READ Model is such a convincing model. Whosoever understands well and is interested to give back to the community to whom he belongs comes forward to adapt and partner with READ India.
Mr Asif Ali, the then Sarpanch of village Chainnsa visited my house with one of my connections in Gurgaon, listened carefully the long term strategy of engaging empowering educating and enhancing the skills of communities, committed the half of his homeland in his village to construct the Community Library and Resource Centre and committed himself to the cause. He agreed that this building will ever be used for the social work. In 2013, the READ Community Library and Resource Center was constructed. The dedication of the building in the name of Tamiko Mitsui by her daughter Kaori Zage, on behalf of Zage family based in Singapore and the funds were channelled through READ Global. She visited the READ Centre on the inauguration and when she saw the plaque of dedication, Community for whom this Community Library has been dedicated, she became emotional. (https://youtu.be/vJ6qIFbPM2k)
Tina Sciabica, the then Executive Director READ Global was also present with her and she was amazed to see the response. The library with new books, brand new computers, some community women saw the computers first time, early learning Center for children from 3 to 6 years, specially girls, sewing machines for women to learn the skill were a few of the initial attractions. Later, the students from Drishti School of Design, Bangalore did their internship and made women learn to enhance their traditional skills of making rugs and baskets. The journey continued and READ was able to bring multiple programmes of Skilling, Education, and empowering youth for employability. These programmes are continuing.
In 2013, when I was challenged by many that it would be tough for a woman with a poised personality to work in Mewat, I accepted this challenge silently because the condition of women and children made me to work with them. I would also like to acknowledge the constant support of Mr RS Dalal, ex Director General of Police, Haryana, whom we invited as the Chief Guest for inauguration. He is still at the back of READ India and provides guidance and support at every time.
We have worked in 15 or more of the surrounding villages around Chainnsa on Literacy and Education, digital literacy, women empowerment and Livelihood, youth empowerment etc. reaching 9600 unique people through various programmes. Many joined repeated programmes from time to time. READ India impacted the lives of around 25000 community people. The dedicated team from READ India understood three aspects from me at the beginning to have patience perseverance and positive attitude to work with the community and today we see the results.
We always say Charity begins from home and the dedication and interest for self-empowerment and transforming others has been seen in Farzana Bano, the daughter of Mr Asif Ali, who is managing the Community Library and Resource Centre so well.
After Chainnsa, READ started working in Nuh, Tauru and other areas and we are proud to say that the positive attitude of learning and safety of the READ Team while travelling and staying in the villages have never been a challenge. It is a welcome opportunity to be engaged with people in Mewat and Palwal.
Geejgarh is a hamlet in Dausa district surrounded by 53 hamlets. Very interesting site to visit! It’s a valley surrounded by high mountain on one side.
I remember, my first visit to Geejgarh, very warm welcome by the villagers, having their roots in Geejgarh. Though their younger siblings have moved to Jaipur for jobs or business, women, old men, girls, and children are in the village, meaning having two establishments, one in Jaipur and another in Geejgarh.
I am not talking about the demographic or geographic information. We have a detailed report on the baseline, which speaks about the villages and its people in detail. I would like to share my experiences while setting up the Community Library and Resource Center and meeting with women and children. While the older men used to play cards on the roadsides, women wanted to learn alternative skills to earn revenue to manage two establishments. Children and youth wanted to read books, learn computers and prepare for their higher studies. While we constructed the beautiful building of lime and stone, it became a second home for women and children. The women panchayat leaders came forward to manage the READ Center in initial times. The skills women learnt were sewing and stitching, making pickles, pappad and other eatable items, the dynamism seen in the women and the inherent leadership was very visible.
I still remember the village stakeholders hosting the visits of national and international guests, by happily organizing the community feast with traditional Rajasthani food.
Women have strong negotiation skills which might have been with them due to hard life they experience on daily basis. The journey of the center was initiated with books, computers, Early Learning Centre when Walmart support came to construct the big hall on the first floor for women livelihood options. Chander Prakashji, the dynamic personality in the village took the whole responsibility with transparency and commitment, supported by a young boy Chand Khan. In the past 10 years, they trained around 10000 women, digital learning to around 2000 youth and many more local community benefitted from the READ Centre. Now from the past two years, women started enhancing their traditional skills on spinning and weaving. 20 women came forward for going out of the village to Jaipur for a month training on weaving and other options. Great transformation!
