Self sustained process of extra school education
2. Group 2 – Unemployed Engineering graduates : Increase competency and promote a career counselling platform

Ter Jayarhe in-house (Special Points of Contact) SPOCs for Groups 1 through 2 have been identified as Mastam, Mr. Pandiyan. We believed that these SPOCS have a very good repute and say amongst their groups in the village and hence can be extremely handy in all our activities. We went on to meet Jayaram and Pandiyan on a regular basis and formulated a convergence point that would satisfy both their needs, which is an idea of a extra school education system for the school children run by these graduates. This benefits both parties and is a mutually inclusive process. On the behest of one such centre of education established, two other centres were established at different places in the village. We on our part have been contributing to the set up by screening science movies and taking classes then once in a while.
There is a famous saying “Don’t limit your challenges. Challenge the limits”. The target that we have set for us was really challenging. But because we as a group believed that the more we stretch ourselves the more we would perform, we were able to meet our targets.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Neikkuppi for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 23
VILLAGE NAME: Natham Kariacheri

Village team Members: Deepika Prakash, HenankshaBehrani, Sathya and Vijayshree S Menon.
Village Coordinator:'Vijayshree S Menon'

Our journey so far...

Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will...
Kariacheri - a village we never heard of has gradually become something close to our heart. As a part of the Karma Yoga project , we started working with village in Kariacheri.

About the village:

Natham-Kariacheri is a village panchayat under the ThirukazhukundramTaluk in the Kanchipuram District of Tamilnadu. Natham and Kariacheri are two sister villages that are clubbed under the same village panchayat. It is about 5 KM to the east of Great Lakes Institute of Management, quite near to the pristine beaches of the Bay of Bengal.

Occupation:

Agriculture is the main occupation of the village residents. During off-season, they get employment in the nearby towns like Thirukazhukundram, Chengalpattu, Mamallapuram etc. Many people are permanently employed at the Kalpakkam Atomic Power station, which is 8 kms from the village. Many are also into the Limestone Business

Education:

There is a primary school at Kariacheri (till Standard V) and a high school at Natham (till Standard X). Children are enrolled in these two schools. The schools run with basic infrastructure.

Healthcare:

Healthcare is poor in this panchayat. Villagers often have to go to Chengalpattu town to get good medical care at the Government General Hospital.

Karma Yoga activities:

Great lakeshas been associated with Kariacheri Village as a part of KY project for the past 3 years since 2009.
The areas of focus in this village has mainly been education, SHG ,creating Health awareness, conducting health camps, Skill training &Agri business.
In 2009, the students found few areas where they could pitch in and empower the villagers. They worked with women Self-help groups, the village school and the health facilities available in the village
In 2010, the students from great lakes focussed on Education , Medical camp, Skill training Programme, & Organic Farming.
In 2011, the students worked on Health awareness programs , Education & SHG front.

Education:

In the education front the following have been done in the last 3 years
In 2009: The school children though eager to learn don't have a proper means to do so. Their only support comes from the teachers in the school. GL students tried to improve their awareness about the potential opportunities available to them in the world beyond their village. They were able to convince the school headmaster to meet up with a few corporate and convince them to pay for buying new books for their library.
In 2010: GL team took up English and Basic Computer training for secondary school children of Natham village.
In 2011: GL Students started teaching children spoken English.
We slowly realised that there would be greater benefit, if we could establish science clubs in village. Hence in collaboration with TNSF, we established a science club in our village. It was named Sir C.V RamanTulir Science club. The aim of this club is to teach science through simple experiments and broaden their thinking. It is meant to facilitate learning through fun. We identified Mr.Yoganathan, the local person in the village as its coordinator.
Science club formation events:

As a part of this activity, GL students also conducted a star gazing event through telescope in the village. It was a huge hit. Children & adults participated with great zeal and saw Venus& the Moon with its craters.

GL Students also showed the children some motivational videos on people such as the entrepreneurSharathBabu and Tamil Nadu 10th Std.Board Exam toppers so that they could take inspiration and study hard.

SHG:

Interacting with the village women was an enriching experience. Their state of affairs is not very different from what we see in the moving documentaries. The raw passion with which they talk tells you something about the years of yearning to do something extraordinary. Though not many had any clue about what they wanted to do 5-10 years from now, not one lady wanted to see life simply pass by.
In 2009:
It was understood that most of the villagers did not even know about the benefits that a self-help group can offer. The first priority was to spread awareness of its existence to the neediest persons of the village. In this regard, GL students were able to convince the self-help group members to come up with a list of women in the village who were interested to start small entrepreneurial ventures with the financial backup provided to be provided by the self-help groups.
In 2010:
GL team spoke to the members of Women Self-Help Groups (SHGs) in the village who are looking to take up new business opportunities. The skills they would learn would help them supplement their income from Agriculture, their main occupation. GL team has contacted EdServ, a leading education and training firm, to organise these trainings through funding from Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME).
In 2011:
GL team contacted an organization called Prakriti which was into paper bags business. The students had a discussion with the owner to conduct training in the village for the SHG women.

Health Programs:

In 2009:
GL students contacted M/s Scope International's CSR division. Apart from educating the villagers and conducting HIV awareness campaign
In 2011:
As a part of spreading health awareness we decided to start from SHG. GL Students contacted RUWSEC Hospital in Karumarapakkam , which conducts several health programs, camps for women's healthcare. RUWSEC will be formally involved in conducting health awareness programs in the village. As a part of this program, GL students arranged for the first health session conducted by RUWSEC on general women's health. The turnout was encouraging.

