Site visit report for BR Hills (Mysore) project Ashwin Nayak 144 N. Sierra Bonita Ave Apt. 2 Pasadena, CA 91106 USA +1-626-795-0476 nayak@cs.caltech.edu Date of visit: December 13, 2001 Date of report: March 16, 2002 Address ------- Vivekananda Girijana Kalyana Kendra (VGKK) Biligiri Ranganabetta (BR) Hills Yelandur Taluk 571 441 Chamarajanagar District Karnataka, India Phone: (8226) 44025 Fax: (8226) 44018 email: vgkkbrh@sancharnet.in Main contact ------------ Dr. H. Sudarshan Bangalore Phone: (80) 6563214 (home) (80) 2271021 (office) email: hs-home hs-office hs-inablers Location -------- (with respect to Bangalore) VGKK is approximately 200 Km from Bangalore. There are two buses daily, one at 7:00 am and one at 1:30 pm. The return bus leaves at 6:30 pm. The bus journey takes approximately 6 hours. In a private vehicle, it takes about 5 hours. Detailed directions from Bangalore: Take the Mysore road for 80 Km, to Maddur. 3 Km beyond Maddur, there is a deviation to the left that goes to Malavalli/Kollegal. Malavalli is 28 Km from Maddur, Kollegal is 60 Km from there. At Kollegal, go beyond the bus stand and take the road towards Yelandur for 7 Km. Turn left just before the bridge and the Forest Checkpost. It is 30 Km to BR Hills on this road. (Distances are approximate, and the road conditions are quite bad on certain stretches.) Report ------ I met Dr. H. Sudarshan very briefly on Dec 12, 2001, at his office. I told him that I was from Asha-LA, and that I wished to visit the project. He called VGKK so that they would expect us there the next day. We talked about his current position in the Karnataka government, and how he was trying to bring health care reform from within the government. He was very busy, and I wasn't able to find out much about VGKK from him. Even from my brief interaction with him, I was impressed by him. He was very nice right from the beginning, very humble, idealistic, but aware of the practical side of things. Next day, I along with my father, aunt, cousin, and a friend drove to VGKK. We started from Bangalore at around 10:00 am, and reached VGKK at around 3:00 pm. The project is located inside a restricted area, which is closed to traffic at 6:00 pm in the evening, so we had less than 3 hours to return. We had a brief glimpse of a class in progress before we went to meet the manager, Mr. H. Ramachari (he is also one of the teachers at VGKK). He told us about the awards that Dr. Sudarshan had won, including the Padmashree in 2000. Then, he told us about the Forestry course, a Job Oriented Course, which is a 2 year course that they teach after class 10th. They were seeking funding for the course. This course had recently been recognized by Karanataka Govt. He showed us the list of 16 students enrolled in the course in 2001, also the budget for the course. I asked them to send a formal proposal for the course directly to Asha. (They later sent the proposal to me.) I asked about past Asha funding (where it was being used, whether it was adequate etc.), but Mr. Ramachari didn't know any of the details. I glanced over the account registers, but I couldn't tell much from the registers, what Asha's role had been. The accountant was also not present; apparently he knew the details of Asha funding. Since we had not had a proper lunch, we went to get a quick bite in a nearby restaurant. During and after lunch my father and I tried to find out about the school, and what it's impact on the life of the tribals has been. For the past several years, the school has been running classes 1 to 10, and various vocational courses. The Forestry job-oriented course has been running since 1999. There are 18 teachers and 480 students in all. They've had between 420 to 500 students every year. 42% of the students in classes 1 to 7 are women, and their overall percentage is 32%. There are 30 to 40 students per class. I asked what the students do after completing school there. Mr. Ramachari told me about a couple of students who had gone on to college, and about a few others who had jobs in the forestry department. However, I couldn't get a sense of what the average student from there did after his or her schooling. The students seem to be doing well in school, though. Some participate in sports (running, volleyball) at the state level. 