TD 604 A Report on

Participatory Rural Appraisal activity

In Ramwadi village,

Mokhada block, ThaneDistrict

Submitted by

Abhiram Sahasrabudhe

Anand Achari

ArunabhMujumdar

Aparna Dwivedi

Dharmendra Kumar

KarishmaBhuyan

Vishal Singh

Centre for Technology Alternatives for RuralAreas (CTARA) Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay

Powai, Mumbai 400076

February 2012

Contents Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 3

Work plan for PRA ............................................................................................................................... 5

Preparations Done .............................................................................................................................. 6

PRA Tools ................................................................................................................................................ 7

Informal meeting .................................................................................................................................... 7

Resource map ......................................................................................................................................... 8

Household survey and interviews ..................................................................................................... 10

Transect walks ....................................................................................................................................... 11

FGD Women .......................................................................................................................................... 15

FGD Men ............................................................................................................................................... 18

Issue ranking ......................................................................................................................................... 20

Venn diagram ........................................................................................................................................ 22

Seasonality ............................................................................................................................................ 24

Timeline................................................................................................................................................. 25

Social map ............................................................................................................................................. 27

Implementation of MNREGA ............................................................................................................ 28

Personal learnings ............................................................................................................................. 29

Introduction

Objectives of the study

Participatory Rural Appraisal is a process of getting to know the ground reality, with the helpof the

locals. Although it was devised for rural areas, it is applicable to a wide range of scenarios. The main

objective of this study was to get ourselves acquainted with the PRA process and with different tools

used for carrying out the PRA process. Second objective of this visit was to know about the

implementation of MNREGA in the Ramwadi village, its impacts on the residents and awareness

about MNREGA in the residents. The PRA process has been briefly described below.

Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) process

Participatory rural appraisal is an approach to incorporate the knowledge and opinions of rural

people in the planning and management of development projects and programs. Robert Chambers,

a Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies (UK), first used the term Rapid Rural Appraisal in

1983.

In 1985, the first international conference to share experiences relating to RRA was held in Thailand.

This led to a rapid growth in the development of methods that involved rural people in examining

their own problems, setting their own goals, and monitoring their own achievements. By the mid

1990‘s, the term RRA had been replaced by a number of other terms including “Participatory Rural

Appraisal (PRA)” and “Participatory Learning and Action” (PLA).

PRA involves local people and outsiders from different sectors and disciplines. Outsiders facilitate

local people in collection and analyzing the information, practicing critical self-awareness, taking

responsibility and sharing their knowledge of life and conditions to plan and to act. The tools used in

PRA are secondary data reviews, participatory observations, semi-structured interviews, mappings,

time-line, trend analysis, seasonal review, workshops etc.

1: Interaction during PRA exercise

Ramwadi Village

Ramwadi is located Pathardi Gram Panchayat, in Mokhadablock of Thane district in Maharashtra

about 40 kn from Khodala town. It is situated off Thane - Khodala – Trimbakroad. The coordinates

are 19°47'55.15"Nand 73°20'52.91"E.

2: Location of Ramwadi

Ramwadi has 43 households and total population of about 350. The literacy rate is very low, about

40%. Themain occupation is agriculture. The village is fully ST, belonging to Warli tribe.

3: Ramwadi village

Work plan for PRA The work plan of the activity to be conducted was initially made by the team before leaving to the

field. However, after the informal meeting held on the first half of the first day of the PRA activity,

we have scheduled the events with the aim of gaining maximum people‘s participation

Time

Activity Goal People involved

16 Feb 2013 12:00-2:30pm 3.00-5:00pm 5.30-7.00pm 7.00-9.30pm 10.30-11.30

Informal meeting Resource mapping Focused Group Discussions Transect walk Focused Group Discussions Social map Seasonality

Understanding villagers, building healthy relationship with them and went for a walk in the village to know about the work done under NREGA Scheme. Resource mapping including wells, roads, temple, trees, mountain etc. Understanding issues about work and payments under scheme and other personal issues Understanding geography and resource availability Understanding issues about work and payments related issues under scheme Understanding social stratification of the village Understanding the seasonal variations in aspects of life

Senior and important villagers from the village With the help of villagers including women and youth At least 8-10 women 7 young boys from the village (with two teams). At least 8-10 senior persons. 8-10 people from village 15 people from village

17 Feb 2013 9:00-2:30pm

Village survey regarding NREGA and interviews

Participant observation and household interviews Checking the job cards, how often they have got the payments under NREGA.

Taken Interview from each house and seen their job card

Preparations Done A lot of preparatory work was done before starting off to the field for PRA activity

Objectives of the PRA activity were decided.