Agriculture:

In 2009:
The primary occupation for most of the village folks is agriculture. They are currently cultivating one crop a year; mostly rice. GL students decided to make them aware of the benefits of crop-rotation and contract farming. In this regard, they interacted with agricultural expert Mr.Madhavan from IIT to give a talk to these villagers. Mr.Madhavan is known to impart training for farmers charging a very nominal fee for his services. He even guides the farmers who undertake his training in their 2 subsequent harvests.
In 2010:
GL team came across Mrs.Sabitha, a resident of the Kariacheri village, actively involved in organic farming. She is interested to take up organic farming to other nearby villages and promote it as a viable business. GL students also worked with her in assisting her promote organic farming in the village.
The Journey continues . . . . .

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Natham Kariacheri for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 25, VILLAGE NAME: MULLIKOLATHUR

Village team members: Divya Gupta and Manish Chadha (Village Coordinator)
26 February 2012

About Village (Getting familiarized with the village):

Mullikolathur, a village on the Kalpakkam road in Tamil Nadu, has a population of 2000 people with a sex ratio of 3:2. There are approximately 300 families living here.
Agriculture is the main occupation in the village. The chief crops cultivated by the villagers are rice, vegetables, watermelon and coconuts.
There is a high level of importance provided to education in this village. The Tamil medium government school (up to 8th standard) was constructed more than 50 years back. Some of the local children prefer going to a nearby school at Thirukkazhukkundram, which is an English medium high school.

Connect with the villagers:

On our village trips, we made it a point that we interact with the maximum number of villagers and make them aware of the work we intend to do. Besides intent, we had to make sure that they understand how this step would help bring prosperity to the village.

Initiatives (The following initiatives we took were primarily based on our analysis of each sub unit):

1. We worked with the Self- Help group (hereby referred as SHG) in the village headed by Mrs. Sumati. We identified the SHG as our focus group because this group had undergone training in tailoring in the month of June'2011 under the guidance of the NGO Hand in Hand. Also this organization had promised that they will get orders (tailoring assignment) for the SHG but nothing was done in this regard as none of the nearby tailoring units were ready to give bulk orders to the SHG. The rationale given by the tailoring units was that these women have recently learnt the nuances of tailoring and they were skeptical if the SHG would be able to handle bulk orders which involved high levels of skill.
2. The other sub-unit that we decided to work upon the education of the children. A Tamil school is present in the village but the students did not have the proper knowledge in English( they found it difficult to converse in English) and also the syllabus followed is a little outdated so we decided to empower the children of this village and make a positive impact on their lives by taking the below mentioned tasks:

1. Start a Science forum with the help of Tamil Nadu Science Forum( TNSF)
2. Teaching English either by arranging classroom sessions or through interactive videos
3. Compare their current syllabus with the latest syllabus of other boards like C.B.S.E, I.C.S.E etc and teach them the latest courses.
1. Make students computer-literate by organizing computer lessons (teaching them MS Word, MS Paint etc.) Initially to develop some comfort level with students we decided to organize painting competition and played games with them. It really helped in solidifying the bond between our team members and the students. After that, we decided to show them the videos on various subjects so as to act as a welcome break for these kids from the classroom sessions. The idea was to facilitate learning while having fun. Our ideas were reciprocated by an active participation from the students. Even the introvert students got involved in the learning process. They were able to grasp very easily and the teachers really got surprised by the speed of their learning and have requested us to share with them a copy of all the videos that we have shown till date.

Implementation:

1. With the self help groups:
We started working with the SHG in the month of September 2011. We found that the women did not want to venture out and look for orders themselves. From our interaction we found out that they would seldom contact Hand in Hand (NGO) to get updates if there were any orders. Hence the task for us was to motivate them to get hand on experience by working in the nearby tailoring shops and they have sufficient experience in tailoring, then they can start their own business. As expected, we met with stubbornness from the women as they were happy to do the much more demanding farm jobs at a much lower price then what they could potentially earn through with tailoring. We made village trips frequently, and tried to motivate them.
• Interacted with them regularly as a means of helping them to realize their own potential
• Motivated them to actively seek out employment for themselves, something that would go a long way with regards to their development
• Ensured that they constantly follow up "Hand in Hand " the NGO that we put them in touch with
• Encouraged them to keep practicing their sowing so that they can then be ready for whatever orders that come their way
• With the school children:
• Having established contact with the teachers we were able to convince them to give us a slot during the week. As opposed to the earlier model where we would show the children educational videos, the time slot will now be used to conduct the science forum. The focus will be on the children from std. VI to std. VIII.
• School library: Met with the newly re- elected Sarpanch of Mullikolathur village namely Mr. G Babu. The topic of discussion revolved mainly around the school. Having spoken to the teachers of the school we realized the need for a library given that they currently have a library with only a few story books.

Results:

1. Employment for 7 villagers- 4 women and 3 men from the village with whom we have interacted on a regular basis for the last 9 months have actively sought out employment for themselves. They have been employed for stitching and are earning a salary of Rs. 4000/- per month. The efforts we put in over the last few months has culminated in us achieving one of the first few goals that we had set for ourselves in term I.
2. We organised the inaugural session of the Science forum. The first of participants were 13 boys and 8 girls from the same village.
3. Our visits to the school, wherein we educated children in groups of 15-20, have taught us the key to effectual interaction with children. We have learned to engage the entire group during the learning sessions.

Learning:

Some key learning that stands out for most of us are leadership amalgamated with team effort. We see ourselves in leadership roles, as the children at school not only watch us but also pick up ways to behave like us. At the same time as a team, we have learned to be organized and efficient, with work prepared before every visit to the village.

Future course of action:

1. Use the example of these 7 and inspire others in the village to follow suite. We also plan on keeping in touch with these 7 members to ensure that they continue to work and also to get them to try and get jobs for others from the village.
2. Discuss with Mr. Dhananjayan from Tamil Nadu Science Forum regarding the way forward to establishing and conducting the science club for the village children. He will also be gauging the level of interest of the school children and assessing their current level. The AEO has to give the final permission for conducting the science forum. This would be done by Mr. Dhananjayan.
3. Having spoken to some of our fellow students who have conducted medical camps in their villages, we have been able to get important contacts from them. The next thing on our agenda is to actively pursue this and get a medical camp conducted for the members of our village. We are currently speaking to various organizations and are close to fixing on a date for the same.
4. To avail more education-based videos to the children.
5. To hold activity sessions for the children to keep their surroundings clean, avoid wastage of resources and learn craft.

