Empowering girls in India

A new charity launched in Australia seeks to educate young girls in rural India and turn their lives around

BY DANIELLE MATHIAS

At the age of five, Mariyam, a village girl from Rajasthan met with a terrible accident in which she lost her right leg. When Mariyam turned seven she decided she wanted to go to school. Her parents were helpless as the school was quite a distance away, and they could not carry Mariyam to school daily. They also feared she would get hurt at school. Mariyam felt dejected because of her situation.

When not-for-profit charity iIMPACT opened a girl’s Learning Centre near Mariyam’s home in Mahua Bas village, her life changed forever. After a few years at the centre, today Mariyam is a confident girl who reads well and loves to recite poetry.

Still, Mariyam missed out on running around and playing games like the other kids. She shared her feelings during a team visit by iIMPACT members. Within a few days, an iIMPACT member had arranged for an artificial limb replacement for Mariyam. After an operation in 2009, Mariyam was able to walk again. By 2011, Mariyam could run faster than many other children at the upper primary school where she was enrolled by iIMPACT.

Recently, Mariyam participated in iIMPACT’s 10-year anniversary celebrations at Gurgaon in India, where she was awarded for her courage and achievements.

On August 9, in light of its 10year celebrations, iIMPACT was formally launched in Australia at the City Hotel in Sydney. Since its foundation in 2002 by the 1978 alumni of the Indian Institute of Management, iIMPACT has had the vision ‘to transform the lives of women, families and entire communities in India by the education and empowerment of the girl child’.

The mission of iIMPACT is ‘to mobilise and motivate non-school-going girls, aged 6-14, from economically and socially backward rural areas of India, and put them firmly on the track for formal education through quality primary education’. iIMPACT has established over 760 learning centres and has educated over 30,000 girls in India.

iIMPACT gives priority to villages with no existing educational facilities and the highest amount of out-of-school girls, where female literacy rates are extremely low.

During the Sydney launch, iIMPACT India Trust CEO Nirmala Tandon made an emotional appeal for support via Skype video-link from her offices in Gurgaon. She said that the greatest strength of iIMPACT learning centres is that they are within easy access of villagers. The lack of commute equals less hesitation for villagers to send their daughters to school. The average distance a child has to walk to an iIMPACT learning centre is 120m. The average walking distance to a government school is 1.8km.

Nirmala emphasised that iIMPACT is different to other NGOs, as the organisation remains connected to the girls even after they graduate from the learning centres. It helps integrate the girls into the government education system so that they can go to university after finishing their primary education at the learning centres, which are then handed over to the community.

Such networks, like those created between iIMPACT and the girls, has the potential to unite the whole country. Chief guest at the launch, - Mr Arun Goel, Consul-General of India in Sydney said, “We need a level playing field for progress. Poor people need to be given the opportunity to shine”.

He emphasised iIMPACT’s goal to empower women by providing them with the ability to read and write, so that they can gain more respect and determine their own future. iIMPACT also differs from other charities in that 100 per cent of donations go directly towards benefitting the education of girls.

Nirmala stated that there is a high level of transparency in the financials and accounts of iIMPACT, saying each corporate sponsor receives complete statements regarding spending every quarter. Internal audits are also conducted every three to six months. iIMPACT works with 18 partners including the Bryan Adams Foundation and Give India.

President of iIMPACT Australia, Dilip Rao, said that it costs each girl Rs 2500 per year to attend the learning centre. There are 30 girls in each learning

The mission of iIMPACT is ‘to mobilise and motivate nonschool-going girls, aged 6-14, from economically and socially backward rural areas of India, and put them firmly on the track for formal education through quality primary education’ centre, and there is currently a 75% attendance rate. iIMPACT is currently in talks with organisations about imparting vocational training to girls, which goes hand-in-hand with their primary education. Its goal is to educate 60,000 girls by 2016, in response to the growing demand for schools in India.

“Educating a girl can transform a community,” said Rao, “Rural India is suffering from a problem of exclusion”.

76% of the girls that graduate from iIMPACT learning centres continue onto higher education, with 16% of the girls in college. These girls are daughters of landless farmers who were once vulnerable to child marriage and human trafficking. According to Nirmala, the girls want to leave their villages and go find a better quality of life in the city after being educated. Some even become teachers at the learning centres, she said.

“For this goal to be achieved, $13 million needs to be raised over the next four years,” said Nirmala. “This milestone contributed to the decision to launch iIMPACT in Australia, as dollars have more leverage over rupees. The first cheque from Australia would go towards funding a learning centre in Delhi”.

