(Trip report by Subhash Pochareddy, Jan 2009)
Each time I return to India for a vacation, my to-do list remains almost the same. But during my recent trip in January, there was a new item on my list - a unique, and a much awaited one: An ILP project site visit to Thiruvallur District in Tamil Nadu.
More project images
Since joining ILP in late 2006, this was my first trip to India and my first project visit. As I planned for this event, I debated two mindsets with which I could approach the visit: wearing an auditor hat or wearing a visitor hat. An auditor hat would allow me to take stock of the situation on the ground, a feat already well accomplished by our strong, seasoned ILP-India team. As a visitor, I was hoping to see how my volunteering efforts were directly benefitting the cause of literacy in India. I chose the latter.
Thiruvallur is a border district of Tamil Nadu, about 3-1/2 hours away from my home town in Andhra Pradesh. My trip was planned to be a one-day visit to 3 villages/communities in the Poondi block. Mr. A.L. Rangarajan (Ranga) from ILP-India team joined me from Chennai on this visit. The trip was planned on a Sunday. Since it was a holiday, I was expecting to meet people in the community rather than visit open schools. The 3 villages/communities we visited were: Kalaignar Nagar in Katchur panchayat (Village 1), An ST colony of Vellathukkottai panchayat (Village 2) and Varadapuram of Pattarai Perumbudur (Village 3).
I reached Katchur panchayat about 10 minutes before the IRCDS team and Ranga. Village 1 was about 5 minutes away from where I had stopped. While I awaited my counterparts, I got a chance to capture a few pictures at that location. The din & bustle around the bus station was nothing unusual - people waiting to hop on to the next bus, make-shift kiosks busy with activity, people chit-chatting on an idyllic Sunday morning. As I glanced around, a couple of things caught my attention: (a) Despite being in an interior community, people were carrying slick cell phones that would make a few silicon-valley models look outdated. (b) A group of children were working on digging some roadside channels, on a Sunday no less. I was amazed at the diverse scenarios, juxtaposed within a few feet of each other. One depicted a sign of progress. The other, however, tugged at your heart and made you wonder, “Do these children not mind doing this in what should be their free time?”
After the introductions to the IRCDS team and Ranga, we went in to Village 1. The village was organized as rows of thatched roof huts for the 60 families living there. The mud-roads looked certain to create issues during the rainy season. After a quick walk around the village, we came back to meet with the community that had gathered at the anganwadi (pre-school) - mostly kids, some women and a few men. The pre-school was a single hut with an area in front that we used for this session. I sensed that the the NGO personnel have had to spend a good amount of time before they could earn the villagers’ trust. Only then could they successfully broach the topic of their children's education. IRCDS was already involved in helping the community get their caste certificates, the panchayat president helped to prevent encroachment of the village area by an eager affluent etc. A few conversations later, one of the community members explained how one of his deceased relatives' daughter needed money for diagnosis of a medical condition. It was an implicit cry for monetary help. Ranga astutely used the girl’s situation as an example to tell people how the community had to take care of themselves and that IRCDS and ILP were only helping as guides to them. This was a resounding example of the ILP’s philosophy "ILP is not a charity, but a rights-based organization" being put to action.
We drove for about 20 minutes to reach Village 2. The schools in the area were robustly constructed, with good water tanks for drinking water. We met with a very small group of villagers who had a pressing problem of some upper caste members of the community trying to displace them out of their homes. The villagers found an outlet in us and we chose to be willing listeners, though the topic was not directly related to schools or education. I concluded that, as in Village 1, lending a listening ear to the community is the best way to gather their trust. On our way out, I was pleasantly surprised to see that the school even had well constructed toilets. However, they were not being used properly. Ranga made a mental note that this was as an area of improvement that he could recommend to IRCDS. The experience at Village 2 turned out to be a little disappointing as we could not get much traction in the areas of interest to us.
On the other hand, Village 3 was buzzing with activity from the moment we arrived. The community had assembled under the shade of a few big trees. And before we settled down, a few kids were busy enacting a play that explained why drinking unclean water can lead to problems. The adults then jumped in to explain the unclean water problem that used to exist in their own village. I started engaging the kids with a few of my own antics and they were all excited. It was charming to see that they were no different from any other privileged kids that we encounter in our daily lives. The spark in their eyes was delightful, and a sight too hard to capture in words. One of the volunteers in the village, who works actively with the village and the IRCDS team members to help the children with their school work, books etc explained some of the problems at hand Some that he mentioned were children at risk crossing the roads to get to school, unclean water and caste problems. But his pride in his own sense of purpose and his accomplishments is not something I can put an estimate on. Compared to his efforts, my volunteering in the US felt relatively much easier.
As the conversations progressed, one of the village elders said something that really struck home. "You know, our local politicians come by once in 5 years to ask for votes. They don't even have time to talk to us, to understand our issues at any point in time. The fact that you come here, sit amongst us to hear about our issues and help us means SO much. It makes us believe that our children can also see better lives". There could be no better validation of my time and effort. To end my trip to the villages on the grandest note, I had every child coming to me to shake my hand and say "thank you". Even if they were nudged a bit to do it, the happiness on their faces was something that I can never forget.
For over 2 years, I had been visualizing the impact of my volunteer hours through other volunteers' project visit narrations, reading project audit reports from our ILP-India team, project videos and photographs. The one thing that was missing was a first hand experience, and this visit gave me exactly that. As I walked through the villages, I could not hide a sense of happiness when interacting with the communities, nor could I suppress the sense of pride about every minute of my time spent towards this worthy cause. It was indeed a truly rewarding experience that will keep my spirits up and my motivation high for many, many more hours before my next project visit, whenever that may be!