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Making Lives: Service by Sai
Alumni MAKING
LIVES:
Service by Sai Alumni
Some time ago, we
published an article by Gene Massey about a
seva camp run by our old students. In this article, I would
like to briefly describe a different kind of
seva, once again done by our old students. This
seva is different because it is not a
one-day affair like most service camps are; rather, it is a
continuing and on-going
affair.
One of these days, we hope to have the leader of the group in our
studio and interview him for Radio Sai; in the meanwhile, I could
perhaps give a short and broad-brush overview of the wonderful
work being done by these old students of Swami. Before I get on to
the description, may be I ought to mention that the leader of this
team, after graduation some years ago, decided not to seek a job
as that would separate him from his mother, who though a
working-lady needed help due to a physical handicap. Having
decided to stay back to help his mother, this boy then started
exploring possibilities to do some additional
seva during his spare time, and thus
were born the projects that I shall now briefly describe.
The
seva activity was launched on 1st
January, 2003, and the service group decided to focus on a small
village
named Kovalaguttapalli. If you walk from the Planetarium towards
the Sai Geetha shed, you will see a road turning to the left. That
road leads to this village, which is on the bank of the Chitavathi
river. There are about 150 families in the village and the main
occupations are farming, milk vending, and labour service [as
coolies].
The
service group set itself three objects which it defines as follows:
· To understand the
socio-economic and cultural aspects of village life, and to
explore suitable means of improving the welfare and quality of
life of the villagers.
· To focus the
project so that they target self-sufficiency in food grains,
drinking water, health, education, and economic sustenance.
· To render
quality work, even while putting into practice the
teachings of Swami.
Wanting to do good
is one thing and doing it the right way is entirely another. Often,
service projects boomerang because of a wrong approach. Not many
realise that though villagers are in general quite poor, they have
their own sense of dignity. Understanding this, our old boys made
a modest and fairly tactful entry. To start with, they just
started paying periodic visits to the village and teaching the
children there songs composed by Swami. Everyone here
loves
Swami, and thus the children were quite eager to learn Swami’s
songs. The parents too approved heartily of this assistance. The
ice had been broken.
Next step was to
tell the children something more, about personal cleanliness,
keeping the surroundings neat, prayer, respecting elders, and
studying hard. By the way, I should mention that almost all the
kids in the neighbouring areas attend Easwaramma School
established by Swami many years ago. Once again, all this
instruction went very well with the village elders; I mean who
would complain if someone came along and taught kids how to be
clean, study hard and be respectful to parents? An added
attraction was that from time to time, the children were also
given food. So, round two also was a success.
Having gained the
confidence of the villagers and established their seriousness of
purpose, it was now relatively easy for the old boys to start
talking to the elders. It started with regular Bhajans, and soon,
after the Bhajan session was over, the students started talking
about Swami’s teachings. What kind of teachings? Did they give
scholarly lectures on Advaitam and
stuff like that? Not at all! Being Swami’s students, they know
very well how to focus on the relevant, as Swami often had advised
them to, when they were students. Thus, their talks were about how
parents
must save for the welfare of their family.
It is no use giving
mere talks about saving money. Something concrete had to be done
and a clear road map had to be presented. Thus was born the
SARD or SAVE A RUPEE A DAY
scheme. Four Self-help Groups were formed, each with about 12
women members. Each group nominated two group coordinators, whose
job it was to collect money at the end of every week, and deposit
the same in a savings account in the local branch of the Vysya
Bank. While the villagers were encouraged to do the money
collection, all the required banking assistance was provided by
the old boys, including in relation to making deposits and
withdrawals. By the end of 30 weeks, the total savings stood at Rs.
30,000/- an impressive sum one must say.
It is not the women
alone who received attention and assistance. The men engaged in
farming were introduced to a cost-effective method of compost
generation. To start with, the farmers were encouraged to
regularly collect all easily bio-degradable matter found in the
neighbourhood such as dry leaves, twigs, etc. All this was then
dumped into special puts dug for the purpose of generating compost.