PRA plan was sketched which included

PRA tools – Resource map, Social map, Seasonality, Timeline, Transect walks, Pie chart, Vein

diagram, Problem ranking etc.

PRA plan – detailed timetable for each PRA tool.

PRA script for each PRA tool which gave detailed description about time required, materials

required, roles of team members, participants and steps for each PRA tool

Based on each PRA script, inventory list of materials required for carrying out PRA activity

was prepared, like chart papers, rangoli, chalks etc.

A briefing session about the MGNREGA and what all issues in implementation of scheme ,

works and assests, awareness, livelihood options, and wage payment for sustainable

development was given by Hemant, Adwaita&Kiran.

A briefing session about the Dos and Don’ts during PRA was taken by Hemant&Nitin along

with Prof. N.C. Narayanan was taken

PRA Tools The PRA methodology utilizes different tools to seek its goal of a participatory approach for

addressing any issue. The following tools were used by the research team in the exercise under

consideration:

1. Informal meeting

2. Resource mapping

3. Social mapping

4. Focus Group Discussion

5. Transect Walk

6. Seasonality

7. Trend line

8. Time line

The next part of the chapter goes on to describe the details of implementation of each of these, and

the observations and learning about the same.

Informal meeting We reached the village around 10 am on 16th February. We were accompanied by Bhaskar, who

works with the facilitator NGO Arohan. He introduced us to the villagers, Vilas Garel, RavindraGarel.

In this meeting, the basic purpose was ice breaking. It was facilitated by Hemant and Bhaskar, as

they knew the residents of Ramwadi. Thus we faced no problem while starting to speak to them. In

addition, they were very enthusiastic for interaction, which proved to be extremely helpful during

the two days.

We explained to them, why we were there, stating that we were there to study the situation, and we

do not have any power to bring about the changes to cope up with the problems the village was

facing. Doing this was very important as we did not wish to proceed with them thinking that we

would provide them with solutions, only to be disappointed at a later time, a quite likely risk.

PRA tools were explained to them briefly and then we decided how we shall proceed, according to

availability of time. The thing we ensured here that their comfort / suitability was given prime

importance, not ours, as we were there to study, they had not called us. Language was a bit of a

problem, as many of our team members could not speak Marathi, the language spoken in Ramwadi.

Some of the Ramwadi residents spoke Hindi thus the problem was eased to some degree.

Resource map Resource mapping is an effective tool or an exercise to investigate the knowledge of the people

about their own locality, their resources and their spatial distribution. In our case, it helped us in

getting knowledge about implementation of the MNREGA and the assets created, in Ramwadi.

Time

12:00 pm – 2:30 pm

Roles carried out by team members in this activity:

Facillitators: Anand, Abhiram

Karishma, Aparna: helped in drawing, took photos, interacting with the villagers through the

facilitators,

Vishal: Copied the map on paper

Arunabh, Dharmendra: Helped the villegers share inputs

Along with RavindraGarel and Vilas Garel, we started inviting the people from households. Many

men came for the activity. With some women came, as all were busy in their daily activities of

fetching water, washing utensils, cooking etc.

Location

The courtyard of RaghunathGarel’s house, next to the Mandir. This is the central place in the village,

and its surface was prepared with cow dung, thus was suitable for making the map. We used chalk

and Rangoli with colours to prepare the map.

Starting from the

Mandir, the central

location, we first

drew the rivulet, the

mountains and the

well to get a bearing.

Then going away from

the habitation, the

relevant details were

drawn. By this time,

the villagers got

interested, and about

20-25 men, women

and children were

now participating in

the activity.

4: Making the Resource map, with the pole indicating the Temple, the center point of the village.

Learning

Forest land and agricultural lands were the same, people farmed in the forest, without

disturbing the large trees

Almost all the land in the village was like this

In small communities, everybody knows who owns what, and the details too.

5: Resource map of Ramwadi

Household survey and interviews After studying the Trendline and Timeline, we conducted household surveys and interviews

pertaining to NREGA. We decided about the content of the survey i.e. what information we expected

out of the survey and accordingly designed a questionnaire.The interviews were informal and semi-

structured, yet aimed at extracting required information. The survey included questions about

following:

Were they aware of NREGA ?

Did they knew the number of days they were to get job under NREGA?

Did they knew about the compensation, if they were not getting 100 days job?

Were they aware of the daily wages amount ?

What type of work they are getting under NREGA?

Did they want jobs in their village only or getting job in any village was ok?

(Awareness of asset creation within their own village)

Noting their job cards and bank account details?

No. of family members listed on job card?

Annual payments being paid to them?

Difficulties faced while getting wages?