6. To build a repository to house the videos for future use. Overall, in our Karma Yoga experience of we have enriched ourselves with knowledge and leadership skills.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Mullikolathur for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 31, VILLAGE NAME: VENGAMPAKKAM

About Village

Vengampakkam is a village located along the ECR between Great Lakes Institute of Management and Kalpakkam. It spans on either sides of ECR.

Year-2010

Village team members: Shefali Bhatia ,ShrutiWani ,Siddhartha Bose,Sivaraman N ,Somnath Banerjee Sonakshichandra ,Sudarshan K, Sunil BansalSurabhiGawdeSwamynathanArunachalam

Summary:

We have been working in the village Vengampakkam for our Karma Yoga Project. After spending adequate time in getting to know the village and its needs, we have decided to do three major programs there

1. A series of seminars and special classes in the village high school. We have already chalked out a plan of action with the Principal of the school. The series will include computer classes for a few selected students, spoken English classes and career guidance workshops with the entire population of students in classes - IX and X.


2. A program of micro-financing with the help of Rang De. We have apprised a representative group of women from the village about the whole concept of micro-credit and currently, we are in the process of identifying the households which can be considered for this project.


3. A health camp for the entire village population with the help of Chettinad Hospital. The village Panchayat is more than happy in welcoming this project. We are in the process of working out the details of the whole activity.

Year-2011

Village Team: Mohanraj K (Village Coordinator), PrachiSawant, RamyaBijinepalli, Sowmya K Kumar, Sumit Gupta

Summary:

As a part of the Karma Yoga project, the team aims to empower the people of Vengampakkam to enrich their standard of living and bring about prosperity in their lives. To facilitate this, the village was divided into sub-units to identify the aspirations of different sections of people and work with the influential members of these groups to enhance the self-efficacy of the village population.

Financial Inclusion Group

Financial Inclusion (FI) is an initiative spanning the entire village that aims to build healthy banking practices among the people through the door-to-door services provided by banks assigned to each village.
The process of implementing the initiative was studied and the practical difficulties involved were identified. This initiative will encourage savings by offering no-frills account with overdraft facility and reduce the pilferages of funds offered under the benefit schemes of the government.
The process of the identifying a Business Correspondent is currently being undertaken by the Bank with aid from the Karma Yoga team.

The Self Help Group (SHG)

This sub-unit covers the people who are involved in 13 SHGs operating in the village aspiring to have alternative sources of income through stitching and craftsmanship. Currently, the team is evaluating the existing skill-sets of the people and identifying the different sources of funds required for procuring necessary tools.

Farming Group

The major problem in farming is the lack of irrigational facilities during certain months of the year. After consulting experts in this area, organic farming & backyard farming have been identified as the starting points. This is aimed at providing steady supply of vegetables as well as enhancing awareness about the benefits of organic farming, thereby increasing the farming yield.

Youth Group

This sub-unit comprises youth who come from diverse educational backgrounds and work profiles and aspire to undertake challenging roles. They organize cultural and social events in the village. Counselling sessions have been planned with them to help them evaluate their options and find the right career path depending upon their inclinations and resources.

Children's Group

This sub-unit covers students from classes 6 to 10 studying in the Government School, Vengampakkam, selected with the assistance of the Principal. These students will be inducted into the Science Club, a unit of the Tamil Nadu Science Forum. A few sessions have been conducted with these students to improve their spoken English and basic knowledge in science. An Art competition was conducted to enhance their artistic skills.

Activities

In order to build bonds and strengthen our ties with the students, we conducted a drawing competition in the village. The students of various classes enthusiastically participated in the competition. Some of the paintings were very creative and extraordinary. Many students also came forward with other talents such as singing & dancing. Prizes were given to the best performers. From this point on, we could really connect with the students. Students also considered us more approachable post this event.
As a part of the activities conducted in the village, we have successfully registered our science forum group with the Tamil Nadu Science Forum (TNSF) and have conducted various event. Regular science forum classes are held every Sunday evening. We also conducted a sky gazing event in association with TNSF where the enthusiastic students were taught about various astronomical bodies. The students were shown various constellations that were visible to the naked eye. Using a telescope we were able to take a closer look at the moon, Venus, Jupiter and 3 of its moons. The session was very insightful. It was an experience that was both educative and entertaining.
We also organized a talk by Mr.Dhananjayan that aimed at taking forward our initiative of developing a sustainable income for the Self Help Groups (SHGs). A few members of each of the SHGs enrolled for a three day workshop on organic farming. They now seem very impressed with the idea of Organic Farming and wish to start implementing the same soon. We have also asked Ms Nagabhushanam (the head of the Anna Teresa SHG) to identify a date when Mr Dhananjayan will be meeting her SHG to discuss the alternate sources of income for the SHG. The same will be conducted once they are done with their training.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Vengampakkam for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 32, VILLAGE NAME: VITTALAPURAM

Village team members: 12321 Devyani Sharma, 12341 Neha Verma, 12356 Shashwat Rai(Village Coordinator), 12162 Shruti Tamrakar

"I can walk, talk and laugh English Sir. I am a student of class 8th and I want to become a pilot one day."
These were the first words that greeted us on our arrival, words that at first glance were hearsay and could have been casually categorized as self marketing tripe. But as we started interacting with our guide, I realized that maybe I wasn't looking; these were first signs of things to come.

