ANNUAL REPORT

APRIL 2016 - MARCH 2017

Institute of

Research and

Development for the

Rural

Poor-Trust

No.48,18 Cross st, Kakilanchavadi, Tambaram Sanatorium,

Chennai 600 047, TN, India

E-mail : irdrpindia@gmail.com Phone : 044-22410117 Website : www.irdrp.in

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of contents ............................................................... Page 2

I. Context ............................................................................................................ Page 3

II. Our Associative Project ............................................................................... Page 4

III. Our Programs .............................................................................................. Page 5

I. Children Care ................................................................................................ Page 5

II.I Tuition Courses ..................................................................................... Page 5

II.2 Children Sponsoring ............................................................................. Page 7

II. Youth Activities .......................................................................................... Page 9

II.I E-learning .............................................................................................. Page 9

II.2 Nurses Training .................................................................................... Page 11

III. Housing and Sanitation Program ............................................................... Page 13

IV. Future Programs......................................................................................... Page 16

V. Our Partners .................................................................................................. Page 18

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I. CONTEXT

The Government of India as long as various state Governments and NGOs have been

implementing various programs for rural people. However, rural poverty and unemployment still

persist in the state of Tamil Nadu. This problem is becoming severe and acute due migration and

Climate changes. Farmers are not practicing cultivation and sale the lands.

Financial inclusion of the poorest is a big challenge, especially for those who have been

excluded from society or who live in rural areas were communications are very restricted. They

have no access to the most basic services such as waste collection, safe drinking water and

sanitation and are exposed to disease, pollution. They also lack other services such as health

clinics and schools.

The resources of rural poor households have few boundaries :

– The price of the workforce due to the market competition, is repressed the salary at very low

levels.

– Any period during which the work is available depending on the geographic area and the

season.

– The inconsistency of resources : resources are irregular, there is a very small amount of money

and salaries are unpredictable.

The main objective is to enable women to overcome the disadvantages that they face and to

empower them to play an effective and equal role in society. Indeed, women and girls play an

important role in the fight against poverty as they bear the responsibility of many aspects of our

society.

There are many environmental issues due to the proximity with Chennai: air pollution, water

pollution, garbage, and pollution of the natural environment are all challenges for the state.

The major source of pollution includes the rapid burning of fuel wood and biomass such as dried

waste from livestock as the primary source of energy, lack of organized garbage and waste

removal services, lack of sewage treatment operations, lack of flood control and monsoon water

drainage system, diversion of consumer waste into rivers, cremation practices near major rivers

Environmental issues are one of the primary causes of disease, health issues and long-term

livelihood impact for the people of the villages.

ENVIRONMENTAL

CONTEXT

SOCIAL AND

ECONOMIC CONTEXT

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II. OUR ASSOCIATIVE PROJECT

OUR MISSION

To empower the underprivileged women, children, elderly and disabled by enriching their

life through education, health and sustainable livelihood skills and opportunities.

We empower these underprivileged children, youth and women to grow ahead in life by

giving them applicable education, healthcare facilities and livelihood programs.

To study the real situation of the people in vulnerable situations through participatory

approach, in order to find the solution to their situation.

OUR VISION

To work towards creating better villages

around Chennai, making them provide

basic health, education and empowerment

to every citizen.

To provide access to education

opportunities, access to affordable and

reliable healthcare and industry backed

livelihood skills.

OUR OBJECTIVES

To create and access livelihood

opportunities to teenagers, especially for

young girls in ensuring their future human

dignities and accomplishing their future

values.

To protect and promote women rights in

terms of `Access for their Gender justice'

through need based social and economic

empower initiatives.

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III. OUR PROGRAMS

CHILDREN CARE

TUITION COURSES

CONTEXT :

For the past 25 years, the IRDRP has been

dedicated to empower the people in the

villages and stone quarries around Chennai

through socio-economic and educational

development projects. IRDRP is continuing

the Stone quarries child labour project for

the next three years in new villages by

enrolling of all the eligible children in all

three major working areas by the end of the

other three years.

All children (both boys and girls) in the age group of 6-14 years follow the tuition courses every

evening.

OBJECTIVES :

Provide evening courses for drop outs and

youth in quarry areas

Enrol and admit the children in quarries to

schools.

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ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS :

In Puducheri, every evening between

5 and 7 pm, 20 children (13 boys and

7 girls) work together helped by a

Teacher in the same village. At the

same time, 19 other children (12 boys

and 7 girls) are reunited in Melathur,

whereas in Darkhas they are 21 (12

boys and 9 girls) between 6:20 and 8

pm.

