Voice
of People
Email
update from Nilanjan
Aug. 19th,
2003
We haven't had anything from the Voice Of People in West Bengal. We had sent them an amount two years ago for the construction of a permanent schol building. This was done by them and verified through site visits
by Joydeep and me in 2001. However, we were not very satisfied with the organization. There were somethings that irked us after the second site visit. One was the fact that they never supplied detailed receipts for
their expenses even after we wrote them a letter and sent them emails about the same. The second was the fact that we found it odd that the parents of the children were not involved in the decision making process
as well as the school building process as much as they had led us to believe. They also were not able to put a permanent roof for the school building within the budget they had requested (though it was part of the
original plan)
Overall, the organization didn't give us a good feeling. We suspect it was receiving funding from multiple sources for the same projects. The bulding next to the school that housed the organization leaders seemed
to be quite a lavish investment. The Tata Sumo that the organization's leader used also seemed a bit out of touch with the rest of the area. While, we cannot prove misuse of funds, we did find the organization
very reluctant to provide clear and concise statements of their finances and receipts of thier expenses. They never got back to us with answers to our questions about usage of funds.
Voice
of People
Minutes
from July 22nd, 2001
Thus
far, Asha has given $6000, which is Rs. 2,57,177. The money has been used by
them for the construction of a permanent structure to house the primary
students. The earlier structure was a make-shift bamboo structure and straw
mats.
Both
Nilanjan and Joydeep have visited this project many times, see project website
for site visit reports. Thus far, the building exists, although there is an
issue with the roof not being permanent, even though we has thought that they
were going to use it for this purpose. When Joydeep and Nilanjan last visited
this place, there was a serious concern whether all the money we gave was used
up for the construction or if it was misused. For example, on site, they could
only account for about Rs. 1,00,000, which was quite alarming. Hence, Joydeep
had requested that they send us receipts of money spent. Finally, they did send
us some receipts, which Nilanjan has analyzed. See his attachment for detailed
analysis of the receipts.
The
receipts have a lot of problems, in the sense that only Rs. 1,21,929 can be
accounted for with acceptable receipts. And Rs. 92,956.84 is accounted with
unacceptable receipts for building materials, which only gives a total of Rs.2,14,885.84,
which is less than what we gave them. In addition, the amount spent on labor
charges, sanction fees and supervision fees simply have no receipts at all!
Regarding
receipts, Nilanjan correctly pointed out that there is no general Asha guidelines
for what constitutes an acceptable receipt. Since the IRS audit we have been
more vigilant with getting receipts for every single paisa spent, however,
perhaps this is a good time to setup general Asha rules for receipts. For now,
Nilanjan decided that a receipt is acceptable if it has supplier information,
details of the part provided and a signature. An unacceptable receipt is one
which is hand written with little or no info on what has been supplied and
without a revenue stamp.
Since
this is a serious problem for Asha, everyone was concerned as to how to solve
this problem.
Joydeep
then pointed out that VOP does belong in the professional NGO category. VOP has
lots of connections with the Indo-German society and that Swapan Basu Mallick
is the smooth character. Ananth asked if there was any connection with them and
Milan Dinda. Joydeep did not know.
Joydeep
also emphasized that since the rules of site visit are vague, it was hard at
that time that force VOP to show us their bank passbook and other records. But,
in any case, Joydeep feels that VOP does not want to play by the rules: despite
Joydeep's insistence that they send us valid receipts, they have sent about 40%
shoddy ones without any revenue stamp. These could have been just made up, although
of course, we do not know.
In
addition, the fact that there is no receipts for labor charges is perplexing.
The laborers would still be there in the local community, so they could have
asked them to sign or thumb-print a post-facto receipt, but it has not been
done.
Ananth
specifically asked if we have any evidence that there has been a real foul
play. Both Joydeep and Nilanjan stated that with the current evidence we have,
we simply cannot say.
Joydeep
also explained that regardless of this problem, the school itself is doing
fine. There are children who come to this school and are taught by teachers who
come everyday. The parents are quite happy with this school and send their kids
here despite that fact that they have to pay a fee and that there are free
gov't schools nearby. The gov't schools there are quite non-functional: the
buildings exist, but no teachers come. And the NGO has a good rapport with the
community. The kids are all first generation learners.
Finally,
it was decided that we request them to send us the FCRA income report filed
every year, which should have all the info. Also that the proposal will be
looked at only after we resolve the case of the missing receipts and VOP has
fully and properly accounted for their past funding.
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Voice
of People
March
11th, 2001
Nilanjan
Nilanjan
and Joydeep have recently visited the VOP site, and discussed their views with
the ongoing project.
ASHA
Boston has funded VOP twice for a total sum of $6000. Nilanjan made a first visit in January 2000, and another visit in
Jan/Feb 2001. The sum was given to fund
their school called “Bodhi Vikas”. The
school is located in Nutan Diyarah, a small village 5km from Calcutta.
The
area is sparsely populated, predominantly rural. Fishing / farming / auto driving seemed to be the occupations of
the people. Some were maidservants
also. Since Nilanjan’s previous visit,
he has seen some improvement and was satisfied. The amount funded allowed the organization to build a 1500 sq
feet building that houses 4 primary classes.
Currently, VOP is planning an expansion to the secondary classes as
well.
Mrs.
Maya Karmakar manages the day-to-day functioning of the school, assisted by a
group of teachers. Some teachers take
this job as an intermediary till they find a more highly paid job. Others get married and move to a distant
location, thus cannot teach after some time.
Current teachers will also move on.
