People’s Organisations
From End Of Poverty
3. People’s Organisations:
Formation of Village Development Society (VDS) is promoted as the only solution for their development. A system of organising periodic meetings, maintaining records and registers, discussing each and every problem and finding solutions by obtaining opinions from all the parties, following transparency in programme and finance management, etc are some of the focal areas imbibed to the members of the POs to function effectively. In order to make it possible, Awareness Generation Camps inclusive of cultural programmes are organised in all the target villages. Leadership training camps are organised area-wise to make the members of POs as effective and efficient. Qualities, duties and responsibilities of a good leader are well explained in these training camps and they are also taught of group dynamics and different strategies to be followed by a leader at different times. Managerial tasks to be performed by a leader are also taught in these training camps. These trained leaders are expected to disseminate their learning to others in their respective village in their regular meetings or special orientations.
The project intends to initiate a process which culminates in the emergence of people’s movements based on issues. As such the important and primary phase is the formation and strengthening of the People’s Organisations. This phase would take normally about six months of intensive educational inputs involving the communities in PRAs (Participatory Rural Appraisal) while the strengthening process has to continue throughout the project period and till these POs attain all the required capacities and capabilities to continue the process to attain sustainable development on their own. The remaining four phases may begin simultaneously or one by one depending on how soon the target communities get mobilised and how genuinely they are participating in the process of reflecting on their problems and trying to find solutions. The project is planned for a minimum of three and a half years and the assumption is that even if target group mobilisation is delayed by a few months in the first year; all the phases would be grounded in the second year and continues simultaneous execution complementing one another. Broadly it may be possible to divide the three and a half year period into three phases, beginning with the first six months of intensive education and mobilisation, followed by 24 months of activity centred mobilisation and then 12 months of tapering off and consolidation of achievements and dovetailing the movements into broader movements.
Intensive leadership training camps are proposed to bring out the inherent talents and to imbibe organised system in functioning as an effective organisation. In our past experience, these camps help and enable the respective communities to identify potential leaders in these distressed and depressed communities. It is clearly visible in the phased out villages of ASSIST that these leaders have now become the elected representatives under reservation quota while the migrated educated people were enjoying the benefits in the name of ignorance earlier. (For more details on the People’s Organization, refer Annex 1)
Setting up Mutually Aided Co-operative Thrift and Credit Society (MACTS):
As a first step towards setting up MACTS, women Self Help Groups are formed and given different trainings to bring in confidence and empowering them to participate in all the developmental activities. Necessary trainings are imparted to build their capacity to think and decide on political, economical and social aspects with sustainable empowerment. The main purpose of the MACTS is to meet their financial demands to take up viable income generation activity which is not possible with the internal lending money from SHG. Savings is promoted compulsorily at SHG level and also at MACTS level. Since MACTS is a registered entity having substantial share capital and regular savings on record, it attracts financial institutions to lend money at less interest. More than meeting the financial needs, it does create a platform to discuss vital issues hindering their growth and prosperity. As they become united, they will develop as a cohesive force not only to demand but also to fight for their rights.
Another important activity planned under the project is to form and strengthen the SHGs on a family concept and mobilise them to form into Mutually Aided Co-operative Thrift and Credit Societies (MACTS) at cluster level. While the Self-Help Groups (SHGs) among women have become successful ventures to meet the domestic needs of their members, they are getting stuck by questioning what further. Confederation of Self-Help Groups on a family concept and promoting Mutually Aided Cooperative Society is the wonderful legal platform created by the Government of Andhra Pradesh to sustain the growth of SHG movement further and further. But, it is necessary that MACTS is promoted keeping identity and functioning of SHG intact. It is visible in many places after the formation and functioning of MACTS, the groups get less attention and they are getting paralysed. Keeping this in view and having learnt from the previous experiences, new MACTS is being promoted under ASSIST exclusively with the group membership. It implies that in order to join MACTS the entire group has to join and it should be represented by one or two leaders and part of the group is not eligible to join MACTS. To attain the overall goals of the project i.e. promoting sustainable village communities through POs and to continue the process of sustainable development, it is planned to support the POs to take up variety of developmental activities with matching assistance under this project.
PHASEOUT:
“ASSIST” strongly believes its task is achieved when the people come to the level of playing decision-making role after having obtained the capability to analyse the problems, to find feasible and amicable solutions, to translate the solutions into action and to monitor the activities on their own. It is hard to fix parameters to say when the village is totally developed. There will be scope to do some more activities whenever the village is totally developed. As such, the following indicators have been developed by ASSIST to say its role is completed in that particular community:
• When the Village Development Society (VDS) is strong, united and follows democratic process in taking decisions, • When the decisions taken by VDS are strictly followed, implemented and respected by all categories of people, • When the VDS is practising the transparency system in maintaining accounts, executing projects, etc., • When the VDS is capable of developing linkages with village panchayat, other Governmental and non-Governmental departments for taking up any community development project in a village, • When the people develop the feeling that “self-help approach is an appropriate one for our own development”,
As a result of series of meetings about the transfer of responsibility to village sanghams, setting up a revolving fund, common fund and Corpus fund at village level managed by the POs has come up as one of the most vital solution for their sustainability. These funds are expected to meet the needs of the villagers to enhance their economic status and to cross the poverty line and to meet the basic needs as per the family desires. MACTS are expected to be promoted with considerable women members over a project period of three years with the matching share capital for every member as project cost while the members would contribute the same amount from their meagre savings. (For more details please read the attached document on phasing out from 130 villages and on sustained VDSs; refer Annex 2)