We divided ourselves into following groups to cover a larger number of houses:

Abhiram &Karishma Dharmendra&Aparna Anand & Vishal

Learning All the villagers are cooperative in nature. They take part in every type of discussions and all

other activities.

Almost all were aware of the NREGA Scheme.

They were not aware that they were eligible for 100days of work annually.

They were also not aware of the eligibility of compensation of they did not receive 100 days

of job annually.

Job cards are not issued for few household. And in some job-cards name of all family

members are not there. Those who have got their names registered have not still being

reflected on the job cards.

Currently under NREGA, they are getting mainly two types of work: bunding of rivers and

nursery (mainly for forest plantation). Only 1 bund was made by 30 workers in 1.5 days. But

rest of the time they are working in nursery.

They were also not aware they could go and make an application in the panchayat to get

jobs in their own village. Many were keen of getting a job rather than creating an asset for

their own village.

Irregularity in wage payment was reflected in the bank passbook.

Also, discrepancies were seen in passbook regarding payment of wages. One of the lady in

village got approx. Rs 17,000 in single financial year. Her passbook shows many double

entries for single date.

Transect walks Transect walk is a walk across the area of interest, that gives us the general idea about the

geography of the area. The distribution of the resources, social distribution, can also come out of a

transect walk. During a PRA activity, taking the locals with you on the walks is key, as they are the

experts on the situation, and thus can guide to what is important to them.

We went on walks across the village in two directions, more or less perpendicular to each other. We

were accompanied by young boys from Village. Two teams went on the two walks as shown in the

map. The walks were planned in order to visit or see

The assets created during the implementation of MNREGA (Vanrai bund)

Land use

Land cover

Terrain

Water sources

Soil types

The two teams, and their transects are as follows

Transect walk 1 Route: Site for new cement bandharas to vanraibandhara to hillock towards the west of the village.

The walk was around 1 km long.

Team: Abhiram, Karishma, Arunabh, Vishal

Facilitators: Yogesh Ghulum and others

Transect walk 2 Route: Road junction near Patilpada to Ramwadi village to hillock towards the south of the village.

The walk was around 1 km long.

Team: Anand, Aparna,Dharmendra

Facilitators: RavindraGarel and others

During the walk, we observed along the following points:

Land use

Land cover

Water sources

Slope

Assets created during MNREGA, their quality

Major findings during the transect walks Major proportion of the farm lands is on slopes, hence rice could not be cultivated

Water sources are in the vicinity, but dry up in summer

Forest land and agricultural land overlap

Soil cover is very thin in the area

MNREGA vanraibandhara is washed away every year

6: Profile -Transect walk 1

7: Profile: Transect walk 2

FGD Women

Venue: - Common Gathering Space besides the central temple.

Number of women participants: 9

Timing: 12:00am – 02:00pm.

Facilitator: Anand

Notes and Observations: Aparnaand Karishma

8: Focused group discussion with women

A FGD is a qualitative method to obtain in-depth information on concepts, perceptions and ideas of

a group. A FGD aims to be more than a question-answer interaction. A FGD also helps to bring out

the perceptions of the weaker stake-holders in an issue, which otherwise may not come up.

Group: - A focus group discussion (FGD) is a group discussion of 9 senior citizen women guided by a

facilitator. During the discussion group members started talking hesitantly but after some time they

started talking freely on a certain topic/issue.

In Ram Wadi village, the primary goal of PRA was to study implementation and the effects of NREGA

in the village. As the senior citizen women mostly neglected in the decision making of the village

improvement, it was necessary to understand their needs and wants.

The FGD with senior citizen women was carried out on the first day at 12:00 am as this group was

freely available. This helped us in getting an insight of senior women needs.

Daily Routine: This group since retired and old, they don’t have a specific schedule common for all. They worked as

per their needs, convenience, and health. During Monsoon they would do farming and during non-

monsoon they would go looking for a job in different villages besides.

Women’s general schedule os shown in the following table:

Time Duration Activity

AM 4:30:00 AM 5:00:00 30 min Wake up, get ready

AM 5:00:00 AM 6:00:00 1 hour Bringing water

AM 6:00:00 AM 7:00:00 1 hour cooking

AM 7:00:00 AM 9:00:00 2 hours Serving food, Breakfast

AM 9:00:00 PM 1:00:00 4 hours Work- Outside / household

PM 1:00:00 PM 2:00:00 1 hours Lunch

PM 2:00:00 PM 5:00:00 3 hours Work - Outside / household

PM 5:00:00 PM 6:00:00 1 hour Bringing water

PM 6:00:00 PM 8:00:00 2 hours Cooking

PM 8:00:00 PM 9:00:00 1 hour Dinner

PM 9:00:00 AM 4:30:00 7hours 30 min Sleep

Table 1: Daily schedule of women in Ramwadi

Job / work Scenario: - The major problem all sr. citizen women identified was the availability of job for them or their daily

survival.

