I have been volunteering for AID(Association for India's Development, San Diego Chapter) for the past two months or so. This has exposed me to a lot of facts and figures about India, the magnitude of which am still trying to take in. One thing is very clear. There is so much work to be done and any help, how much ever small it is, is most welcome. AID, in my opinion, serves as a perfect platform for that. It won't be a great exaggeration to say that the kinds of projects it undertakes are as diversified as the number of problems India is facing at the moment. So, there's something for everyone.
I must consider myself very lucky for having picked this time to join AID because Memorial Day Weekend(last weekend of May) is when the annual AID conference(in USA) happens, and that's when people like Ravi Kuchimanchi and Balaji Sampath visit the States to attend the conference and to render speeches in the different AID chapters(36 chapters in USA according to the website- possibly more). More luckily for me, they were both going to visit the San Diego chapter this year(i couldn't attend the conference because of my trip to the Rocky Mountains that weekend- more on that in my next entry). Balaji was slated to give a speech about his "Padippum Inikkum" campaign in Tamilnadu on May 22nd, Ravi about the recently launched NREGA Act(National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) on June 9th and his wife Aravinda about the need for promoting rural arts/practices, on the same day. In between these two speeches, there was another speech by social activist and Gandhian, Dr. Prabhakar Menon, on "Violence Against Women in India- Connections to the Caste System" on June 6th. I attended all three talks(four speakers) and am so glad I did.
Let me try and give a brief intro about Ravi and Balaji. Ravi can be considered as the official founder of AID. He was doing his PhD in Particle Physics at the University of Maryland-College Park in 1991, when this idea of doing something for India struck him. He sent out an email to a bunch of his friends asking them if they'd be interested in contributing money to do something good in some village in India, and most of them did. This motivated him and he started organizing CSHs(Community Service Hours- this is an AID culture to this date) and gathered more volunteers for AID. By the time he graduated, AID had become very popular there. He married Aravinda Pillalamarri, who grew up in USA, and left to India for good in 1998, and has been living 50% of the time in Mumbai and the rest of the time in the villages of Orissa and Srikakulam(AP) district, working fulltime at the grassroot level on a variety of issues. They have a four year old daughter, Khiyali. They have been acknowledged as one of the inspirations behind Ashutosh Gowariker’s “Swades”...and i personally feel that they make a wonderful couple.
sharing a light moment with Ravi at one of the volunteers' house, couple of hours before Khiyali, Aravinda and him left San Diego.
I don't know much about Balaji's personal life- mainly because there was rarely an opportunity to ask him any personal questions. He had so much to tell us about his work in Tamilnadu and boy, can he speak or what?!! He's amazing when it comes to discussing issues, and is very methodical and down-to-earth in his approach. Balaji was in Ravi's junior batch at College Park and used to evade Ravi to avoid going to CSHs! He did his PhD in Communications. His wife is Kalpana is also an active volunteer of AID. Balaji also left US for good and is based in Chennai, working at the grassroot level in the villages of Tamilnadu. His area of expertise, so to say, is education. He has been, and is, instrumental in improving the reading skills of kids in village schools.More about the speeches rendered in San Diego by the two prime figures of AID and much more about the past month in my upcoming blog entries!
16 comments:
Thats a very nice write up!!!!good to see you wetting your feet in AID
Any organization which intends to help the poor must first learn basic economics! Then, they they wouldn't think NREGA would help anyone!
Ramya- Thanks! :) -you should too when you can!
Naren- NREGA has helped people and there are statistics available to show the same...but what'd be the rationale behind thinking that it wouldn't?
@Ram
I expected this from you - typical NGO-ish key-hole thinking!
What you saw is visible statistics - be very clear. Invisible effects don't show-up until a few years later.
For example, there is a simple side effect of distorting labour markets - people would prefer to do NREGA work and get some money for no work at all, rather than to do backbreaking work in the fields, even at full daily minimum wage rates.
What you often fail to understand is that Govt. doesn't produce anything. So, any employment it 'creates' is nothing but fake employment - it just redistributes money from somewhere!
Redistribution of wealth makes everyone poorer, even if there is zero corruption(total wealth reduces when you redistribute wealth).
Some (left-leaning)economist does a better job of explaining it here
That's why I'm skeptical of many NGOs - I see economic ignorance, a reluctance to learn it and above all, a blind belief that what they do will succeed. If they were indeed intent on helping the poor, they wouldn't be closed to reason!
Naren- NREGA guarantees a minimum income for each rural family. Whether you agree or not, employment translates to definite income in the case of these villagers. Atanu's argument that producing more will increase the income unfortunately does not hold true for those below the poverty line. The more you produce, the more is the income of the people at the top rungs of the social ladder. It is definitely not proportional or even within reason to consider that as a short-term path. Until the basic problem of poverty is not attended to, India cannot think long-term...at the expense of those below the poverty line.
get some money for no work at all, rather than to do backbreaking work in the fields, even at full daily minimum wage rates.
-you have no idea what kind of works they get to do. To state an example, digging a 100 cubic feet hole and moving the mud to a place 50 metres away is considered as 2-labor days' work by our government, whereas a similar job was considered to be 3-labor days' work during British rule in late 19th century! That's the kind of atrocity that's happening with these people. You have no idea how much welcome this "Act"(not Scheme) is for these people. Ravi and other AID volunteers are working so hard to make sure that the Act is being implemented in a proper manner, and it's no easy task, given the corrupt nature of the government officials.
it just redistributes money from somewhere! Redistribution of wealth makes everyone poorer
-not the ones who benefit from this Act and that matters.