CHILDREN PARLIAMENT

In December, IRDRP organized a Children Parliament. First Dr. Irudayasamy, IRDRP’s director,

explained to them the Indian political system. Then the children volunteered to be a part of this

government as the President or Minister. After that, they were split in three groups to discuss

important matters: at this time it was the money issue that stroked India in November and was

still going on at this time. Together, they tried to find a way to resolve this issue, and they named

a protractor in each group to propose their solutions to the other.

REPUBLIC DAY

All the children were gathering to celebrate the Republic Day Thursday 26 of January. It was a

time of celebration : after two hours of performing songs, dances and playing games, they all

received notebook, pencils and other school materials they need. Provinding educational support

material is a part of the tuition program: 126 children are receiving this support.

ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS

In the beginning of March, the children were gather again, this time to talk about environmental

awareness : they heard about ecology. The main issue in the villages is the habit of burning

plastic trash: it creates a lot of pollution in the atmosphere. To make them develop new and eco-

friendly habit, they went for collecting trash and they brought it to the collection department

program.

Village Male Female Total

Puducheri 13 7 20

Melathur 12 7 19

Darkhas 12 9 21

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SPONSORING CHILDREN

CONTEXT :

In India it’s difficult to have numbers regarding the HIV pandemic, especially when it comes

to children. In Chennai, there are a lot of people infected with HIV/AIDS. Due to the lack of

communication, to the marginalization, a lot of people don’t know they are infected, especially

in villages. The medicine have made great improvement these past few years, now the

antiretroviral are easily accessible. But a lot of children lost their parents due to the virus, and

are now orphan and infected, living among their relatives or foster families.

A lot of children need help regarding disabilities or important diseases, help the government

does not provide to their families. Since 10 years now we set a program of sponsorship for

vulnerable children in Chennai or in the villages around. Their families struggle to take care of

these children with special needs, and with the help of our international sponsors, we try to

provide this help.

OBJECTIVES : Support children’s education, nutritious foods, medical expenses, travelling to get

treatments, hospitals visit etc.

Provide free new clothing, shoes, and study materials during Christmas and Pongal

(Tamil harvest festival).

ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS :

CHILDREN WITH HIV/AIDS

IRDRP works in partnership with OrphelinsSida

International (International HIV Orphan), a

French organization, to support 15 orphan

children infected and affected with HIV/AIDS.

OSI send 1500-1900 Rs every month to each

children and their families. 5 more children are

supported by the sponsors from the Belgium

association Children Are the Future.

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This money is used to feed them, dress them properly, to pay scholarship fees or higher studies,

school materials etc. It’s an important help for the families that raised the children now.

Every month we conduct meetings for them and give some inputs sessions on health,

education and cleanliness. This was very supporting to care takers to educate their children in

a good manner. At the beginning of the year, we had a meeting with HIV/AIDS infected

orphan children for their education sponsorship program. We discussed the importance of

vitamins and minerals for their disease control.

In February and March 2017 we conducted an important monitoring with 5 then 15 children:

we asked them about their lives, their health, how things went at school, what are their

expectations, how things go in their families. We conduct big monitoring like this twice a year,

in addition with the little meetings every month.

CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES

The situation of people with disabilities is also difficult, especially in rural communities where

they are exposed to marginalization. It’s also complicated for the families, because it’s an

important charge to take care of in poor families.

The number of people with disabilities in Chennai is substantial and likely to grow. People

with disabilities in India are subject to deprivation in many dimensions of their lives. Social

attitudes and stigma play an important

role in limiting the opportunities of

disabled people for full participation in

social and economic life, often even

within their own families.

Regarding this situation IRDRP provides

every month a bag of food materials to

five families. Inside, they have enough

rice for one month, along with spices,

soaps, and house materials with the

support of FIS staff volunteering.

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YOUTH ACTIVITIES

E-LEARNING

CONTEXT :

Every 4 months, IRDRP receives one batch of 40 students to give them the opportunity to

develop their knowledge and

professional skills on computer. The

purpose of this program is for the

students to improve their skills so

they can find a job after the 4

months training.

Six days per week, IRDRP provides

computer, English, and personality

development courses to the students

in our Technical School.

At the end of the 4 months, we organize a meeting with professionals who help them by

developing their employability, increasing job opportunities. We also organize group job

interviews with companies, institutions.

OBJECTIVES :

To give more technical training and skills in order to start decent jobs in the city.

To provide job placement and job camps.

ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS :

COMPUTER COURSES

We completed three batches of 40 students. They are coming from Monday to Saturday to learn

how to type, to use an email address and how to use the Microsoft Office, which are the skills

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required to work in companies nowadays. We have 10 computers in our Chrompet Office in

South Chennai, the students come either in the morning either in the afternoon. Most of the time

they have one computer each, but work by pair when need be. Our staff, three women from the

first batch who are now working for IRDRP, help them whenever they need.

