Touching human lives on a significant scale
We have touched more than 100,000 lives over the past decade. This has been achieved through our many projects in rural development in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Uttaranchal and Tamil Nadu.
Our projects are built on finding out and addressing the needs of the most disadvantaged village communities and groups, in particular scheduled caste and tribal villagers, and building their capacity to contribute to, absorb and benefit from our primary areas of intervention.
When our interventions bring about a perceptible, meaningful and sustainable change in the lives of villagers, then we have touched their lives – whether directly or indirectly.
But that is not enough. Until we are touching hundreds of thousands of lives, we are not achieving the mission we are committed to. Schumacher was obsessed, and so are we, by the sheer scale of Indian rural poverty; his ideas deserve the widest possible application.
To illustrate how we seek to incorporate the idea of 'multipliers' into our projects...
We have provided training and initial investments for beekeeping to 150 women in 7 villages in the northern state of Uttaranchal, who previously had no opportunities for generating income for their families. This project has touched 150 lives directly through skills training and empowerment. When these women start producing and selling honey they generate additional income for their families, and thereby we are indirectly touching more than 750 lives. By working in self-help groups these women not only help each other to learn and practise the knowledge they have gained, they are also acting as trainers to share it with others in their communities. |
Our Integrated Nutritional Health project in 40 villages in eastern Uttar Pradesh, has meaningfully touch more than 40,000 lives and our Water and Sanitation project in 16 villages south-east of Agra will make a sustainable difference to up to 30,000 lives. |
Our Deepening Democracy projects in Uttar Pradesh and Orissa have taught panchayat leaders, community based organisations, and village elders about their rights, duties and entitlements with respect to local self governance and local development. This has directly touched the 400 recipients of training. However, the fact that these leaders now have tools such as information, awareness and confidence, that equip them to access development schemes for their village, means that our intervention has touched the lives of their entire villages. |