For Team32 of Spartans (as the Class of 2012 is known), visiting the village exemplified a sense of expectation, as when discussing a major life change. We were all eager to experience the village life. The warmth and friendliness of the villagers was remarkable. Language of emotions is truly the language of all. In subsequent visits, the villagers shared with us the simplicity of their lives and their strength in handling all adversities. It was amazing how appearances can be deceptive. Their simplicity was not to be translated into any deprivation. Some families are definitely well to do with their children studying in good colleges and schools in the city. There are some well educated and well employed members in their society. However, this village is deprived of numerous essential services such as proper and consistent medical care, assured education services, sanitation and garbage disposal etc.

A Look back in the past

2009

It was observed that most of the students could read and write English as they were taught in school, however, they could not converse in the language and dint really have the basics of the understanding of the language as they used to merely mug up the words and spellings without really knowing the meanings. The karma yogis focussed on working on enhancing their English speaking skills and on ensuring they understood word meanings and sentence construction. English speaking classes were thus a part of the project.
A health camp was also organized in the village with the help of Chettinad Hospital. Over 140 people derived benefits out of the same. The students also worked towards conducting an HIV awareness camp in the village. SCOPE int had shown keen interest in partnering for the same and the students were in fact in talks with the company to schedule and hold the program in the village.
Women were approached, seeking their participation and interest in making handicrafts and other utility items at home. Looking at the response rate and enthusiasm, five women were selected who underwent workshops for candle making and making washing powder at home.
The students were also in talk with an NGO, RangDe in order to obtain micro finance for the small businesses in the village. The organization offers micro credit at low rates. The organization also agreed to work on providing a proper distribution channel for the products of these small businesses.

2010 - Focus on education

At school the Headmistress welcomed Great Lakers, also the kids were excited to see visitors and we were equally excited to be in a school after a long time. During our conversation with the Headmistress we got the following details

• The school has classes till standard 8th.


• Total number of students are 192


• Total number of teachers are 7


• The timings of the school are 9:30 PM to 4:30 PM


They expressed the following requirements


• Teaching Students English and Computers


• Conduct Sports Activities


• Conduct an Awareness program in village so that more parents send their children to school and encourage them to study.

With our efforts we were able to meet some of the above and provided continuous guidance to develop a sustainable system to contribute to the education requirements of the villagers.

2012, Present Scenario:

There is a story behind every existence and a plethora of reasons behind every story, it's one of those whirlpools that will and have always existed and perhaps forms the untold story of every living creature on this planet. Some are fortunate enough to realise a hint of it and the rest are lost in their own world within the world. The dream for us is to influence and bring about a sustainable change in the life of the children in our village.
There are number of students in high school or getting vocational training from polytechnic institutes. They seek employment in Kalpakkam power plant and some of them work as part time welders. A disturbing fact is that with disposable income and no responsibility, there is a possibility of using this money for unwanted purposes. We have started mentoring them so that they contribute this money towards their family, focus on their studies and also plan for higher education.
We also plan to advise them on avenues of higher education and sources of finance to fund it. There are many problems that villagers face - lack of medical facilities, lack of livelihood which fits the village ecosystem, quality education, etc. We went to Vitalapuram with the specific target and zeal, promising ourselves to bring about a substantial change in the life of the youth and kids over a period of time. We have devised our strategy keeping our eyes open to things happening beside and maintaining a view of our targets beyond! The only reward perhaps we expect from the kids is the smile on their faces in our presence that fuel our motivations and add strength to our beliefs, belief of contributing to carve a better future for some of them at least.

Water conservation

As we embarked further into our quest for conservation of the water bodies around, I happened to visit my own village and understand the ground condition of a lake/backwater that occupies the backside of the village. The agenda of the visit was to identify various prevailing conditions such as how the water was used, what system was in place to upkeep the same and various other factors. Following are the findings:

1. The lake is a perennial body that is fed by the nearby sea and all the rain water that flows into the lake through various channels in the village


2. The water is salty, completely unfit for agricultural and drinking purposes


3. The surrounding area of the lake, primarily covered by dense forest is used for 'dah-sanskar' and some were also using the scenic ambience to drink alcohol etcetera (as was visible with the bottles floating around)


4. The water though was being used for cattle upkeep.

Little could be done was our initial reaction and after talking to the elders around our notion was confirmed that at the most this lake water could be used for developing a small park or perhaps for recreation purposes but desalination and purification would require immense effort and instead other water bodies like that of Kadambadi or Kunnathur or Manmai should be our focus areas.

TNSF workshops

The concept of Science club which was seeded in 2011 was institutionalized in our village In January 2012, when the first TNSF session was organized by Mr Dhananjayan and his team of TNSF activists. This session dealt with understanding the scientific bent and analytical capabilities of the kids in the village, the sharpness of their memory, their keenness to learn and adapt to new environments etc. Several games were played like Ping Pong, some alertness games etc. in order to gauge the above parameters and do a rough analysis of the kids in the village.
This was followed up by a series of workshops held by TNSF, in all four by now of which two have been organized by TNSF people and the remaining are carried out as a routine weekly sessions held by the science club coordinator appointed for the village Ms. Indumati. The lady appointed as the coordinator has been associated with TNSF ever since her participation in a nationwide competition held by TNSF annually in which she won in the district level. She has been extremely enthusiastic and involved in this activity and things related to it right from the very beginning. She has deep rooted leadership skills which were hopefully further enhanced when she started working along with us in this activity. Kids in the village treat her with a lot of respect and gel with her very well. She is currently pursuing her engineering degree from Dhanlaxmi College of Engineering.

We hope to institutionalize the science club workshops as a weekly activity carried out in the village with a new agenda every week so that it can help in nurturing new talent in these young kids and develop the scientific approach in whatever area of interest they pursue in their lives.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Vittalapuram for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 33, VILLAGE NAME: PUDUPATTINAM

Village team members: Hemangi Sharma, Manish Bhadri, Mrinmayi Sapre (Village Coordinator), Noopur Goel, Urjit Shah, Venakata Manotej Swami.