They were also aware of the National Pension Scheme and were getting National Pension Scheme

(NPS). 7 out of 9 women were getting the NPS, one out of the two was getting pension but was

stopped since few years. They need to go to Khodala post office to collect the pension. They go after

being informed by villagers that the pension has come to post office. This amount was very irregular

in delivery. They were getting in a range of Rs. 1200 on a bi-monthly.

They knew the NREGA scheme of job provision. But were not aware of the number of days they are

eligible for the job. Also they did not know the compensation of the scheme if they were not

provided with the 100 days job. They were not much concerned about the scheme as they were not

in the age bar of getting job.

They do farming of Nachni, Rice and Warai. They do farming during monsoon and on other days

some of them look for jobs.

Health: - The FGD also brought to light the health care situation in the village. The village had no primary

health centre (PHC) or sub centre (SC). Senior women used to have frequent health problems which

they had to travel to the town to get government health services. The discussions made a strong

point of being dissatisfied with the health care available in the town. Hence they used to go to

private hospitals where they even did not mind spending Rs. 200 to Rs. 400 per visit.

FGD Men Venue: Common sitting area besides the temple of the village

Number of participants: 12

Date: 16March, 2013

Timing: 6.00-7.00 p.m.

Roles

Facilitator: Anand

Notes and Observations: Dharmendra

The FGD with men was specifically carried out in order to understand men’s perspective towards

the implementation of MNREGA in their village. All the people gathered to have a discussion

with us in the evening. Everybody took active interest in the discussion and shared information

on their daily activities and issues faced by them with special emphasis on the implementation of

MNREGA.

We had a long discussion for around 1 hour, which resulted in the following understanding of the

village:

1. Young men gave a lot of importance to constructing the road which would link the village to

the main road, followed by drinking water and construction of a school in the village. However,

the middle aged men were more concerned about the construction of the school and provision of

NREGA works after drinking water issue.

2. They further discussed about the houses made under Indira Awas Scheme. They stated that the

Gram Panchayat decided who would be the beneficiary. The ones ones who got a house under

this scheme have to pay 375 rs/ year as taxes whereas the others have to pay 70 rs/year. The taxes

are paid for the provision of electricity, water and sanitation. However, the three facilities have

not been adequately provided in the village.

3. Villagers have applied and paid the fees for electricity connection, however, MSEDCL has not

provided them with the connections because of lack of transportation facilities.

4. Migration is not a major problem in the village, but a few people migrate each year in the

neighbouring villages for employment in the Rabi rice plantation and a few to towns like Kalyan,

Bhivandi and Titwala.

5. There was a general consensus within the male group that more NREGA works should be

undertaken in the village.

Time Lable Activity

AM 4:30:00 AM 5:00:00 Half hour Wake up, get ready

AM 5:00:00 AM 6:30:00 1 hr 30 min Pooja

AM 6:30:00 AM 8:00:00 1 hr 30 min Breakfast

AM 8:00:00 PM 1:00:00 5 hrs Work

PM 1:00:00 PM 2:00:00 1 hr Lunch

PM 2:00:00 PM 5:00:00 3 hr Work

PM 5:00:00 PM 8:00:00 3 hrs Recreational activities

PM 8:00:00 PM 9:00:00 1 hr Dinner

PM 9:00:00 AM 4:30:00 7 hrs 30 min Sleep

Table 2: Daily schedule of men in Ramwadi

Issue ranking In the end of each focussed group discussion the discussion was steered towards the issues faced by

the respective groups. The importance of this activity was to have a comprehensive understanding

of the issues faced by the different groups. Further, the perceived issues could be correlated

between the different groups to understand the influence of gender and age on the felt needs or

issues.

Following are the findings of the different focussed group discussions:

Men

Young Middle aged Old

Men felt that lack of an all season road leading to the village was the prime issue. They

justified this mentioning that a road would provide easier access to facilities like

transportation and will solve some of the other problems. Water was the second most

important problem, described by them. They mentioned that the women had to carry the

water every day and a piped water supply system would be a good idea. Lack of a water

source for a month or so in summer was also their big concern, as they had to go to the river

beyond Patilpada, a walk of about 20 min.Lack of a school in the village was the third most

important issue ranked by them. Men did not mention to alcoholism as a problem in the

village, even on asking them on different occasions and repeatedly, so we decided to take

this problem while talking to women.