Two stories I can never forget. Kailashi, a girl affected with polio, used to walk for 45 minutes, wanted to learn stitching and sewing and reading. She got full support from the Center, and you can see her here.
Another story of Pintu, who had the wheelchair to come to the Centre but learnt sewing and stitching and later became the trainer and now running his boutique, earning around Rs. 10000/- per month.
The beautiful building was constructed with the support of an individual donor, Barbara Kipper, friend of the founder of READ Global. Here I would like to highlight the passion of Dr Antonia Neubaeur who raised the money from her friends and donated to construct the libraries in rural India. She might have visited Geejgarh 2-3 times.
The concept of “System Change” and the ‘People’s first’ is new for us but this was practiced knowingly or unknowingly by READ India in the past. Research on the one side, community on another side for deep dive discussions have shown the results. Their needs, their perceptions, their desires, their own management skills play a pivotal role in the development sector. We should ignite passion in them and see the miracles.
READ India provided me many opportunities to study different cultures, be with them and develop a common understanding for Education and Development of the local communities through Community Library and Resource Centers.
From West Bengal to Manipur, a big shift in culture, thus setting up the Community Library and Resource Center was not tough. In early 2009, my next journey was to Manipur, Imphal to do the stone laying of the Library to be constructed on the land donated by the Community in Sanghaiprou village of Imphal where I met the Kabui tribes. I was dressed in a simple traditional Indian salwar kurta. I went straight from the airport to the launch of the Community Library and Resource Center. I knew only one person, Mr Newmei, who was invited in September 2008 to sign the MoU with Carol Erickson, the then Executive Director of READ Global and Bob Renu, the then Asia Director. This was my first trip to Imphal. Language was the barrier though the warm welcome made me comfortable. I still remember the lunch hosted by one of the Library Management Committee member in her house. Being a vegetarian, it was tough for me to select the dishes as I knew the dry fish was part of every dish, whether vegetarian or non-vegetarian. I was amazed by the hospitality, the community lunch and it seemed that the whole village is one family. The traditional songs sung by the community women with their dance performances, the beautiful women were dressed in their traditional attire and men too. People committed to the cause was visible. Education is the need along with the livelihood programmes. Weaving is the traditional craft which every woman knows and READ India was encouraged to support these women to enhance their traditional craft. I still remember, I was not able to stay at the hotel alone because of many barriers and above all, my fear. I remember, one of the girl from Sanghaiprau accompanied with me to the Hotel and stayed in my room. I made almost 10-12 visits after 2009 as I liked the community, the people, the library, the warmth. My colleague, Dr K K Mishra, Anthropologist joined me twice to study the culture, the people, the challenges in general and how READ could do better.
After making the Centre running in Sanghaiprou, the journey was continuing because READ Global used to bring many guests to Imphal as tourists and Sanghaiprou community always welcomed them with warmth, organising cultural programmes, traditional dances performed by men and women. I still remember one incidence when Dr Antonia Neubeaur was with her co-travellers, myself and one visitor from the travel business was with me. The welcome ceremony and inauguration of the building was organised. The elder community was made to sit in a row outside the building along with the guests. The plaque of the names of the local community contributions was displayed outside the gate of the building.
As per the traditional culture of the community, the young boys brought a big pig tied with ropes in a big basket, they cut the pig and brought the spine of the pig in a big plate in front of the eldest man and woman, they saw the spine and declared the auspicious occasion of inaugurating the building. The pig mutton was cooked in big pots and served with rice to the local community.
Later, to Metei Community, where I met with Mira Bai, the government servant holding a position in the State Department of Women and Child Welfare donated her building in Tubileima for the READ Center. The Community Library was established. It was a beautiful building and 100 women used to weave the cloth and were taking in the evening in a van donated by READ India to the Emma market and used to sell their cloth. This mechanism went very well and Mira Bai also supported financially to add more weaving looms to the programme.