About Pudupattinam

Pudupattinam is a census town in Kancheepuram district in Tamil Nadu. It is in the southern end of the Kalpakkam Township, a few kilometres away from the Kalpakkam Nuclear Power Facility.
Pudupattinam town consists of 2 villages, Oyyalikuppam and Pudupattinam Kuppam. These villages are coastal villages along the boundaries of the Kalpakkam Township. Pudupattinam predominantly is a fishermen colony surrounded from three sides by sea water. Main occupation of the village is fishing with a small percentage of people engaged as daily wage labourers. The village was severely affected by the Tsunami of 2004, since then village has been rehabilitated by the effort of various NGOs. Hope Foundation is one of the most prominent NGOs which has been working in the Kuppam. Hope foundation runs primary school in the Kuppam area which also caters to the nearby neighbourhood of Sadras. We after having a discussion with Mr Santhosh, the Correspondent of Hope School, we decided to work with them in their initiative of helping the underprivileged children of the Kuppam area.

Hope Foundation Details

Hope foundation is based in Delhi. It is a NGO which is funded by a German Shoe manufacturer. HOPE foundation in Chennai takes care of HIV/AIDS affected people.
HOPE foundation arrived in coastal Tamil Nadu with Tsunami relief on 27th December 2004. Immediate relief to the victims was provided. Food packets and sleeping mats, bed sheets, rice and other essential items were distributed to the victims. Community development programmes for the villages of Pudupattinam district were initiated. The partnership envisaged the construction of the Wilhelm Hamm Centre of HOPE (WHCOH). The centre aimed to provide the children with quality education and medical support – including vaccination etc. At present, a Primary and Nursery School has been established at the Centre.

Initiative taken up the Great Lakes Team

Football coaching

The intention of starting the football camp was to introduce the students of the Hope School to football as well as of importance of physical activities. We decided to conduct the sessions on every Thursday early in the morning from 6am to 7.30am. Initially, only students from class V and VI were invited to the camp as we felt it would be easier to start with them. Initially we started with by explaining students the benefits of fitness and daily exercise was given and some ice breaking exercise. Later the session focused on the physical exercises and football training. Apart from physical education student also learned the importance of discipline, punctuality and team work.

ID card Initiative

We also provided our help in the making of ID cards for students. Joseph from our Karma Yoga team took photos of all the 300 students in the school for the purpose. This was done in over 2 separate visits in which around 1000 pictures were taken in total with a few covering the school premises as well which would be used in the different initiatives undertaken by Hope Foundation.

Personality-development sessions

Apart from the sports activities which were focused on improving the health and fitness of the children and increasing their knowledge about the games our prime focus was to improve the oratory and the communication skills of the students. For this we decided to work on the Personality Development Programme. We wanted it to be a structured programme so as to target the need- base requirement of the students. The key issue was that once the students move into the real world for further education and working in the cities, they are not able to accept themselves as confident people in front of the city bred kids in spite of having a good amount of talent. So we wanted to make the children speak as much as they can during their interactions with us to overcome the fear of speaking.
Our PDP sessions included various modules starting from ice-breaking sessions to make the students comfortable with us, speech delivery sessions, confidence improving sessions etc. While in the course of this initiative a group of VI standard student participated in the presentation competition conducted by IGCAR and won third prize in the competition.

Science Club initiative

In collaboration of TNSF, Karma Yoga teams decided to establish a science club in each village. We with the help of Hope Foundation School formulated science club at Pudupattinam. The goal of science club was to enhance the scientific curiosity of the students in the school and expose them to various activities in order to stimulate their thought process. As a part of this initiative we conducted a science exhibition in the school in which students from third to sixth standard participated.

Sky watching session

We also conducted a sky watching session for the students in collaboration with TNSF. A telescope was arranged and various celestial bodies were shown to the students including planets and constellations. Students were also imparted information about the planets. The session was attended by around 100 students.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Pudupattinam for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 34, VILLAGE NAME: VASUVASAMUDRAM

Village team members: Avani Mittal (Village Coordinator), Ajay Pokale, DebasmitaDey, Mohammad Khurram Mirza

About Village:

Vasuvasamudram village is situated on the East Coast Road at a distance ofabout 15kms from Great Lakes Institute of Management. The villageis inhabited byquite friendly and hospitablepeople.As part of the Experiential Leadership Project called Karma Yoga, we've been working towards enhancing the self-esteem and self-efficacy of these villagers. We intend to be a change agent to bring about a positive transformation in the lives of villagers. The idea is to 'teach to fish' and not 'feed the fish'; to cultivate empowerment and not dependence.
Our institute adopted this village in year 2010. Students from Gladiators batch started forging bonds with the villagers. They conducteda drawing competitionfor the village childrenand interacted with Ms Sahaya Mary, the headmistress of the village school. They also touched base with the then village head, Mr C Sekhar to hold a health camp in the village. As there is not even a dispensary there, the villagers were quite receptive about this idea.Also, there are several self-help groups operating in the village. It is found thatthe money pooled in by these groups is not put to use for an entrepreneurial advantage. We learned that NGOs such as 'Hand-in-Hand' canprovide some training to these SHGs. DrKumaravelfromKrishiVignan Kendra had suggested to the Gladiators that mushroom farming would be the best option in the village. Our Great Lakersthus pondered over the idea of introducing Micro Finance and Micro Entrepreneurship in the village.
This year we, from the batch of Spartans,embarked on this journey to colour the picture envisaged by our seniors.In this position of responsibility, we've initiated several key measures in Vasuvasamudram. Introducing organic farming to village-folks as a sustainable, self-reliant and constructive means of living is one such step in this regard. For the villagers, the primary source of livelihood is paddy-farming. However, a substantial land area is left unutilised by many households. We felt that such places could be utilised to cultivate vegetables organically, thus cutting down the expenses incurred in purchasing them from market. Initially, villagers had mistakenly assumed organic farming to be an unyielding, expensive and time-consuming activity. To change their notion, we had to convince them with substantive evidence. With the backing of our institute, we approached several scientists like Mr Satish Patel from Enzotech, Mr Sami from Centre for Culture and Development and MsSabitha that pioneer in this field. They visit the village head Mr GovindRajan and the farmers on a regular basis. They explain and demonstrate the economic benefits and methodology of this practice. As a result, a number of farmers have now come forward showing their willingness to adopt the same.
Likewise, we've been conducting children-centric activities with the support of Tamil Nadu Science Forum.Initially we established a deep-rooted rapport with the children by tutoring and assisting them in their studies. Presently TNSF scientists like Mr.Jayavelu, Mr.Venkatesh and Mr.Parthasarthy are the eminent personas working with our team. Our village moderators, Mr.Srinivas and Mr.Prasad, are enthusiastically involved in the 'Sir C.V.Raman' Science Illam activities at our village. Our science club has 22 registered students. As the science clubs activities take place, we've observed a tremendous positive change among the children. The nervous and hesitant ones, especially the girls have become more outspoken with increased levels of self-confidence. Children are increasingly becoming active in listening and attempting/answering the questions raised. The science experiments interest them and they have started developing curiosity about happenings around them. The moderators as well as the designated students of the club have assumed greater sense of responsibility and accountability. They serve as the role models for the aspiring lot.
With the support of TNSF, we've also conducted a star gazing event for our village children during which the TNSF scientists explained astronomy to children. The distant stars, constellations and planets in the sky were shown and pointed out with a laser beam. Children were so elated about the whole event that they were actually singing and dancing along.
Apart from the TNSF activities, we are also trying to nurture the extra-curricular talents of children in the village. We've organized two drawing competitions this year. The motive ofsuch competitions goes beyond the purpose of enhanced reach and visibility in the village. With these activities children develop a sense of healthy competition. The prizes and recognition boost their morale. These are small activities to make them realise their hidden worth and potential.
Besides, we're also working towards women-empowerment with the aid of Self Help Groups operating in the village.As part of these groups, our village women operate in clusters of 10-12 members and take bank loans of around Rs.45, 000 @ 1% interest rate. This money is distributed among the members who repay it as per their convenience. The profits earned by the self-help groups are equally shared among the members. As we persuaded the ladies to undertake initiatives to enhance their income, we realised that they were willing to undergo vocational trainings in this regard. Ms.Kumuda, Ms.Rukmani and Ms.Vidhyavalli are some of the proactive ladies who are willing to lead this cause. Once equipped with vocational trainings the women can market their self-made products and thus further their monthly income. We conducted a focus group and found that women are keen on attending trainings and starting an enterprise if a third party procures materials and sells for them.
Emancipation of village folk from drug addiction and alcoholism is another priority which we are addressing by collaborating with specialized organizations and hospitals.
This project has made us assume the role of leaders of leaders. Our followers are actually taking key responsibilities and getting positive action items done in the village. The increased sense of ownership and self-confidence among them is our true reward.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Vasavasamudram for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 41, VILLAGE NAME: KOTHIMANGALAM

Village team members: Anamika Roy(Village Coordinator), Gajendran Murugesan, Hariharan G, Sandeep Singh, Sonam Duhan

Summary of Key Activities

As a part of the activities of our leadership experiential project, Karma Yoga, we divided our village-Kothimangalam's population into homogeneous sub-groups. In each sub group we selected one central person who acts as a central point of contact and who keeps in touch with all the members of the sub group. Aset of goals common to members of a single group were determined which was communicated to them by the lead person. The lead person was selected on the basis of being capable enough to influence all the members of the group so that all the members contribute equally to achieve the goals set by them.
One sub group mainly consists of children who are studying in school. Their central person is Dhanush. The objective for this group is to enhance their knowledge through science clubs and other knowledge sharing activities. First we started with conducting Children's Parliament Sessions. By doing this they learned about law and order control and what is the role of parliament and government bodies in India. This helped them to know about democracy and the importance of being a democratic nation. By doing this we want them to learn about raising their voice in case of need. We want them to be active participants in the decision-making processes in their daily lives. We have always encouraged them to learn more about what is going on currently in the world. This helps them to look beyond their village and bring the improvement in living conditions of people living in their village. We have regular sessions of science club in our village and it has actually helped in increasing their knowledge and interest in Science and Maths.
The other key contribution of our Karma Yoga activities has been to the Govt. Boys Senior Secondary School. We have introduced the school to teaching tools like You-Tube videos, internet access and the use of LCD projector screening. This has actually helped the teachers to have more interactive teaching-learning sessions with the students. Also the Teacher-Student ratio is really poor in the school; hence we have been closely working with Mr. Sridhar from Reward Trust to employ more teachers in the school.
The other sub group consists of the women whom we have been motivating to form a self-help group, to gettrained to operate sewing machines and soon they will start earning through it. We met the village head Vasantha who works as a maid in the nearby village. Vasantha belongs to the Erula tribe which consists of 62 families in the colony. She helped us in taking the survey about the major employment jobs of the villagers.
These are, in essence, the various sub groups with whom we have been working in the last few months. We do hope that our efforts have had tiny yet positive impact on their lives. That said, it has been an experience to reckon with, having come this far in this project.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Kothimangalam for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 42, VILLAGE NAME: Amanambakkam

Village team members: Abinaya Bose, Adveta Dwivedi, Indraneel Kulkarni, Manish Garg, Maunil Shah (Village Co-ordinator), Richa Kumari