That's why I'm skeptical of many NGOs - I see economic ignorance, a reluctance to learn it and above all, a blind belief that what they do will succeed. If they were indeed intent on helping the poor, they wouldn't be closed to reason!
-General Economics takes a backseat when you work for an NGO. It takes less brain and more heart to do social service, and there will be wrong decisions at every step as perceived by a rational person. It's inevitable and not worth spending too much time on.
"It takes less brain and more heart to do social service"
That's exactly the problem - that's why you'll NEVER succeed!
Ram, good initiative on your part! :-)
This sunday I will be joining CRY (Child Rights and You), an NGO which believes that every child is entitled to basic survival and protection. Guess you must be knowing about it.
There is no point in being cynical and cribbing about the state of affairs. Lets make a difference!
"Atanu's argument that producing more will increase the income unfortunately does not hold true for those below the poverty line. The more you produce, the more is the income of the people at the top rungs of the social ladder. It is definitely not proportional or even within reason to consider that as a short-term path. Until the basic problem of poverty is not attended to, India cannot think long-term...at the expense of those below the poverty line."
Totally fallacious. The same economic ignorance I talked about!
Producing more will only increase everyone's income. There are simply NO SHORTCUTS.
The only way to eradicate poverty is to make everyone rich!
And your statement "India cannot think long-term" is laughable.
A country doesn't need to plan. All it needs is to let people free to plan for themselves!
When I talked about "..get some money for no work at all, rather than to do backbreaking work in the fields, even at full daily minimum wage rates" - I referred to the unemployment benefits mentioned in the act, which means getting paid for nothing!
"..there will be wrong decisions at every step as perceived by a rational person. It's inevitable and not worth spending too much time on"
oh... then wrong decisions & schemes are worth spending money for? especially taxpayers money??
If you are really intent on helping people, economics CANNOT take a backseat!
And yeah... every step you talk of "it makes a difference to those people" - but you forget those invisible people to whom it made a negative difference!
Gads- Thanks. yes, i know about CRY.
There is no point in being cynical and cribbing about the state of affairs. - i completely agree :)
Naren-
Producing more will only increase everyone's income.
Try figuring out the correlation by using a linear method or by using some complex economic model and see how varied it is from top to bottom. That's increasing everyone's income by a % of what they earn already. That small % makes no difference to the poor, whereas it's huge if u already earn more. Well, this can be an endless debate.
The only way to eradicate poverty is to make everyone rich!
not necessarily. it is enough if the poor are made richer, atleast for now.
And your statement "India cannot think long-term" is laughable.
A country doesn't need to plan. All it needs is to let people free to plan for themselves!
that's in an ideal world where everyone starts at the same point. not in real world.
I referred to the unemployment benefits mentioned in the act, which means getting paid for nothing
if NREGA is implemented in a proper manner, the government officials will be under pressure to make sure that nobody gets unemployment benefits to avoid being questioned for not distributing labor amongst people in an efficient manner. That can only mean more employment opportunities and more income per family.
oh... then wrong decisions & schemes are worth spending money for? especially taxpayers money??
They are wrong as far as the rationalists are concerned. But they are not if you work for the poor people.
If you are really intent on helping people, economics CANNOT take a backseat!
it sure cannot. The simple economics that we understand is that some section of the people have a lot more than they need while a much larger section does not have the bare minimum and is dying on a daily basis.
but you forget those invisible people to whom it made a negative difference!
those invisible people are living and living well despite being on the wrong end of things. you can take blood from another person to save another person...but not kill one to save another. As long as that is not the case, i see no reason to crib.
"It takes less brain and more heart to do social service"
That's exactly the problem - that's why you'll NEVER succeed!
success is a very relative term. As long as you feel happy about what you've accomplished, you have succeeeded.
I don't think you ever want the problem to end, you just want to "feel happy about what you've accomplished"
Your socialistic thinking won't lead you anywhere. More damage will happen as long as "Govt. should...." mentality prevails!
I don't think you ever want the problem to end
it's either you think wrong or you don't want to think right. thinking can be a tricky thing... :P
you just want to "feel happy about what you've accomplished"
that was my definition for success. how did u translate that to "i want to be successful and that's all that matters to me"? wrong again.
Your socialistic thinking won't lead you anywhere. More damage will happen as long as "Govt. should...." mentality prevails!
If Govt. wouldn't, those people can kiss life goodbbye. NGOs, by definition, don't expect the Govt. to. But when they do, we grab it with all hands. i'll be happy to see the poorest man eat one meal a day and smile with content- whether the richest man on earth paid for it or the government did matters the least to me.
Hello Ram,
Wonderful to see this post! Thanks for posting and thanks to Gads for giving me the link to your post.
In CRY Chennai, we are planning to launch a sensitisation campaign with the Right to Education as the issue. I was looking for relevant data and statistics was able to find a few in the links that you had provided. I wish CRY could partner with AID, Chennai chapter for this campaign. Thanks a lot for the post.
More about the speeches rendered in San Diego by the two prime figures of AID and much more about the past month in my upcoming blog entries!
...and I am waiting :-W
Heretic- thanks for your comment. That's nice. You can get in touch with AID-Chennai and see what can be done. Goodluck. I'll try to post the remainder of "As It Happened" pretty soon!
cool, keep up the good work !
Vidya- Thanks! :)
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