Women:

For women a new item had to be added to the list of existing issues which did not figure in the

earlier discussion. Firewood collection was one of the most cumbersome and time consuming

activity for the women and they gave it the third highest importance. The first two important issues

were water and road which were more or less similar to that of the male issue ranking.. We also

asked the women if alcoholism was a problem in the village, but they said it was not a problem.

When asked again, when no men were around, the women repeated the same,and also told that it

was a problem when they were staying in Patilpada, but things have changed for good after they

came tostay in Ramwadi. Some men drink, but “It is not a real problem”, is what one of them said.

The following table shows the ranking of the issues by different people.

Young males Middle aged males Old males Middle aged females

Vija

y

Mah

adev

Go

nd

Vila

s

Kas

hir

amG

arel

Mah

end

raB

ha

uG

on

d

Nau

nat

hK

ash

ir

amG

arel

Bal

uD

attu

Gh

at

al

Jair

amSo

nu

Nar

ge

Rav

ind

raR

agh

o

Gar

el

Laxm

anN

ausu

Gu

lum

Su

resh

Man

oh

arG

ho

r

pad

e R

amu

Dev

uN

ar

ge

Kas

hir

amR

agh

oG

arel

Kal

pan

aSak

har

amG

ulu

m

Shak

un

tala

Jayr

amN

adge

Jan

iLak

shm

anP

ard

he

Tota

l

Ran

k

Road 1 1 2 2 5 1 1 1 1 3 1 2 3 3 27 1

Water 2 4 1 5 1 4 4 5 8 6 2 1 1 1 45 2

Firewood Men did not think of getting firewood as a problem 7 2 2 11 3

School 5 2 3 3 6 2 2 2 5 1 4 6 10 9 60 4

PHC 6 5 4 7 2 7 3 4 6 2 6 4 4 4 64 5

Electricity 3 7 8 1 3 3 7 6 4 7 3 5 5 5 67 6

NREGA Job 4 3 7 6 8 5 5 3 2 4 7 3 8 7 72 7

Bus 9 9 6 4 4 8 8 7 9 8 5 9 7 6 99 8

Indira Awas

Finance 7 6 5 8 9 6 6 9 3 5 8 10 9 10 101

9

Irrigation 8 8 9 9 7 9 9 8 7 9 9 8 6 8 114 10

Table 3: Ranking of issues by people in Ramwadi

Note that the number in total columns is the total of the ranks, thus less number means higher priority

We have ranked firewood at number three, because it was ranked high by the women, and not by the men.

Venn diagram Venue: Front yard (Angan) of Bhiva Devu Budhar

Number of participants: 4

Timing: 5:30 PM - 7:00 PM

Roles:

Facilitator: Abhiram

Notes and Observations: Karishma and Aparna

Photo: Dharmendra

This activity was carried out to understand the influences of different institutions in and nearby the

village. The participants of this activity were given a thorough introduction regarding the purpose of

the activity. After the initial discussion, they identified the various institutions to be used in the venn

diagram. Initially the institutions were sorted regarding their relative importance in a villager’s life.

Once the importance of each institution was assessed, chits of different sizes were cut out of paper,

wherein the size of each chit represented the relative importance. These chits were then placed

around a circle signifying the village to identify the accessibility of these institutions by the villagers.

The final placements of these chits were arrived at based on multiple feedbacks from the

participants. The visual method of constructing the venn diagram was easy and intuitive and also

attracted more participants. Sticks were used to designate the relationships between the different

institutions.

9: Preparation of Venn diagram regarding interactions with institutions in village

10: Venn diagram: Interaction of people of Ramwadi with various institutions and facilities

Seasonality Venue: Jayram Sonu Nadge’s house

No. of participants: about 15

Timing: 10:30pm to 11:00 pm

Roles:

Facilitation: Abhiram, Vilas Garel

Notes and observation: Karishma, Dharmendra

Table 4: Table showing seasonality of various aspects of life at Ramwadi

Timeline

The timeline mapping exercise was carried out by the team with the help of old and elderly people in

the neighbourhood. This exercise helped us immensely in understanding the events and activities of

the past that have dictated the present day state of the village. This also helped us recognize the

effects of various social, economic and climatic factors on the lives of people in general. Trend

mapping over the time scale to gauge the gradual changes in the understanding and activities of

people.Insights about historic events from the elderly citizens was a very enlightening experience.