Science club

In continuation with the science club activities, we decided to show the kids some videos on missiles & space rockets. We showed them a video on the moon mission with the launch of the Apollo 11 mission on the Saturn-V rocket, carrying astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin. We explained to them in Tamil about what was going on and the children watched with keen interest. The moon mission video was followed up by some videos of missiles developed indigenously (Prithvi, Trishul). It was interesting to note the reaction of the children upon seeing the flag of the nation on the missiles. They were quite enthusiastic about the whole thing and we threw some general knowledge questions at them. It was good to note that they knew about APJ Abdul Kalam, the missile man of India.
Unfortunately, we have also suffered a set-back in this initiative. We had been on the lookout for and found a person in the village that was both capable and interested in carrying forward the Science club. This would have ensured some continuity and hopefully, increased interest among the children for higher education. However, all of a sudden, this person suddenly decided to back out and is no longer interested. Attempts to get in touch with him so far have been unsuccessful. Also, so far there isn't anyone else that we have interacted with who could possibly take up from where we leave.
Further, we also tried to highlight to the children some of the benefits that can come from keeping a simple but accurate record of their daily pocket money and expenses. The children were asked to maintain a simple sheet in their notebooks where they were to write down three simple things everyday:
Pocket Money: Rs.xx
Spent: Rs.yy
Savings: Rs.zz
In our next visit, the kids were required to show us their records. Some of the children did keep records and also informed us that their mother was quite happy upon seeing this. We will remind them of this activity again in subsequent visits. Hopefully, someone will benefit from making this a habit.

Hygiene Session

The much planned-and-postponed hygiene session finally took place in the village. We oversaw and confirmed the arrangements for all things the day before by meetings with the principal of the local school, the lady from the local Self Help Group Mrs. Sumathi and finally Mrs.Mekala of TNSF, who conducted the session. The necessary permissions were obtained by the principal and we checked the location for conducting the session. The girls from std. 5th to 8th were also notified of the event. Perhaps due to political or maybe esteem reasons, some villagers asked us to inform the village head as well. We got hold of him and following our chat, he was found to be quite willing to help out in any way required. He even went to the school to speak with the principal. Whether this was a part of local power games or a genuine interest, we do not know. This notwithstanding, the arrangements were finalised and the session commenced the next morning. The session was a success and we received feedback from some of the ladies to hold more such sessions. We were assured that there would be an even higher participation the next time. The current session saw participation of around 35-40 girls and women and explained to them some important aspects of the female body like the reproductive system, menstrual cycle, awareness of puberty, the changes that the adolescent girls would take place in their body. The attendants were also educated about scenarios which they should look out for, be cautious and seek the services of a doctor. The children were very responsive and took in the information. The talk gave them courage and lessened, if not completely removed, their fears on the matter and made them more aware about levels of health and hygiene. People were seen later, approaching Mrs. Mekala individually to discuss their health problems. We are interested in arranging a session again soon.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Amanambakkam for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 43, VILLAGE NAME: Echankaranai

Village team members: Charanya T (village coordinator), Chintan Gandhi, Gunjan Raja, Maheeja G, RichaChauhan

Work Summary:

The Karma Yoga project is a unique opportunity provided to each of us to practically discover the skills of leadership through adopting a village and introducing positive changes. Our initial visits to the village were aimed at understanding the focus areas for initiating the change process. As we tried to gain better insights into the nature of the problems, we had the growing realization that becoming a part of someone's world is the key, and the most significant aspect, before we start to transform it.
Through intensive interactions with the villagers and our observations, we drew up an action plan to put into effect our objective of empowering the villagers. Our first focus was the young enthusiastic children in the village with whom we had established excellent rapport within the first few visits. Through organizing a painting competition for them, we not only got to know the children better, but utilized the opportunity to educate them about the importance of a good education and the ill-effects of tobacco and alcohol - a persistent problem in the village. A few movie clips proved instrumental in delivering inspirational messages to these young children. Towards the end of this event, villagers invited us for religious ceremonies taking place in the temple. The thought that they were so welcoming cemented our belief that we have been successful to an extent in making them our friends and that, we as a group and as ambassadors of the Karma Yoga project have touched their lives in a positive way. This was just the beginning.
The next step involved bringing the children to our institute to cement in them the importance of pursuing higher education and to sow in them the desire to go ahead in life and to think big. We named this event 'Siragugal', which means wings in Tamil. This event was our humble attempt to give wings to their dreams, and hope to their goals. With this aim in mind, we organized a campus tour for them in which they interacted with various members of different departments. This was aimed at informing them about the broad spectrum of jobs that can be pursued after a good education. Our professors addressed them to imbibe in them the importance of building a great career.
To keep up the momentum in this direction, a Science Club and a Reading Club were initiated, in which the village children met in the library on a weekly basis to share knowledge and create an effective forum for 'Empowerment through Engagement'. The idea was to create a platform for the village children which will be managed and run by them, thereby effectively empowering them to engage in productive learning activities. We have already had many successful meetings of these two forums and are hopeful that this wheel will keep going now that the initial few cycles are complete. At present, we are working on organizing a career counselling session for the children to guide them effectively with respect to their future goals.
Besides working with the children, we simultaneously focused on the men and women in the village. The two major areas that we identified for intervention were substance abuse and hygiene. To create awareness about these two themes, we facilitated a street play which was performed by an enthusiastic group of seventeen children. After months of practising and perfecting, the play was performed in the village temple before a large and appreciative audience. As a follow-up to the play, pamphlets pertaining to diseases due to lack of cleanliness, prevention of urinary tract infection, causes and prevention of diarrhoea and ill effects of tobacco were distributed to the village people. In the next phase of these interventions, a cancer screening camp for women was organized at RUWSEC hospital. We created awareness about the camp and encouraged the women to come in full strength for the screening.
As we look back at all these memories, we hope to make the last one month of our association with the people of Echankaranai just as productive and as rewarding. We sincerely hope that our presence and interaction made some positive difference to the lives of these people and that the batches after us will continue to cement the relationships we nurtured and to make a positive difference.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Echankaranai for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 44, VILLAGE NAME: Naduvakkarai

Village team members: Manu Girdonia "Village Coordinator", Praveen Prabhu, Roshani Nair