SPOKEN ENGLISH CLASSES

We are doing Spoken and basics English

classes: we divide each course in two.

One part of the students goes with the staff to

learn basics English (the younger ones), and the

advanced students (usually the students in their

last year of college) goes with our two

volunteers to do spoken class: they organize

debates, discussions to make the practice.

PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT

Our students also have “Personality Development” three times a week, performed by our

director. They learn how to make a resume and a cover letter, how to prepare themselves for job

interviews, how to present themselves, to negotiate salaries and so.

RETAIL MANAGEMENT

Every Sunday, the students have retail management courses, to teach them about commercial

work. They learn about communication (body language, greeting and directing customers) ,

about sail and retail, closing deals, then packaging and promoting products. The purpose is for

them to find a job a salesman/saleswoman and then to work at a higher level in marketing in the

same companies they start in.

NURSES PROGRAM

In two batches of students, 14 have now jobs in several companies. IRDRP hired

three women to help the new students with the computer courses, to do accounting and to

keep records. The reason why so many students don’t have currently a job is that most of

them are still students in first or second year of college. They will benefit from these four

months training when they will complete their studies.

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NURSES TRAINING

CONTEXT :

IRDRP Nursing course for unemployed, drop outs, discontinued girls from studies. We enrolled

17 girls, specially made up for quarries girls. With this program, IRDRP wants to promote

vocational training for quarries women, to reduce the socially exclusion and discrimination of

these women, to guide them to get good jobs, career guidance and career opportunities.

We select these girls according to the criteria commissioned by the government. They just have

passed the 10th standard, must be aged 16 in the beginning and 18 to have jobs at the end.

We decided to first select girls who

live in the quarries areas. They live

with their families in the stone

quarries. The quarry areas are

located among small mountains,

where the stones are blasted. The

environment is filled with stone

dust heavy noises of the crushing

machines, trucks and the blast of

the grenades.

The salaries of the students are

already improve the family living and

expand their buying power. They can

feed better and we hope this extra

income will enjoy improve the

education of the younger brothers and sisters.

OBJECTIVES :

Promote vocational training for quarries women

To reduce the socially exclusion, discrimination of these women

To guide them to get good jobs and career guidance and career opportunities

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ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS :

The program’s cycle follows a fixe timeframe : Six months of theory at the Technical School and

six months of practical experience in the hospital (8 hours/day). IRDRP commits to find an

internship for each girl.

SIX MONTHS OF THEORY

The nurses and doctors who are coming to teach the students reported that the students were very

motivated, there wasn’t any discipline issues and they were highly motivated to continue their

behaviour.

All students fell engaged in and empowered by what they are learning. With all this new

knowledge that they have about the theoretical part, they learned to be more confident and

responsible during the fourth semester of internship.

SIX MONTHS OF PRACTICAL EXPERIENCE

All the students completed a convincing internship, they were given opportunities to put their

theoretical knowledge to work with professionals who have experience. During their internship,

they earned, on the average, 6000 Rs (84 euros). Their parents’ salaries are much lower.

THE FINAL EXAM

In May 2017, the girls will have to pass their exams to get their diploma. We are very confident,

the remaining girls are more than motivated and all their families are very proud of their

achievements so far. We hope that the end of this project will go successful for them.

This project was certainly successful, all the students got the diploma. The 17

students passed and succeeded in their exam in May; 14 of them have are already

working as nurses in several hospitals. We are helping the remaining 3 to find a

place.

The hospitals directors are pleased with their work : they all are hard workers,

they like their facilities and what they do in it.

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HOUSING & SANITATION PROGRAM

CONTEXT :

Chennai faced heavy rain in November and December 2015; most of the places affected by lake

opening and lake cuts due to over flow of water and over accumulation of water. This situation

made all sectors of communities to suffer without work, earning, food, basic needs and many

families had lost all their belonging.

We proceeded from the beginning of the December month to food distribution first for around

500 people, then we distributed food, milk, bread, biscuits to 750 people, and we distributed

2000 bags of rice to 955 families few days later.

We also immediately started a program with Habitat for Humanity to build/rebuild the houses

that have been damaged or destroyed. This project was launched in April 2016 with the entire

team of Habitat for Humanity India, along with many volunteers.

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OBJECTIVES :

Help vulnerable population in the worst affected areas by the Flood of December 2015 to

rebuild or repair their home.

Providing proper toilets for the communities

ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS :

After the flood, families started to live in shields, sometimes with just a tree roof on their heads,

but no walls to protect them. IRDRP immediately built an emergency program with Habitat for

Humanity to rebuild/build houses of 250 families.