11: Timeline and trend of events in Ramwadi

Event Time Trend

Dense forests present 1940's

Lack of labor inn village stopped migration

1975 Lack of labor inn village

stopped migration

Forest dept. chopped down trees 1975-80 Farmland yields going down

Drought Around

1980

Kachcha road till Patilpada 1980 Animals in Jungle reduced

ZillaParishad School in Patilpada 1983

Electricity in Patilpada Early '80s

Tar road till Patilpada 1994

Aforestation by Forest Dept. 1998 Downward trend in cattle

1st self-help group in Patilpada 2001

Permission to farm on forest lands 2003 Disease in cattle gone down

now

Dept. of Agriculture distributed pumps

Around 2003

Cement Bandhara near Patilpada 2004

1st Pukka house in Patilpada 2005

Girl from MahadevKoli community eloped with Boy from Warli

community 2008

Deterioration of cement bandhara,started leaking

People moved to Ramwadi form Patilpada

2008 Sanitation, health improved

2008

Started household level horticulture

Multipurpose hall, Anganwadi building in Patilpada

2008 Decrease in Alcoholism

Jalswarajya well 2008

MNREGA jobs began 2008

Flood 2010

Cement Bandhara near Patilpadarepairedby Agri. Dept

2012

Solar street light in Ramwadi 2012

Table 5: Timeline and trend of events in Ramwadi

Social map Roles Facilitators: Abhiram, Anand

Interaction with men: Abhiram, Dharmendra, Aparna

Interaction with women: Karishma, Vishal, Anand, Aparna

Interaction with kids: Arunabh, Karishma

Mapping Process: Abhiram

The social mapping exercise was conducted on 16th of February (first day) to get a general idea of

the social and economic status of all the households of the village. People were gathered near the

solar night lamp at about 8.30 pm for discussions. The exercise was started by drawing a map of the

village and marking the positions of the houses. Then with the help of people around, each

household was marked for being pukka, kachcha or semi-pukka. The availability of the ration cards

and their types was also depicted on the map.

People were questioned about the forest land holdings they had and this was also marked on the

social map with a green patch for those who possessed it. The general discussions were about

NREGA, job availability and education. The social mapping exercise did give us some valuable

insights about the economic and financial conditions of the families and the households. We also did

get information about the general difficulties and problems faced by the people.

12: Social map of Ramwadi

Implementation of MNREGA Through various PRA tools such as Resource maps, Social maps, Focused Group Discussions and

interviews with households we tried to understand the NREGA and job availability issue of Ramwadi

in detail.

Currently, people get jobs from three main sources in and around Ramwadi. The most widely spread

and practiced job in the village is agriculture. Some families also owned animals like goat and hens.

One major source of jobs is NREGA, which generally includes the bunding of rivulets for water

availability and farm bunding for minimizing soil erosion. Under the NREGA scheme, people also get

jobs in the nursery where they sprout seeds and replant them in the forest area. Another big job provider is migrated labor which is employed in the agriculture of big farms nearby

and around the village; also some of the migrated labor goes to the nearby city Nashik for work. One very important fact that came out during the semi-structured questionnaire session was that

NREGA job card holders sometimes did sub-contract their task and paid the person doing it Rs.

60/day. After the harvest of the kharif crop in September, the general population of the village remains

jobless for atleast 6 months till March. They get engaged only in April when they start preparing

their fields for the next crop.

The months of October and November are filled with festivities and marriages also happen at the

same time, hence bringing a lot of expenses for everyone in general. If we study the daily activities of the people in Ramwadi, we will get a notion that during the months

of agriculture, there are numerous activities to do for all the residents. However during the non-

rainy months, there is a general lack of job opportunities which forces the people to take steps such

as migration.

Personal learnings

Aparna It was a learning experience. The prior preparations and plan made the stay fruitful and efficient. As I

am not a Marathi speaker, but I could able to understand Marathi. Many times the sharp

observations during Group discussion/ Transect walk/ Living with villagers etc., tells many things

about their culture, lifestyle and so on. My individual experience about this village is that in this

village people were very simple, very enthusiastic and with very less aspirations.

In Ram Wadi village, the primary goal of PRA was to study implementation and the effects of NREGA

in the village.

They are managing without electricity, only one Solar lamp was there in the village, hardly people

have locks in the houses. Ladies are getting water from almost a kilometre distance.

No good school in the village. Kids have to go to different village for school.

No dispensary or hospital in the nearby village.

The grain they have is Rice, Nachni and warai etc. they eat Rice and Nachni and Warai normally they

sell in market.

People are generally unhappy with the scheme. That fruitful work is not happening through this

scheme. As well as they are also not getting job opportunities.

There are lot of work which can be given priority like road as there is no road in the village

No electricity, No water, so very less vegetables to eat. They have very little source of income, some

household are hardly getting any jobs in NREGA Scheme.