Into these pits were now introduced earthworms of a special type,
which were then allowed to multiply. At the end of about 40 days
or so, the bio-degradable matter had been transformed by the
earthworms into a rich, natural fertilizer. Not only
had
expenditure on chemical fertilizers been cut, but, more important,
a better and more eco-friendly fertilizer had been produced
instead. And the yield has gone up too.
Swami often quotes a
Chinese proverb that says that it is better to teach a man how to
fish than to feed him fish. In this spirit, the students now began
to initiate new programs that would augment the family income. The
first of these was to train the villagers to make cotton wicks.
Now wicks are used regularly in Pujas at homes, and there is a
good demand for cotton wicks. The students taught one and all to
make the wicks, gave the villagers cotton and packaging material,
and finally took the responsibility for the marketing. Sold under
the brand name Deepam Cotton Wicks, the wicks are
on sale in the shopping centre in Prashanti Nilayam, and believe
it or not, the sale is around Rs. 10,000/- a month. Not bad, I
would say. By the way, the money is not used up but saved in a
bank so that it can grow.
The villagers are
now quite enthusiastic and participate actively in all programs
initiated by the old students, having thoroughly understood that
whatever is being done is entirely for their own good. Thus, every
alternate week, a day is set apart for village cleaning. It starts
with the children going round doing
nagarsankeetan, after which comes the cleaning in which all
participate. And when the cleaning programme is over, there is
aarathi.
There
is always room for more, and the old boys are now exploring the
possibility of systematically cultivating a leguminous plant, that
is know to grow wildly in the region. The attractive point about
this plant is that grows easily in arid regions, and requires very
little water. What is important is that the seed of the plant
yields oil that can be used as fuel. And the oil cake that remains
after the crushing for oil extraction is a very good fertilizer.
Project studies are now under way.
This shows how
methods of man-management and cost-effective production etc.,
studied in the Business
School can come in handy even in seemingly mundane village affairs!
Let me end this heart-warming story with something that is really
wonderful. Sometime ago, a farmer lost his cow suddenly. It was
apparently healthy all along but mysteriously died and quite
suddenly too. The veterinary doctor who was consulted when the cow
became very sick was suspicious that it was all due to something
that the cow had eaten. So, with the permission of the farmer, he
did a post-mortem. What he saw shocked not only him but also all
the curious villagers who had gathered around. The cow of the
stomach was full of plastic bags that had been discarded as
garbage by all and sundry. Promptly, our boys told the villagers,
“It is time to
get
rid of the plastic bags, a major curse of modern times. We will
teach you to make paper bags. This will save us from the horror of
plastic bags, and incidentally also fetch some income.”
And thus has come
into existence another cottage industry. Our boys help in the
collection of old newspapers, and the villagers are busy making
paper bags. What about marketing? Will our boys leave the
villagers in the lurch? No way, and using their contacts, they
have now got the Boys’ Hostel to abandon plastic bags and use
paper bags exclusively in their Co-operative Stores. Thus, it is
quite common to see our hostel boys move around with paper bags
rather than plastic bags.
I do hope this new
trend would spread like wild fire, because the plastic bag menace
is assuming alarming proportions. You do not have to take my word
for it. Just take a walk to the Chitravathi river and you would
see tons and tons of plastic bags getting dumped there. Frankly, I
do not have the heart to see this terrible sight any more. I mean
this is the same river bed that was once the scene of
extra-ordinary Divine Leelas of which
you have had a glimpse in this issue. Is this to be the fate of
the Divine Playground? Is this the way we should
show
respect to One whom we do not miss an opportunity to hail as the
Lord?
You know what Jesus
once said? He said, “Why call ye Me Lord, Lord, when thou does not
follow what I say?” Our Lord says, revere the Earth. Is this the
way to show reverence to Mother Earth? May be I should end with a
Chinese proverb that says: If man ill-treats the Earth, the Earth
in turn would punish him!”
I would very much
like to hear your comments on what I have written. As usual, we
can be reached at:
h2h@radiosai.org
G.VENKATARAMAN
Source:
Radio Sai
E-Magazine, April 1, 2004
http://www.radiosai.org/Journals/Vol_02/07April01/08_Window_To_Sai_Seva/sai_seva.htm
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