Among them, 5 families are struggling because one of them is disabled. With the help of the

CIPLA Foundation, we built special houses, adapted to their needs.

HOUSES RECONSTRUCTION

The EICHER Foundation in partnership with IRDRP and Habitat for Humanity are financing the

rebuilding of the houses in the villages. The first phase of reconstruction ended in December

2016 by the finalization of 89 houses in the villages of Padapai, Mannivakkam and Vaipu, in the

Kanchipuram District. 55 other reparation are coming and should be finished by July 2017 in the

village of Vadakupattu and 60 houses in Melathur.

With the support of the villages Self Help Group and community leaders, we identified 19

families whose houses have been destroyed by the flood and who needed our help. 83 more

beneficiaries who saw their houses damaged by the flood were selected.

Village Number of houses Number of beneficiaries

Padapai 45 150

Mannivakkam 18 69

Vaipur 20 133

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New House Construction:

With the help of the CIPLA Foundation, IRDRP and Habitat for Humanity are building 5 houses

for disabled people. Those houses will be built in consideration of disabled people: access ramp,

lower kitchen, special bathrooms, and rounded corners. We completed 5 houses for People with

Disabilities with the support of United Way of Chennai.. These families didn’t have the asset to

rebuild their own houses, especially houses made up for their special needs. 19 other houses

were finished in December 2016 in the same three villages.

Village Number of houses Number of beneficiaries

Padapai 11 44

Mannivakkam 4 27

Vaipur 4 25

Meeting with the beneficiaries

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FUTURE PROGRAMS

IRDRP wants to set up and develop different programs whose the main objective is to bring the

beneficiaries above the poverty line by proving income generating assets to them and vocational

training to get jobs in a near future. By these projects, IRDRP’s mission is also focused on

improving children’s well-being and education: the support provided to the family should remain

the possibility for the children to continue their education.

This is a cyclic process : by providing families’ life with FMB or training, the parents will have a

better life and will be able to support their children in continuing their studies. Indeed, in

villages, children are often forced to stop their education to help their parents by working to add

a little amount to the family’s income. If the parents don’t need this extra money because they

have steadier jobs due to their new skills or to their new business, the children will continue to

study and with higher education they will have access to better jobs.

Project rationale: We observed that the FMB launches a collective economic activity: with a mall

loan we help and paid local people with local materials. With the money from the FMB the

beneficiaries will buy from the community and will make the local economy works. This project

has a real impact on the local economic activity. The same logic applies for the former tailoring

students who opened their shops in their villages as for all of beneficiaries that will live there and

use the money they earn from their new jobs inside the villages.

FAMILY MICRO-BUSINESS

We try to build a Family Micro Business project in the village of Melathur. We want to help the

beneficiaries as long as the development actors, to enhance their initiative, organization and

economical accounting skills. This project will help them to micro-business family helped to

improve their living situation, pay for the children scholarship fees, take care of the children’s

health

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We already met the Self Help Group that will help us from the selection of the beneficiaries to

their auto-sufficiency. The villages’ people have a lot of idea: make a fish market, a candle shop,

a flower shop, or an animal business.

VOCATIONAL TRAININGS

We built a Technical School in 2014, there we completed three batches of computer, beauticians,

spoken English or tailoring courses for the inhabitant of the villages around. Poor communities

live there, they don’t do higher studies. This is an opportunity for them to develop new skills and

have access to better jobs. This was also the place the nurses student had their theoretical

teaching.

But since more than 6 months the school is only used two hours a day for tailoring teaching. We

want to start again a school where there will be courses all day long: nursing for 20 girls from the

quarries, computer and beauticians for the villages’ people.

TAILORING

In the IRDRP office, a second floor is ready to welcome 30 women from the neighbourhood who

want to learn tailoring skills, to be able to open a little shop after that. We have 30 students ready

and eager to learn, the sewing machine and the place.

The project’s frame and budget is ready, we wait for one of our partners’ approval

to launch it.

The project is also ready to be launched, we are still looking for a part of our

funding.

We are going to launch a crowd funding to pay the teacher and the material

required in a few weeks. We hope it will be a success.

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IV. OUR PARTNERS We extend sincere thanks to all our development partners for

their wonderful support.

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INSTITUTE OF RESEARCH AND

DEVELOPMENT FOR THE RURAL POOR-TRUST

NO.48, 18TH CROSS ST, KAKILANCHAVADI,

TAMBARAM SANITORIUM

CHENNAI-600 047, TN. INDIA

PHONE & FAX : +91-44-22410117

EMAIL : irdrpindia@gmail.com

WEBSITE : www.irdrp.in

FACEBOOK : IRDRP TRUST