The problem ranking activity with women revealed that they want work for income, water in the

village, pucca road and school for the children are on priority basis

I saw very less employment opportunities for men most of them were sitting idle with no jobs, and

very few men got opportunities to work as labours under the scheme. There is no clear vision about

the work to be done in future. They have just made some bund walls in the river, that to in mud and

gunny bag which will not last. They are maintaining the nursery which is also in the initial stage.

We enjoyed our stay, and the villagers also did. They showed incredible hospitality towards

strangers like us, which is rarely found in cities. There are numerous things to be learned from them.

Also, we as students got an opportunity to have hands-on experience of PRA. So, we as students

benefited a lot.

But the scheme should be made more powerful and with a vision to do work which will benefit the

villagers in the long run and for future generations. For these works there should be somebody who

will monitor that whatever works are happening by the involvement of villagers should be fruitful.

Anand

The visit to the village was very good experience of learning along with the villagers. It was an eye

opener for working with villagers and learning their difficulties but still living happily. Important

aspect of the whole project learnt was of incorporating every individual and making them take

decisions of their own. Patient listening and incorporating every individual was the most important

point of the whole exercise. We all received a very warm welcome from the entire village. People in

the village went beyond their capacity to help us; this was a heart touching experience. The village

even though 3 years old, it did give the experience of a deep rooted culture of past.

Abhiram

The PRA activity in Ramwadi was the first of its kind experience for me. I had known about PRA for

about a year, but had never been in any such activity. The striking thing I noticed was that people are

extremely rich sources of information, regardless of age of education which are considered kind of

measures for it. The highlight of what I learned from this activity is as follows.

About PRA activity

The most important thing is to know that we are there for our work, they have not invited

us. Respect and humbleness are very important.

Having an open mind to get the information in helps. Our pre-conceptions might act as

inhibitors to understanding.

Listening is important, not opining

Transect walk and the maps give us a general picture about the situation in the village

Venn diagram, and issue ranking give us the importance of various interactions with other

agencies

Timeline and seasonality gives us the idea about the history and the trends in the village

About the village

Ramwadi was a new village with strong social bonds

The village was very clean

All the people were BPL, and wished to get more employment through MNREGA

Some of the Post Office Bank passbooks had discrepancies, indication of someone taking

advantage of their ignorance

The people had many demands, but their attitude was not complaining

To summarize, this PRA activity was very important with respect to the similar activities in future

career.

Vishal

The PRA field trip brought a very strong mix of experiences for me. The serene mountains romanced

with the cold rivulet, while the setting sun formed a perfect setup; here was a city boy, who

somehow strangely felt connected to this scene. Having taken a dip in the rivulet's cold water and

scaling the nearest peak, I returned to join the others in the tasks of social mapping and FGD's. It was

insightful to know what the people thought and felt about everything. Together with Karishma, I

entertained the kids for a small time. The drawings and crayon sketches made by the kids were

amazingly beautiful.The next day brought even bigger revelations for me.I had to do a set of semi

structured interviews for afew households in the village. Asking them about how and what do they

work in, and how much do they get paid, what are the typical habits of people around, these

questions helped me observe the nitty-gritty of a societal system at a very minute scale. The glitter

in those eyes after being appreciated for scribbling something on a piece of paper was simply

picturesque. So innocent was the place and its people.

Arunabha

The visit to Pathadi lower (Ramwadi) village as part of the Participatory Rural Activity over 2 days

undertaken as an exercise to apparently understand the problems of the villagers and suggest

solutions to their problems was an eye opener. It’s not every day that you see village youth talking

about the ‘hopes’ the villagers have every time a city dweller visits them and how they ultimately

come to nothing- a phenomenon so common over the past few years that the arrival of the so-called

‘do-gooders’ does little to interest them anymore.

Govt schemes: Interaction with the people personally made me very skeptical about the govt

schemes implemented (NREGA for instance was nothing more than a feeble attempt at covering up

for shoddy implementation). The ‘bunds’ were plain mud filled bags which defeated the whole

purpose of having them.

Electricity: The villages were no different. My assigned village had no electricity at night though a

very ‘modern’ mobile phone charger with multiple pins for phones ranging from a Blackberry to a

Samsung was very prominently displayed at the village square. For a village which is lit by a solitary

solar light late in the night this was ironical to an extent only reinforced by the fact that the village

has had no power supply for quite some time. All attempts to procure the same have been futile

thanks to the exorbitant bribes being demanded and the attitude of ‘helplessness’ displayed by the

people who matter.

The village is very picturesque and the people are extremely generous and cordial. It’s amazing to

see a total stranger offer his bicycle to a guy he has never seen before in his life, and one who landed

in his village a few hours back.