If you are interested in educating the girl child in India, visit iimpact.org.au. A donation of just $50 can educate a child for a whole year and significantly improve their quality of life.

BJP blocks Sonia’s food bill, three states roll it out Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s pet welfare measure, the food security programme was launched recently in three party ruled northern states - Delhi, Haryana and Uttarakhand - even as the bill could not be taken up in parliament with the BJP disrupting the proceedings on its demands regarding alleged irregularity in coal block allocations.

The government’s hopes to pass the bill in the lower house on Aug 20, the birth anniversary of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, were belied as the Congress managers failed to gauge the opposition strategy.

However, Sonia Gandhi, while launching the rights-based ambitious food scheme in Delhi, described it as “unparalleled in the world”. Delhi is among the first states to roll out the programme after the government got the president to approve an ordinance in June.

“We decided to formulate a food security bill so that the poor do not remain hungry, their children do not sleep hungry and they do not suffer malnutrition,” Sonia Gandhi said at Talkatora Stadium in New Delhi.

“The guarantee of food provided by the food security scheme on such a large scale is unparalleled in the world,” she said in her speech beamed live by TV channels.

She gave away food security ration cards to women beneficiaries along with a 5 kg packet of rice.

Speaking at the function, Food Minister K.V. Thomas accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of delaying the passage of food security bill in parliament.

The party was dissatisfied over the statement made by Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal over the missing files on an issue that was being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for alleged irregularities.

Though the BJP did not say it was opposed to the bill, party spokesperson

Prakash Javadekar said they will not give up the demand for the prime minister’s statement on the “missing files”.

The “missing files” pertain to decisions taken at various levels in the coal allocations where the opposition alleges large-scale corruption at ministerial levels.

Congress managers hope the bill will be passed in the current parliament session, saying there still were three working days left in the week and four in the next.

“We will be trying our level best to get the food bill passed. We are talking to everybody (all political parties),” Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajeev Shukla told reporters.

Congress managers said if the opposition deliberately blocks the food bill, they will go directly to the people and explain things to them as to who had opposed this legislation.

Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has said it will support the bill and the Samajwadi Party has given conditional support, saying that its amendments should be accepted.

BSP supremo Mayawati said: “We support the bill as it is for the poor, but we want certain changes for which we will move amendments”.

The Food Security Bill - seen as both a major welfare as well as populist move designed to swing votes for a beleaguered Congress in upcoming elections - aims to provide subsidised food grain at prices much below the market rate to around 67 percent of India’s 1.2 billion people. The bill is expected to benefit about 800 million people.

The party is hoping that the bill, which was a part of the Congress manifesto for the 2009 polls, will bring electoral benefits just as the rural job plan, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, is credited with swinging the party’s victory in the 2009 polls.

The bill will cost the government around Rs.124,723 crore, the Congress has said.

The bill was first introduced in parliament in December 2011. It remained with a standing committee for a year, before it was taken to the Lok Sabha for consideration and passing in the budget session that ended May 8.

In the national capital, the bill will provide benefits to 3.2 million people in the first phase and later cover 4.1 million people. It will come into effect Sep 1 in Delhi and the beneficiaries will be get a fixed amount of food grain at Rs.3 a kg for rice and Rs.2 a kg for wheat.

Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna launched the food security programme in their states. More Congress ruled states are slated to launch the programme in the coming days.

India, China discuss ways to maintain peace on border

India and China recently discussed ways to maintain peace and tranquillity along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) as well as the recent incidents of incursions.

The two sides discussed issues of mutual interest including ways to reduce trade deficit during the 5th round of India-China Strategic Dialogue, a ministry of external affairs release said in New Delhi.

“The discussions covered bilateral, regional and global issues of mutual interest,” it said.

The Indian side was led by Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh and the Chinese side by Vice Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin.

The two sides discussed ways to enhance understanding on using trans-border river waters, expanding bilateral trade and investment and ways of maintaining peace and tranquillity along the LAC.

There have been Chinese incursions in Ladakh sector including the stand-off in April after Chinese troops pitched tents but pulled back after 21 days following flag meetings and talks at official level.

The two sides also took stock of developments in bilateral ties since the visit of Chinese Premier Li Keqiang to India and discussed ways to boost cultural cooperation, people-to-people exchanges and expansion of scientific and technological cooperation.

They also prepared the ground for a possible visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to China later this year. The two sides also talked about the potential and prospect for Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) cooperation.

India and China also discussed future cooperation in the BRICS framework and ways of ensuring an open, inclusive and transparent architecture in the Asia-Pacific region.

