Awareness Campaign on Water & Sanitation

An awareness campaign on consumption of safe water and proper sanitation was organized by BISWA at Khilei village of Deogarh district on 9th September07. The resource persons of the camp were Mr. C.S Pradhan, District Coordinator, BISWA, Deogarh, Mr. Lingaraj Dash, Manager Water and Sanitation and Mr. Badri Narayan Pati, Asst. Manager, Water and Sanitation, BISWA. The theme of the camp was to create awareness among the villagers and to mobilize hygiene education. The participating self help group members demanded to provide water supply and sanitation program in their village to meet the demand relating to water and sanitation. The guests informed the participants about the impact of the problems of improper sanitation, their causes and consequences. To provide the implementation process and role of beneficiaries in this regard. As village is settled in a scattered manner, it is not possible to supply the water through over head tank. It is decided to install street wise tube well fitted with motors for supply of water to every house holds. The villagers ensured to extend their cooperation to make the sanitation program a success.

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Communicate Minds
15th Sept 2007 FORTNIGHTLY

Volume-69

ADVISORS
Khirod Ch. Malick

Workshop on Mahila Shanti Sena

BISWA organized a 4-day training camp of Mahila Shanti Sena (MSS) at village Barmaunda of Dhankauda from 10th to 13th August07. The training started on 10th August07 at its scheduled time at 9.30 A.M. Before the training started the participants welcomed the guests with flower bouquets followed by a welcome song. Then in the introductory session the honorable guests Mr. Uma Shankar Charurbedi, Mr. Sneh Kumar from Shram Bharati, Mr. Bhanu Prasad Panigrahi, Ms. Rita Parida, Mrs. Meena Behera from Unnayan, Orissa introduced themselves followed by self introduction by the participants. After tea break Ms. Rita Parida started imparting training. At first she welcomed all the participants with a bouquet and instructed to welcome each other with a welcome note and the receiver should receive the bouquet with thanks. In this way all the participants welcomed each other. Than Ms. Parida distributed candles and told them to look at the fame of the candle. Looking at the candle she instructed them to recall their past life what ever they have done since birth. All the participants remain silent for some time and participants in group came together and put the candle in the center of the hall and at the end they saw that it depicts the message of unity in diversity. After this orientation program Mr. Bhanu Panigrahi took the class and instructed to concentrate whole energy in the mind and to transfer it to the whole part of the body. Then Mr. Bhanu Panigrahi invited Mr. Chaturbedi for an experience sharing. Mr. Chaturbedi started his session in his usual style i.e. in questionnaire method. Before lunch he played a game with the participants with the help of Ms. Parida. In this play she wrote some animals and birds in a piece of paper and distributed to the participants. She instructed the participants to choose their partner by making sound. Then Sri Chaturbedi gave 10-minute break to the participants to choose their partner. After 10 minutes all the participants gathered in the training hall started giving information about their partners. In this way all the participants came closer to each other. Then he started questionnaire
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Pitabasa Sethi Ajoy Shroff Jogeswar Majhi Shiv Prasad Meher Aurobinda Mahapatra

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In this Issue...
Editorial Workshop on Mahila Shanti Sena Other news of BISWA

Inauguration of Sanitation Program

A program on Sanitation was inaugurated at village Pendrakhol of Riamal Block, Dist-Deogarh on 9th September07. The resource persons of the program were Mr. Giridhari Pradhan, Chairman, Riamal Block, Mr. Lingaraj Dash, Manager Water and Sanitation and Mr. C.S. Pradhan, District Coordinator, Deogarh. The resource persons selected the village under the Nirmal Gram Puraskar scheme of Govt. of Orissa to ensure 100% sanitation and control of open defecation, improve hygiene education, aware the people regarding sanitation and make use of it. The resources persons also ensured to extent their support to this village to make the sanitation program a successful one. The participants of the meeting were SHG members, PRI members of the village and all the supporting staff of BISWA.

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Chief Editor Debabrata Malick Editor Kiranbala Acharya

91+663 2533597(O)

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Printed and Published by Debabrata Malick, Chief Editor. The Link, at BISWA Computer Section, Danipali, Budharaja, Sambalpur. PIN- 768004 Ph. No- 0663-2533597, email: thelink@biswa.org

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Water Management: In hand with replenishing the hydrological cycle

Water is a fundamental condition for survival and is indispensable for an adequate standard of living. And, today, another realization has dawned upon us that water is a finite natural resource. At present, ground water table is depleting at a rate of 1-mt every year (HRD report 2006), river water is highly contaminated with industrial effluents and domestic waste and the supply side for the provision of potable drinking water as well as water for irrigational purposes hardly meets the demand. Another pitfall for water scarcity is that though our country is blessed with an annual rainfall of ~1100 mm, it is irregular, erratic and concentrated to a few months and places. This calls for implementation of mechanisms in water management, especially since the Government of Indias declaration of year 2007 as the Year of water productivity. Water management envisages tools like rainwater recharge and watershed management instead of a prior outlook of big dams as temples of modern India as the only solution to hydro-needs. These methods involve participatory community efforts with an active civil society/ NGO intervention in developing each geographical patch as an ecological unit. It is a steady march ahead in the wake of forecasts that 33% of Indias population will live under absolute water scarcity conditions (International Water Management Institution).