It is just sad that we the ‘civilized and developed’ crowd of the cities arrive at the village to do our

research which turns to be redundant as apart from drawing a resource map (which called on the

time of the villagers), conducting discussions with different groups (with no promise of addressing

their problems) and going on the transect walk for the sole purpose of figuring out the topography

and watching the pathetic condition of the bunds and lamenting on the neglect by the govt nothing

more is done.

It is audacious enough that the villagers are given false hopes by the mere act of involving the entire

village in drawing a resource map in a very grandiose manner right in the middle of the village

square (which could be done very simply with a large enough Google map printout and a bit of

asking around to identify strategic areas) but going to the extent of asking the problems the villagers

are facing and then coming back, making a report without a concrete attempt at helping them out is

just not done. What these villagers need is help, not sympathy. What is needed is quiet help.

Problems identified. Govt addressed. Govt reluctant. Then it’s time to go out there with likeminded

people and help them in what little way we can. Pity is not something the villagers asked for. And it’s

time we stopped giving it to them.

Dharmendra

The two day field trip to Ramwadi gave a lot of insight and provided me with a number of ideas as to how we can take part in development work of any village. The activities which we practiced in the field like resource and social making, was totally new for me. The active participation of the villagers and their creativity made me very happy. Also, the activities like transect walk, resource and social map helped us to thoroughly understand the village. Our main focus was on NREGA work, so we are working accordingly. Following are some of the observations that I made during my stay in Ramwadi:

Villagers were very progressive; the only thing lacking is proper implementation of yojanas which includes NREGA, Indira Awas Yojana and many others.

They were also very cooperative and participated actively in all the activities.

FGD with the villagers made me aware of the problems faced by them.

Many of the villagers were getting regular job in NREGA, but their work was not focussing on assets creation. Also, their payment was not made on regular basis.

Villagers wanted to do work, but they were not getting job in the same village.

Also, there were some discrepancies in the allotment of wages and entries made in the passbook.

One of the main problems in the village was the construction of road, because in the rainy season children were not able to go to school for three to four months.

Through this field trip, I learn how to understand the problem of villagers and the different ways of resource allocation of any village. The unique experience in this field trip was the time spent in making social & resource maps, FGD, transect walk, timeline making & problem ranking. I also enjoyed watching different types of game played by children.

Karishma

PRA was a very humbling experience. The villagers were very supportive and enthusiastically

participated in the activities and the discussions that followed. We had only heard in classrooms

about certain keywords like participatory planning, involving stakeholders etc. PRA gave us a feel of

how this can be done on the ground. We had gone there to listen to the villagers and only listen to

them. Through the informal discussions we learned a lot about their daily activities and their

problems. Language was a barrier; hence I was worried if my experiences were through the lenses of

the facilitators and not my own. However, in due course I realised that even by observing the subtle

dynamics of the village I could relate to a lot of things I have read or heard as part of my courses and

such experiences were important to understand the village life and the issues faced.

The PRA was undertaken to understand the implementation of NREGA in Ramwadi and while doing

so, to get a thorough understanding of the different tools of PRA. Following are my inferences about

PRA, the village and NREGA

It is of utmost importance that we lose all our prejudices and conduct PRA with an open

mind.

Villagers should be given an opportunity to speak their mind and we should not impose our

ideas on them. I felt that the villagers are comfortable when one behaves like they belong to

the village itself and not like an outsider.

Ramwadi was a village that was built by the Warli community when they were driven out of

Patilpada. I was amazed how the villagers built their homes without any external assistance;

this made me aware of their determination and drive to make a living for themselves against

all odds.

The villagers told us that they were driven out of Patilpada as a boy from the Warli

community eloped with a girl from Mahadev Koli community. This created a conflict

between both the communities and many people were beaten up in the process. This

incident highlights the influence of caste on a villager’s life.

While conducting timeline I got to know that the productivity of the land has been

deteriorating along with decrease in the cattle population. According to me, this is a matter

of concern and can be a consequence of many factors. These factors should be looked at in

details so as to arrive at an appropriate solution.

In terms of NREGA, there were a lot of ambiguities in allocation of work and payment of

wages, as highlighted in the report. This is also an important issue and should be looked at in

priority.

There was a lot of willingness amongst the villagers to work however not many

opportunities were provided under the NREGA scheme. It is important to empower the

people by creating useful assets and in the process providing work.

My most memorable experience was with the children of the village. On interacting with

them I got to know that they were happy with the food they were getting in the school as

part of mid day meal. The children were very receptive and intelligent and I think more

should be done in terms of providing them quality education.