The two sides also discussed the outlook for Afghanistan in 2014 and beyond.

Later, Liu called on External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid.

It was also decided that the 6th IndiaChina Strategic Dialogue will be held at Beijing at a mutually convenient time, the release said.

Bihar train tragedy: Victims’ kin blame lack of road

A day after at least 28 Hindu pilgrims were mowed down by a speeding train in Bihar, the survivors and families of victims blamed lack of road access to a temple near the accident site for the tragedy.

They alleged that as there was no foot overbridge, the pilgrims were crossing the track at a railway station to visit the temple when the Rajya Rani Express train hit them on the morning of August 19 in Khagaria district, over 150 km from Patna.

Babulal Yadav, who lost his 10-year-old son Ramgrish in the tragedy, said: “Pilgrims are forced to take the risk of crossing the track to visit Katyayani Temple as there is no road access”.

“In the past, former chief minister Lalu Prasad and his wife Rabri Devi promised to construct a road but nothing happened. The present Chief Minister Nitish Kumar also promised to build a road to the temple, but it has remained on paper,” said Yadav, a resident of Dushmudhi village.

Madhuri Mahto, who lost two young sons Prem Raj and Ram Raj, in the tragedy, said: “Pilgrims cross the tracks during festivals to reach the temple because there is no road facility”.

“A road access to the temple could have saved so many lives,” Mahto, a resident of Dhariyavas village, who himself was injured while saving his wife Sangeeta Devi during the accident, said over the telephone from a government hospital.

Suresh Singh, a villager from the area, slammed the delay in arrival of medical help and rescue teams after the tragedy.

“The family members and relatives of the victims carried them on their backs over seven km to reach the nearest highway and take them to hospital,” Singh said.

Additional Director General of Police (law and Order) S.K. Bhardawaj admitted that rescue work at the accident spot was also delayed due to lack of road access.

National Disaster Response Force Director General Krishna Choudhary said in Patna that all states must develop disaster response structure down to the village level.

“There is a need to develop effective and accountable disaster response structure at the state level” said Choudhary, who is visiting the flood-hit state.

Nitish Kumar told media that road construction department had been directed to build an approved state highway on a priority to improve connectivity of the temple area and the spot close to the train accident site.

“I visited the temple during my tenure as railway minister. It is a very remote place. The terrain is difficult. There is no other means to reach the temple, except trains,” he said.

Chief Public Relation Officer of East Central Railway Amitabh Prabhakar said that six seriously injured pilgrims were undergoing treatment at a hospital in Khagaria.

“Both the drivers of the train, who were thrashed by angry pilgrims after the accident, are undergoing treatment at a hospital and their condition is stable,” he said.

According to district police officials, the pilgrims were going to the temple to offer holy water to Lord Shiva on the fourth and final Monday of the holy month of shravan (July-August) when the tragedy took place.

India’s Aakash tablet in US pilot projects

After a few minutes on the Aakash, a fiveyear-old American kid proudly announced he had achieved Level 4 in an addition game. He’d started the day at Level 1.

These poorer kids in North Carolina were already picking up skills they’d be learning in the next school year, which was unprecedented - they would usually start off the year at a disadvantage.

The world’s cheapest Made-in-India tablet, nicknamed Aakash (sky), had promised to transform Indian education. Instead, the government project got mired in delays and controversies in India. Meanwhile, the $50 Aakash tablet was creating a buzz in a dozen countries, and in the United Nations, where it was showcased last November.

Now, the Aakash has just completed a pilot in the US state of North Carolina, with 100 units of the Android tablets deployed in summer camps for poorer schoolchildren (mostly under age 10) to help them prepare for next year’s studies. And there are other projects under way, with 2,000 tablets - DataWind’s Aakashequivalent UbiSlate models - already deployed.

The man behind the North Carolina pilot is software entrepreneur Chris Evans. After hearing about the Aakash from Valleybased entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa, Evans agreed to fund 100 tablets for the American non-profit Communities in Schools (CIS), which was running the summer camps in North Carolina. Evans is on the board of CIS. “(The richer kids) were already using smartphones and tablets at school,” Evans says, “and I thought the Akash would be an affordable way to keep them in pace with their classmates and engaged with their studies”.

Wadhwa is an evangelist for low-cost tablets. He has written extensively in the Washington Post, ForeignPolicy.com, and elsewhere, about their potential to transform education. He also saw the Aakash “As a way to force US tablet prices to drop - bring in some competition from abroad”. Along the way, Wadhwa spoke about the Aakash to Lotus Corp founder Mitch Kapor, Obama’s former CTO Aneesh Chopra, and to others including Evans, to bring them on board for different projects involving the low-cost tablets.