We started our Karma Yoga project in April with the aim of increasing the self efficacy and self esteem of the villagers. In order to understand the real needs of the villagers we had to break the ice and reach them at a more personal level so that they would be able to share their concerns and grievances with us.
We felt that through children we would be able to reach out to the adults in the village. Therefore, we organized a painting competition for the kids. It was a huge success, 20-30 kids participated in the competition and we as a group were accepted by the villagers. Through the exercise we were able to develop a personal bond with the children. Later, we realized that the quality of education that children get was not up to the mark. With the intention of creating awareness among children about science, we contacted Tamil Nadu Science Forum. We successfully inaugurated a science club in the village. Through this club we will not only create awareness about science and importance of science but also help children in understanding their classroom subject better. Currently, we are trying to create awareness about villager's immediate environment through videos.
Our next agenda was to understand the problems faced by village women. They are primarily house wives who are ready to work in their free time. We gathered information about self help groups operating in the village and their mode of operation. We also talked to the banks that finance these self help groups. We also realized the importance of hygiene in villager's life.
In our future visits, we intend to create awareness about hygiene by organizing a health and hygiene awareness camp. At the same time we would want to move our science club initiative to the next level in which the club may start operating on its own, without our help.
Below is the census data (2010) of village

Photographs of Science Forum inauguration function:
https://picasaweb.google.com/praveenmprabhu/ScienceForumAtVillage?authkey=Gv1sRgCLv16LTth4X7iQE#5653035392060549506
https://picasaweb.google.com/praveenmprabhu/ScienceForumAtVillage?authkey=Gv1sRgCLv16LTth4X7iQE#5653036092052677666
https://picasaweb.google.com/praveenmprabhu/ScienceForumAtVillage?authkey=Gv1sRgCLv16LTth4X7iQE#5653036147096696082

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Naduvakkarai for the year 2011-2012

VILLAGE NUMBER: 45, VILLAGE NAME: Veerapuram

Village team members: Akriti Anand (Village Coordinator), Divya Monga, Prasanna Krishna Venkat Rao.

The Karma yoga project gives us the unique opportunity of understanding leadership through actual experience. We were sent to our village Veerapuram with the stated objective of increasing self esteem and self efficacy of the villagers. We were supposed to understand the real needs of our villagers through extensive interaction and empower them to achieve it. We had to provide them the means to achieve the end thus in turn increase their confidence in themselves. Our project objective has been to empower villagers in such a way that they

• Are able to achieve their goals through the skills we have imparted- networking, basic negotiation, business skills to a group of youth in our village who were awarded some money by the government to establish their businesses.
• Understand the importance of education in their lives.
• Rise to a better standard of living by spreading awareness of cleanliness and hygiene.
• Realize the importance of healthy living.

When we first went to Veerapuram in the April of 2011 our first impression was of a narrow dusty road flanked by farmland on both sides taking us into the by lanes of this village. This quaint little place with a population of about 2500 was alive with activity on that evening. Girls, dressed in bright Salwar Kurta, had come out to fetch water from the well and men were giving their livestock a bath in the surrounding lake. We found out that the village primary school and a temple under construction beside it were the nerve point, from where all activity of the village flows. We started talking to the villagers to understand their life and the hardships that they faced. We wanted them to trust us and be able to freely communicate with us. After the initial few visits we had identified a few things that we could actually work on to bring a positive change in their lives.
Some of the projects undertaken by us and our seniors through the years are as follows:

2009:

• A HIV awareness camp was conducted in the village of Veerapuram with Scope International.
• A health camp was conducted.
• Candle making, detergent & ink making, selling skills were imparted to villagers. The target group from 5 villages got trained on activities such as candle making, detergent & ink making, selling skills and make a living thereby. 37 people from 5 villages got trained and promised to put the best use of the skills into practice and show us some measurable progress.

2010:

A majority of the time was spent understanding the issues faced by these villagers. One major issue that students came across was of lack of basic amenities in the school premises. There were no proper rest room for girls and it was causing them a lot of discomfort and stress. They talked to the school head mistress, who was initially not at all happy about their intruding in school's affair. But when they showed their earnest interest, they won her confidence and went about getting funds for the construction of restrooms in the school compound. Although not an easy task, they were finally able to garner enough support and funds for it to be constructed by the end march 2011.

2011:

We started off from where our seniors had left off. While they had worked on improving infrastructure of the school, we focused on improving quality of education that they were receiving. We found out that the children didn't have any extracurricular activity in their school and had no idea about any kind of sports except cricket. They were also very weak in English, math and science. So we first decided to engage the students through Drawing Competition and Sports meet. It was a huge success and the kids became really friendly with us.
After this we started holding Math, science, English and Computer classes. Weekly classes were held wherein they were shown educational videos. We also started a Tamil Nadu Science Forum Science Club to increase awareness amongst kids.
Although we could see our efforts were really helping these kids, we knew it was not a sustainable solution. What would happen after we finish our course here? This led us to work with Eureka Child Foundations. We want to start a tuition center in our village in collaboration with Eureka Child which would provide an all round development for these Children.
In the course of our time spent in Veerapuram, we met Vijay, a second year engineering student. He helped us in all our endeavors and is one of the volunteers for Eureka Child Foundation. He also helped us conduct a Health Camp in collaboration with Rotary Club, Madras West which was very successful. We reached out to over 170 villagers through this camp.
We also spent quite a lot of time in convincing our village panchayat head to re-open the village library which had been closed for about a year and half. With our continued effort he saw the benefits and decided to recruit a librarian. Now the library is open every day during school hours.
Road ahead for us would be setting up the Eureka Child Foundation tuition Center as we feel that would provide a long term solution to our problem at hand. We sincerely hope that through our efforts we were able to bring about somechange in the lives of these people.

 

Click here to watch a video on Karma Yoga activities at Veerapuram for the year 2011-2012