60% of them pass in the 10th class (state-wide) exam, while the pass rate for the entire district is 34%. (All the statistics here are as per Mr. Ramachari; I didn't have a chance to verify this by going over their enrolment registers.) After lunch, Mr. Ramachari took us on a tour of the VGKK campus. We started with the hospital. It has a capacity of 15 beds, and has three doctors. There were 4 to 5 patients there at that time. Next we saw the vocational training part. This included activities such as making paper products, handicrafts, food products, etc. They also have a drama school, which is only one of the five in the state. It has 15 students. We only saw a few people (sometimes only one) in each of the vocational course rooms. The classrooms (which we visited next) were also empty, since the school got over at 4:00 pm. There are 12 classrooms, each equipped with desks and benches, and black boards, all in excellent condition. They are arranged around a central yard, with a large prayer hall on one side. Most of the school buildings were built in 1990, with funding from EZE, a West German organization. Along the way, we saw some students repairing a road: 4 pm to 5 pm is supposed to be for students to help with work around the campus (cleaning, repairs, collecting firewood etc.). We went into prayer hall, where some children were practising singing. Every room was very neatly arranged, and was cleanly maintained. 250 of the students (those in class 5 and above) stay on campus, in hostels. The younger ones stay at home. There are three rooms in each hostel, each houses 8 students, with 8 hostels in all. We went into one of the rooms, and met some of the (women) residents there. My father spoke to some of the students (in Kannada, which I don't speak, but understand quite well) about their interests, what they would like to do after school, and whether they liked it there, in spite of being away from their families. The girls were generally shy, but one of them, Parvati, spoke quite confidently. She is from a place (Udyam) 180 Km away, and is handicapped, and seemed to be happy being there. She said she would like to study English and Hindi further after 10th. On our way to the next place, we met another student. He seemed to be very interested in sports, and had competed at the state level in distance running. VGKK provides food at lunch time, and two sets of uniforms per year for all the students. For the residents of the campus, there is breakfast, and dinner as well, consisting of the local fare (e.g. black grams in the morning; ragi ball, rice, dal, curd rice at lunch; and chapati or bread, pallya, rice, rasam at dinner). We visited the dining hall, and the kitchen, where dinner was being prepared. The kitchen is run on solar power, bio gas, and firewood. The next stops were the library, the science lab, and the arts and crafts room. We saw a couple of children reading illustrated books (of the Amar Chitra Katha kind) in the library. The medium of teaching is Kannada, but the library had a good mix of books in English and Kannada. I could recognize some of the science books (as those I'd used during my high school days) and some of the English classics. The students have a library session (every week, probably) for 40 minutes. The register however indicated that in the last few months, only one or two books had been borrowed from the library (by one of the teachers). The students are given demonstrations in the science lab apparently from class 1. The lab seemed to be decently equipped for chemistry experiments, but not in very good shape. The arts and crafts room had a some paintings hung on the walls, and a few Ganesha idols, probably made by the students. The school serves the Soliga tribe from four talukas---Yelandur, Kollegal, Chamarajanagar, and Nanjanagud. In addition there are two remote schools for classes 1 to 4. These are not residential, but provide lunch. There are 85 students in these. (The non-Soliga students in the area go to a govt. school.) There is support to the tune of Rs. 40.3 from the Karnataka Govt. for the school (for food and some clothing) and the Hospital. However, this is limited to classes 1 to 10, and not for the technical institute, job oriented course or the college. That concluded our visit: we couldn't spend more time there, since we had to leave the restricted forest area before 6:00 pm. Although the project seemed to be thriving, I was a bit dissatisfied with the visit. Mainly because I wasn't able to asses Asha's role in it. I got the feeling that they were not familiar with the kind of information Asha seeks during a site visit. My father spoke in Kannada to help us communicate better, but there still was a bit of a communication gap. I think we should clarify the formal procedures (annual reports, verification during a site visit etc.) associated with Asha funding. Photos of the VGKK campus taken are available at http://www.ashanet.org/la/Projects/Mysore/images/dec132001.htm