The tablets in the pilot shipped with apps mostly developed by New York-based Mango Learning, an educational games venture. Mango’s chairman Prakesh Ahuja offered access to their entire suite of apps, including a management and evaluation system that tracks student progress.

The sub-$50 price of the Wi-fi was a game-changer, Evans says, adding that free wi-fi was available in many of the students’ neighbourhoods. “We discussed giving the tablets to the students for the pilot, but the staff preferred to keep possession of them to make sure they stayed configured consistently,” adding that several parents now want to buy the tablet--even though they all live on public aid.

The Aakash, which costs about $50, was designed and developed by Londonbased DataWind for India’s ministries of human resource development (HRD) and information and communication technology (ICT).

About 100,000 units were supplied in the first phase, ending in April 2013, mostly in the form of Aakash 2, a tablet well received even by critics who had panned the first Aakash.

Initially meant for engineering college students at a subsidized $35, the Aakash was to be later given to other students - with ambitious plans of giving them to all 220 million students in India over seven to eight years. That rollout is now planned for 2014, with what the Indian government now calls Aakash 4.

The US isn’t the only country with Aakash pilots. DataWind CEO Tuli reports deployments in a half a dozen African countries, Mexico and Afghanistan, spanning NGOs, government departments and UN agencies. Most deployments, he says, are in the hundreds of units, while Mexico and Zambia “are in the range of tens of thousands of units”. Wadhwa says those projects are good to have, but for technology, the world looks to the US.

“That is why what happens here matters more than anywhere”.

“The 2,000 tablets in the US so far reflects the equivalent of just a day of shipments in India for us,” Tuli says. “But we’ve not yet commercially rolled out there. A US rollout could easily exceed a million units in the first year. These initial deployments are in support of NGOs and educational institutions”.

Draft guidelines for corporate gender parity soon: Sachin Pilot

In an important step towards gender parity in the workplace, the government is framing guidelines for a new rule making directorship of women in company boards mandatory and these will be made public very soon, says Corporate Affairs Minister Sachin Pilot. But many women feel this step is too little, too late.

“We are already framing guidelines along with the chambers of commerce and industry stakeholders and once the draft rule is ready we will put it on our website to seek opinions. Following this the new rule will come in place. We will try to put the draft guidelines as soon as possible,” Pilot said recently in New Delhi.

The guidelines will give the draft rules a proper shape.

Pilot said, “There is a lack of gender parity in most of the workfield. Women have done enough work to prove their mettle. This (the bill) is just a first step we have embarked upon”.

The new Companies Bill holds that at least one woman be made a company board director. This has, however, evoked a mixed reaction. There are some who feel that too little has been done towards giving women their rightful place in companies.

“Why ensure position of only one woman in a company? Is it a charity? What about other women who work in various other positions in a company?” asked Annie Raja, General Secretary, National Federation of Indian Women.

Akhila Sivadas, Executive Director, Centre for Advocacy and Research, said the need to have a rule was felt because women are bringing a lot of strength to many businesses.

The “Professional role of women is changing, said Sivadas. “It cannot just be a male world. Specially the way business world is fashioning itself, can you ignore women? It makes sense for them to have more women on board”.

Sivadas said there are also pressure groups, which contributed towards this decision, like the women’s wing of many business advocacy organisations. “This decision has given some kind of policy shape to women’s position. It was a conscious look at the diversity of the working mass by the government. It is a politically correct, progressive step. This will help bring some change to the pretence of diversity”.

Anasuya Gupta, chairman and managing director, CICO Technologies, said she was happy because at least the government had taken the first step. “If we see universally, in India women are far, far below compared to where women globally are,” Gupta said.

She pointed out it is important to have a “Venus aspect” in every company board as women have a different perspective and views on every matter.

Arun Duggal, chairman, Shriram Capital, who has started an initiative to train women directors, felt this decision is a good small step.

“It gives out a signal. But it is not a sufficient step. There are certain things in the bill which need to be made clear. It will take a while to become clear which type of company will need women directors,” Duggal said.

He, however, pointed out that the bill does not say whether ‘woman director’ also meant independent woman director. “If it has meant so then we might end up seeing wives and relatives of businessmen becoming board directors. But that will not solve the problems”.

Duggal added: “The number of women represented is very low. Sixty percent of BSE 500 companies do not have any women directors. Just having a law without preparatory work could lead to a scramble to get women on the board”.