Location | Living condition | Economy |  Intervention of  SPAR

REGION

Orissa is one of the richest states in India. The state has vast forest area. The ores of many important minerals are abundantly available in the Eastern Ghats region of the state. Orissa also has a considerable length of coastline and so enjoys the marine wealth to some extent. Ironically, majority of the population, who are the Adivasis and the Scheduled Castes, are the poorest people in India. 48.6% of the population live below the poverty line. Whatever wealth the State has, it is all usurped by the rich general caste people.The Adivasis do not get any benefit of it. Even the development efforts that the govt. is making, do not reach the really poor and the people. The Mayurbhanj district of Orissa is situated on the northern part of the State and borders with Jharkhand on the north. This district is situated in the Chhotanagpur plateau. The climate is dry and hot. The temperature in summer sometimes reaches 450 C. Podagarh GramPanchayat (G.P.) is situated near Jashipur on the Simlipal range in this district. The villages are not contiguous but are scattered around the Simlipal forest range. The topography of the region is undulating.  The thin top-soil is lateritic with a hard stony layer beneath. The soil does not have much water holding capacity. This, along with the fact that the climate is dry with a few centimeters of rainfall during the monsoon, has given rise to mono-cropping in the region. 

Paddy is the main crop. During dry season, some of the lands that can be irrigated grow vegetables. During the lean season people depend upon the minor forest produces for their livelihood. As a result, the economy of the area is really poor. The decrease in the area of forestland is deriving the people of their livelihood. This has led to migration of the Adivasi people to  cities.

The infrastructure facilities of the region are very poor. There are no metal roads to any of the villages. The villages under the G.P. are 4 to 20 Kms. from the National Highway, the only metal road passing through this region. The nearest big weekly market place is Jashipur, around 15 Kms. or more from the villages.  Electricity connection is unthinkable in the villages. In this dry area, availability of drinking water is a problem. There are a few primary schools in some of the villages but irregularity and excessive dropouts have made these schools almost non-functional. Though there are a few Anganwadi Centres,which are run quite successfully.There is a secondary school in one of the villages- Durdura.This village is largest in the region and is situated quite near to the highway. Therefore it enjoys some fruits of the mainstream development, while the other villages are deprived of it. the same village also has a primary health care center. But this is totally non-functional. Never any doctor available, nor are there  medicines. The people have to go to the Jashipur township for treatment of minor ailments, while for treatment of major ailments the people have to go to Baripada, around 100 Kms. away from the G.P.

The Adivasi women in these villages face a different predicament than the women of other castes. Like all traditional cultures, the Adivasi culture also has its positive and negative sides. The traditional practice of the Adivasis is that the women will not publicly speak out in front of the men. The women have to look after the families, work in the fields or go to the forests for collection of minor forest produce. Almost all the heavy works are left to the women in the Adivasi community. Even in case of agriculture, tilling of land is considered to be a job of the men, while the rest, i.e. planting, harvesting, threshing, winnowing etc. are considered  women's jobs. Men regularly get drunk after taking the home-made liquor and torture their wives at homes. On some occasions, both men and women drink. Every village has its own separate place for worship just outside the village area. This is called Jaher Than, the place of God. Traditionally the women are not allowed to go to these. They perform their prayer in some other place located within the village. The girl child is never sent to schools but that is not a glaring example of gender discrimination as only a few of the boys are  sent to schools.

Major activities of SPAR are related to organising   people and making them aware, capacitation of the people through trainings, seminars, workshops and  meetings . The main focus of work is to organize the people and strengthen PO & SHGs, promote local self governance, facilitate the process of women empowerment and use natural resources in appropriate manner to ensure sustainable livelihood and food security. People's organisation is enable to undertake peoples plan through participatory process and to implement such plans mobilising resources locally and from outside.  These plans include nursery and plantation programme, alternative education and health practices, setting up Community Centres, Development of irrigation facilities and kitchen garden.

Members of the People Organisation(P.O) have since developed their knowledge, skill and analytical ability. They are capable to look at a problem critically and find out the root causes to address them adequately. The P.O. has become a platform for promotion of leadership in the area. The democratic and participatory functioning of P.O. along with the capacitation of the members has paved the way for emergence of collective leadership in the villages. 

The women have taken up several income generation activities.  These have helped them to have some earnings of their own, which they themselves can contribute to the family expenditure or use in emergencies instead of depending upon the male members.  The women are also saving some money with banks in their names. This was earlier practically unthinkable to them. In this area core members of people’s organisation are now able to plan, implement, monitor and evaluate their own developmental activities. This has created considerable self reliance among them.

43 Self Help Groups have been formed and they have raised Rs. 3,09,000(Three lakhs and nine thousand) as their fund, with which 500 families are benefitted through different income generation activities. 16 forest protection committees have been formed and they are working for natural resource management (land, water and forest) and its optimal use for the people’s benefit.

The empowerment of the people with instances of raising their voice against any type of injustice perpetuated in that area have not only influenced the local government but also the other funding agencies. Among them, CARE-India, not usually practicing  process based development, has kept faith on our value based process and providing financial  assistance to SPAR- Jashipur project for “Integrated Nutrition and Health Project (INHP-III”  programme. This working area consists of  11 blocks of Mayurbhanj district. Primary focus of this programme is on mother and child health, alleviation of malnutrition and infant mortality rate (IMR). Service providers of this programme has improved the quality and coverage of maternal and child health services.

 The people have become conscious about the health care of the mothers and children. It is an apposite indication that long queues are seen whenever any immunization camp is organized anywhere in the village. They are taking preventive measures against the common diseases prevalent among the women and children.