Dwarka, the second biggest district of Asia, in New Delhi. is named after the legendary Dwarika Kingdom. Gurugram is very close. Dwarka Sector 21 metro station connects to the Connaught Place area in 10 minutes through Airport Express Line.
Dwarka has small villages around and one of the villages is Shahbad Mohammadpur, adjacent to the Sector 8 metro station. It is behind the International Indira Gandhi Airport of Delhi. In fact, many employees who serve at the airport for many supporting jobs stay in Shahbad Mohammadpur because of their convenience reaching to the airport at mid-night for shift duties.
While constructing the metro line and expansion of the boundary of the airport, land has been acquired by the villagers, as per the villagers of Shahbad Mohammadpur. One can experience the vibrations while in the village when the metro passes from the underground and can hear the loud voice of landing and taking off the multiple flights from the airport, day and night.
READ India opened a Community Library and Resource Center in Shahbad Mohammadpur in 2013. The house which was taken for opening the READ Library was from a family who stayed in this village after the 1947 Independence and the elders of the family moved from the village in 2013 to stay in Dwarka city which is less than 3 kms away from the village. Much of the families are migrated from various States of India as their husbands either work at the airport or nearby factory areas.
When the READ Community Library and Resource Center was opened, the response of the Community was overwhelming because the women, young girls, children and elders got an opportunity at their doorsteps to learn the skills or share their skills with others. Three generations visited the READ Centre either for training other women on crochet, embroidery or knitting, or learning the other skills like sewing and stitching, digital literacy, special courses like Health Workers, Technology Empowering Girls, Tally an accounting software, cookery classes, teachers training and so on. This READ Center not only created job opportunities for women at the Center but also helped many for getting suitable employability or initiating their own micro-enterprise.
READ India started a pre-school wherein the small children from 3 to 6 years, are studying on Montessori pattern of learning. These children are from the families who cannot afford the exorbitant fee in the private schools. During COVID 19, these children were approached by the local teachers with age-appropriate e-content on a regular basis.
This Center has been a hub of many programs, touching the lives of more than 10000 people in the past 8 years, and the visitors from India and abroad, Ministries, Corporates and other Civil Society Organizations, visited many a time to see how strong the community engagement turning to community transformation is happening. Such examples are reflected from various stories of change. The READ Center is still continuing and managed by the local women leaders who transformed their lives and are now mentoring others to bring change in themselves.
Savita is 36 years old woman who has her residence in Shahbad Mohammadpur village near Dwarka sector- 8 metro station. She is associated with the READ India center for the past 8 years.
In 2013, she came to know about Read India from one of her neighbors. She always had this zeal of doing something by herself but found a lack of opportunities in her community. As she got to know about the opening of the center she visited there to know more about it and thought to give an interview for the stitching instructor position. She cleared that interview and started teaching Stitching and Sewing at the READ India center. To date, she has taught more than 2000 ladies from her village. Among these 2000, more than half are now financially independent. Alongside her trainings, she also started a production unit at the center where items like laptop bags, specks cover, files, folders, etc. were made. In the production unit, the beneficiaries were also involved from where they started earning money.
Ms. Savita never left her house before joining the READ India center, she uses to do all the household chores and stay indoors. She took all the capacity-building trainings organized by READ India like life skills, leadership, mental health, etc. Now, she feels so confident while speaking to people, while taking classes, and is managing the center well now.
Ms. Savita made her identity in the village, earlier people used to recognize her by her spouse’s name but now community people address her as mam.
She is very proud of herself and her work and is thankful to READ India for helping her grow.
Ms. Nagina Begum is from Agra and is residing in Delhi for the past 20 years. She is a mother of a college-going boy and a school-going girl. She is associated with READ India for 6 years now. Nagina joined READ India for learning Stitching and Sewing. She polished her skills of stitching and later joined the production unit, which helped her to earn and support her family.
Unfortunately, she lost her spouse during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. As her husband was the mere source of income, Nagina’s family experienced serious economic crises after her husband’s death. During this difficult phase of her life, she started working at the READ India Dwarka center and worked hard to survive the basic expense.
After achieving mastery in Stitching and Sewing training and then being a part of the production unit, Nagina then enrolled for the Online Selling training with an intention of growing herself with the evolving times during COVID-19.