In the post-lunch session Mr. Chaturbedi drew two pictures one small and another big. Then he asked which one is male and which one is female. Immediately the participants told that the big one is man. After that he asked the status of the women in their home. Then he asked the different games played by them. From their response he asked to differentiate the outdoor game and indoor game. From their answer it was found that whatever game was played by the girls are either indoor or played near by field. Then he asked about the instrument which was used to determine the sex. Immediately the participants told that ultrasound but when he asked the instrument which was used to know the heart, they couldnt answer. In this regard he advised to raise voice against female foeticide and to give stress on care, education and development of girl child. Then he discussed about the superstition attached to witchcraft. In this regard he shared his own personal experiences and instructed to think whether the witch-craft is true or false. With this task he closed the session at 5.30pm. In the second day, the training started with recapping of the previous days activities. Then Mr. Sneh Kumar welcomed all the participants to the second day training. Then Mr. Chaturbedi started his discussions in questionnaire method. Through this method he tried to expose the suppressed difficulties of women.

In the post-lunch session Mr. Chaturbedi discussed about the questions like: what is a woman? What is her role in the society? What is her power? How is she better than man? Etc. Through these questions he tried to encourage the participants to be clear about the women power. Than he discussed about the MSS founder Acharya Ramamurthy, a freedom fighter of Gandhijis age. He said that MSS was Acharya Ramamurthys dream and said that Acharya realized the power of the women. So he formed MSS to change the society and to establish peace in the society through women. Then Mr. Chaturbedi discussed the mission of MSS i.e. to establish a peaceful society through women power. Then the second day session ended at 5.35PM. The third day training started in its scheduled time and before the theme of the third day training attempted by the trainers recapped the summary of the previous day. Than Mr. Sneh Kumar instructed to make a Panja by taking 5 members and Dasta by taking 10 members and instructed to select one leader only through mutual understanding. Then the participants made five panjas and elected one leader from each group. Then Mr. Chaturbedi told the leaders to come to the front and asked the participants about their leaders quality, one by one all the participants described their leaders qualities, and then Mr. Chaturbedi asked the leaders about their feelings and responsibilities which they explained very nicely. Then Mr. Chaturbedi asked the leaders to choose a Gram Nayak, through their mutual understanding and they made their Gram Nayak. Through these activities he described the election process of Mahila

Santi Sena (MSS) from Panja or Dasta to country level. Then he instructed Miss Rita to describe the time period of a leader of MSS and meeting period of MSS, she explained it very nicely. After the tea-break Ms. Rita read out the brochure of MSS in Oriya and Mr. Sneh Kumar broadly described the structures of MSS, its training process,

After lunch all the participants gathered in the training hall, Mr. Umasanker and Mr. Sneh Kumar asked about their decision, all agreed to be a MSS. After that he gave a break of two minutes. After break all the participants stood in a circle, Ms. Rita distributed orange color scarf which is the symbol of MSS and taught them about how to tie the scarf. In between the third days training Mr. K.C Malick, Chairman; BISWA joined the training. In his short stay he addressed the participants and inspired them to focus on the success of MSS. Mr. Bhanu Panigrahi, Mr. Uma Shankar Chaturbedi and Mr. Sneh Kumar gave their hearty thanks to Mr. Malick. After that the participants gave their presentation on their action plan. As Mr. Chaturbedi and Mr. Sneh Kumar were leaving the training program after the third day, so, Mrs. Bani Mahapatra proposed the vote of thanks for their valuable training. On the fourth day Dr. Pranati Jachak deliberated about the health issues of women which appears due to lack of proper care. She emphasized up-on mental, physical and spiritual health also, she emphasized on the co-operation of community to eradicate diseases in their villages. She said that if the community is well educated than half of the problem is solved. Then the participants asked their queries about their health problems. In the post-lunch session of the concluding day, Mr. Panigrahi distributed the MSS identity forms and summarized the events so far. At the end of the program Ms. Kiranbala Acharya, APRO, BISWA proposed the vote of thanks.

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Mr. Sneh Kumar then instructed them to form 5-group of 6 members each and told them to choose their leaders. The session. First he asked about their grand-mother and grandleaders of the groups were Mrs. Rahil Sibil of 1st group, Mrs. fathers names. But most of the participants were unable to Malini Sahu of 2nd group, Mrs. Sumati Sahu of 3rd group, memorize Mrs. Pramita Sahu of 4th group and Mrs. Janani Ranbida of their grand5th group. Distributing the papers, Mr. Kumar gave them one mothers hour to write down the day to day problems faced by the names. Then women. he asked the cause of forgetting their g r a n d m o t h e r s name and all the participants gave their explanations. After analyzing all these things he asked whether they want their grand-children to repeat the culture of forgetting their names. So he advised them to do something new by which all can remember them. After an hour each group presented their problem sheet. It was observed that the problems were mainly related to the education, health, work pressure, dowry system, child marriage, female foeticide, freedom etc. which are ignored by the society towards the girl child. After getting the problems sheet Mr. Chaturbedi discussed those problems and told them to write down their solutions. Then the participants wrote their solutions. After getting the solutions of the problems every one became happy.
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its financial aspects etc. With-in the discussion Mr. Chaturbedi gave example of Shanti, Anataniya, Biju Bai, RadhaLata to demonstrate the women power and MSS power. In this regard Mr. Sneh Kumar described four main functions of MSS To establish peace To empower Panchayati Raj through active participation of MSS members. To make the women self reliant. To spread the MSS program through out the state. After discussing the above matters Mr. Sneh Kumar came to the point of oath taking. First of all he read the oath paper and described all the points regarding it very nicely, then MSS or not with the criteria of MSS and told that to give their decision after lunch.