Case2-July-2017
Mallapur village is situated nine kilometres away from Indervelly mandal, the headquarters of Adilabad district. Mallapur is a hamlet of Tejapur Gram Panchayat and a part of Dharmasagar watershed. The Dharmasagar watershed consists of five hamlets and covers 890 ha of Watershed area. The Mallapur village has 89 households comprising a population of 600 people. The community consists of tribal gonds and except two families (land less) all other families have land holding of 1 to 3 ha.
When we started our programme in 2000, the tribal families were 100% dependent on money lenders. Most of the families indulged in consumption of alcohol. They depended on rain-fed farming and they cultivated cotton as a mono crop during kharif. There was heavy soil erosion and no water conservation structures in the village. In their households, there were no toilets and many houses had no proper electricity supply. Community assets such as overhead tank, community hall and other government infrastructure were underutilised or in defunct state. There was no proper education and the support for girls’ higher education was nil.
There was total lack of awareness about agricultural inputs and marketing of their agricultural produces. As there was no water in summer for domestic use and drinking purpose, people struggled a lot and there was high migration. Families were solely dependent on fire wood for cooking. There was no insurance coverage and no individual interest to progress economically. Child deliveries at home and lack of health awareness was common. Due to their poor economic situation, they could not celebrate traditional festivals and marriages.
DHAN Foundation’s intervention in the village commenced in 2000 through the promotion of self-help groups (SHGs) and subsequent bank linkages. In 2007, revival of tanks was initiated with financial assistance of NOVIB, North India. In 2008, IGWDP Watershed Programme was initiated in the village. In order to address the above mentioned issues, household survey, preparation of resource mapping, social mapping, and SHG-level discussion were done to identify the beneficiaries and evolve ways to address major issues in the village. Discussions with farmers helped to identify their farming issues.
Soil and water conservation works under NABARD’s IGWDP (Indo German Watershed Development Program) aided to complete land treatment using the ridge to valley approach. Under land treatment activities such as earthen bunding with stone outlets, chain of farm ponds, drainage line treatment (stone gully plugs) with sunken pits and stone bunding were created.
The value of work done was Rs.10 lakhs, including people’s contribution of 20%. After the completion of land treatment, the ground water level increased in the existing open wells, farm ponds and thus increased soil moisture. Now, every farmer is cultivating rabi also. The individual yield has increased by 45% for cotton and other crops.
Plantation: Mass level plantation and protection of existing plants were focused upon in Mallapur village. Tree saplings of teak, sweet orange, guava and bamboo were raised. Now, in the village, they have 50 sweet orange plants, 40 guava plants, 3,500 seethafal plants and bamboo in 5 acres and teak plants in 20 acres. Those farmers have started getting yield from sweet orange, seethafal and guava and generated additional income of Rs. 20,000 per year.
Livelihood support: Seven landless and small farm families received support for sustaining their livelihood from the revolving fund of the village watershed committee. They started activities such as tailoring, petti shop and livestock development worth Rs. 2,00,000. These families earn Rs. 3,000-4,000 per month through these activities.
Community Shramadan: Realising the need to keep common assets accessible, they started doing volunteer shramadan in 2008. Since then, they organised shramadan as and when needed on the first of every month. Thus, they have renovated a community hall, revived water tank and open well, cleaned the drainage, revived irrigation tank, repaired electrical line, developed village common place for common meeting and culture programme and dug pits for plantation. This community voluntary-ship is still being practised.
Financial linkage: The community got access to financial linkages through their SHGs since 2002. However, in 2008, farmers were facilitated to avail crop loans from the Telangana Grameena Bank (TGB), Indervelly. Gradually, over the years, they started getting crop loans. Now, that all the eligible farmers have availed crop loan linkages ranging from Rs. 30,000 to 1 lakh, the farmers have received loans of Rs. 55 lakhs as of 2017. This apart, all the six SHGs have also got linked with the bank for Rs.27 lakhs. Thus, the total loan amount released by the bank for the village is Rs. 82 lakhs.
On witnessing the positive trends in their lives, in 2008, the farmers evolved social norms in accordance with the village needs. They evolved norms such as ban on alcohol, tobacco consumption and cutting trees. They have been practising this norm voluntarily. There were very few deviations since then. The youth in the village formed a youth association in 2009. This association has been taking up the responsibility of event management in family functions and festive celebrations voluntarily.
During the last panchayat election, this village facilitated the panchayat leader to be selected unanimously. Thus, they obtained Rs.7 lakhs as financial incentive from the district administration.
Other intervention: Seventy gas cylinders were supplied to women members of the SHG with support from HP gas agency in collaboration with ITDA subsidy.
olar village: Eighty-two families have installed solar lights (two LED bulbs, a fan and a cell phone charger point) with support from IGWDP contribution and through linkages with bank loan. The unit cost of the initiative is Rs. 16,750/- for each household; 30% (5,025) of the cost was met by the IGWDP and balance of Rs. 11,725 was mobilised from bank loan with 40% (6,700) subsidy from NABARD.
Social security village: All families are covered under the Prime Minister insurance scheme (100%) and every member has a bank account. All the families were enrolled in the Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBJY), Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) and the Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY). Last year, two families received claim settlement against the death of the insured family member.
The consistent works of DHAN has helped the village to address some of their development issues that stood unresolved for a long time. This village has become a model for other neighbouring villages. The development initiative has improved every farmer’s family economically and ensured their child’s education. Now that there is improved awareness on adopting agriculture technologies, health care and construction of pucca houses with toilets. there is no outward migration in this village.