She is grateful to READ India for bringing such trainings that help community people to be independent.
Ms. Suman is 35 years old woman who lives in Shahabad Mohammadpur. One of her friends from the community told her about the READ India center a couple of years back. She started visiting the center. She started with her first training in Stitching and Sewing and felt that she achieved a lot in her life. As she brushed up her skills in stitching, she wanted to learn more and enhance herself like others in her class. After that, she got herself into the production unit at Dwarka center.
She is now more independent and is living her dreams. She is also supporting her children to do the things they want. From being a housewife to being an independent woman, her journey is inspiring. She actively participated in multiple trainings conducted by READ India and motivated others to join them, too. She is now financially supporting her husband.
She is also equipped in online selling and considering to running her own business.
Anjana is 26 years old. She was born just like any other normal child and went to school till 10th standard. After her 10th board exams, Anjana was down with a fever which affected her body and soon her legs got paralyzed. Due to this reason and other family issues, she could not continue with her studies. From 16 years of age till 25 years she did not step out of her house.
In one of the health camps organized by READ India, READ staff met her and enrolled her in TAG (tech age girls). She learned ICT skills, like how to book a cab, transfer money using apps, typing, working on excel sheets etc. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, READ India continued the trainings using the digital platform.
Anjana enrolled in another program of Social Media Marketing where she learned how to use social media in a useful and more productive way. She gained knowledge of how to earn money and fame through Facebook, YouTube, and other such apps. She is well aware of the different features of WhatsApp and how it can be used for business purposes. During her training in Social Media Marketing, she shared her thoughts on how she is planning to start her own business in which she can stitch clothes and at this time mask and sell them online. Her words are- “If she is not able to walk, it does not matter, she can still run her own enterprise and earn her livelihood, she is no more a burden on the family”.
Today Anjana is a confident girl and has gained the trust of her family. Now she has started going for therapy alone. She has started contributing in family decisions and her family respects her. They have accepted her again after a long time.
I remember while Tina Sciabica, the then Executive Director, READ Global, came to India from USA, Dr Praveen Agarwal, the Advisory Board member of READ India arranged a luncheon meeting with Mr Darshan Singh, Founder, Socio Demographic Society (SOS), based in Gurgaon, at DLF Club Gurgaon. The purpose was how READ Community Library and Resource Centre could be established in his ancestral village, Devli, Bharatpur district, Rajasthan. He said he has the land and construct the library for the villagers with the simple thought of giving back to the villagers for holistic development of the community. He kept his promise and started construction. Within six months the building was ready. The inauguration was done in 2012. The sense of satisfaction was visible on his face. In one of the discussions, Mr Darshan Singh said, this building is dedicated to the villagers with the support of READ India. Till the time READ India is able to empower communities and communities are able to self-sustain the programmes, I will be the happiest person and always stand with you all.
The READ Centre, the building, the villagers, the stakeholders, all joined hands to work together. Education, pre-school, women livelihood, access to ICTS and youth development are the programmes continuously running since it’s inception.
Tina Sciabica visited the Centre on her next visit to India and was amazed to see the progress. HP computer lab on wheels providing training to youth on IT skills; women making cotton durries, villagers making pickle and edible oil were the variety of products made by the villagers for self -sustaining the Centre.
The confidence in the staff to work towards their own growth and the community is seen in the passion of Kusum Lata and Pushpender.
We have reached to 2864 children, 6123 youth, 2501 women and 200 farmers with needed knowledge to save their crops are a few highlights. Pre-school was highly appreciated by the villagers making the toddlers learn with Montessori education and the young women trained as Nursery teachers. This will continue once we are out of pandemic.
Women are being given equipment to weave durries to sell online. A group of women would also be trained on weaving as they have already been trained on spinning.
As READ India quite often visit the READ Centre, Mr Darshan Singh has been so thoughtful of constructing the rooms on the first floor with kitchen attached so that the staff can stay, cook the food, if required, with basic comforts.
This is what READ India speaks about wonderful partnerships and working with rural communities with strong community participation, community engagement and community ownership.
A group of like-minded people can bring realistic social change where communities join hands and passion is transferred with dedication and commitment resulting Passion in Action by All!