Nilanjan
mentioned, that with the exception of one, all the other teachers were new,
since his previous visit. The school
pays Rs. 400 –500, much less than what private/govt schools pay. Volunteer spirit is needed; rearrange times to allow teachers to teach a
few times a week as needed. These were
some
suggestions
provided to overcome the problem.
ASHA-Boston
is awaiting a detailed expense report from VOP for the amount provided to
them. It was observed that the roof and
flooring of the school building constructed were not done as expected. Currently ASHA
Boston
has a proposal from VOP for additional funding.
Joydeep
had the following comments to make about VOP
-----------------------------------------------------
A
detailed account of the money spent, to evaluate the expenditure and future
plans of the organization, is needed.
Though the building construction looks consistent with the amount of
money spent / funded by ASHA Boston.
The fees charged of the children is similar to the government school in
the neighborhood, then why is their a need for an additional school? Knowing that the govt. schools are not
productive and efficient, an alternative place to send the children would be
appropriate. Parents would be more
satisfied to send them to a school with better performance and quality. What should the long-term direction of the
school be?
Maintain
a parallel school? Student seemed
interested in what they were studying at Bodhi Vikas.
Joydeep
had a conversation with Mr. Swapan Basu Mallick, who is the founder of
VOP. Joydeep mentioned that Mr. Basu
seemed to have a bloated imagination of what he can do. Mr. Basu has been involved with the NGO
professionally for 6 – 10 years, and has used the money received on his pet
projects. He has a Tata Sumo, and a big
building registered for VOP. The Indo
German society was funding VOP a sum of 12
- 15 lakhs an year, to achieve sustainable development by their
definition. No practical development
has been made that would depict efficient results.
Joydeep
had requested to look at the receipts / bank statements / pass books to review
the expenditure on the school building funded by ASHA, during his site
visit. No passbook could be provided. A passbook details all the transactions,
thus is an interesting piece of document to review. No 6-month report has been received from VOP. Joydeep found out that the children are
charged Rs. 30 for the school, and then later tuition is given to them, by the
same teachers for Rs. 50. Tuition,
within the society, is seen as a status symbol, thus is important, and is
assumed to be needed.
As
mentioned by Nilanjan also, teachers are working at Bodhi Vikas because they
may not have anything better to do at the time. The school does teach and educate the children, as compared to
the govt. schools.
Joydeep
found out the cost for doing the roof in the right way would come to Rs.
50K. As VOP has many well wishers,
local community, he asked Mr. Basu why the
amount
could not be raised from the well wishers if ASHA’s funding ran out? Mr. Basu seemed to lack innovation /
imagination, as perceived by Joydeep.
Mr. Basu had opportunities to be more productive / effective and have a
successful organization, but his achievements are not as much as expected.
Joydeep
was not satisfied with the NGO. But
can we help this NGO to better its functions, to make it successful? Should we consider this as a bad investment,
and not consider its next proposal?
Now
that ASHA Boston has a proposal from VOP for the same school, what should we do? It was decided that we will wait for the
itemized expense report, and then
reconsider
how we should pursue this problem.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Voice
of People
Jan
23rd, 2000
Site
visit discussion by Nilanjan
*More
information, please look for Nilanjan's report on his visit in the Asha-core
email.*
Nilanjan
visited VOP during his visit to Calcutta. He had a very hard time in getting
information about VOP since the Asha-website is out-dated and phone #s have all
changed. He recommended that we update the project addresses often.
Asha-MIT
is funding a the construction of building for a new school called "Bodhi
Vikas". Details of this project are the Asha website. Asha has already
given them $3000 and another $3000 was to be delivered after about 5 months,
pending receipt of photographs, account, etc. VOP previously received funding
from a German company.
At the
project, Nilanjan was shown around by Ms. Karamakar, the VOP general secretary.
He even taught a few classes at the school and found that children are very
bright and enthusiastic. They understand English and are able to translate
Bengali into English.
He
found that the current school is held in a make-shift structure which has lots
of problems in the rainy season. The entire region was flooded during October
end and lots of people were affected for about 2 weeks. Hence, a new structure
is indeed necessary.
Discussion:
Nilanjan
sensed that VOP and Ms. Karmakar, in particular, is frustrated with Asha-MIT's
mismanagement of their project. They were disturbed by the communication
break-down for long periods of time between Asha-MIT and VOP. For a time-table
of Asha-MIT's interaction with VOP, see Nilanjan's report.
Saroja
explained that the problem started with a fax regarding land ownership, which
we did not receive due to some problems. The lack of communication increased by
Abhijit's leaving Asha-MIT.
Melli
asked about the teachers at VOP. Nilanjan commented that the teachers, who are
making less than Rs. 500 per month, were all young bachelors who lived on-site.
They are almost on a voluntary basis, and enjoy their work in a commune
environment.
Joydeep
inquired about Ms. Karmakar's background. Nilanjan said that Ms. K. graduated
from Tata Institute of Social Work and joined VOP with an aim of helping women
in Orissa and West Bengal. She is not married and has lots of contact within
and outside of India. Joydeep also asked about the presence of any gov't school
nearby. Nilanjan said that there is a gov't school nearby, but the teachers
never come. So, parents don't want to send their children to it. Srikanth also
mentioned that gov't schools have been malfunctioning for a while and in many
places NGO's such as VOP has taken over a school, and are playing an important
role in the regional education.
Nilanjan
mentioned that VOP wants to build the school within a month to minimize
disruption for the school, and hence wants to get the other $3000 as soon as
possible. Saroja questioned if their request of full funding immediately is a
result of our previous mismanagement of their project.
Finally,
there was a vote on whether Asha-MIT would give them the rest of the money now.
The result was an unanimous decision to give the money now. Deb, Rama and
Sampath abstained.
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Voice
of People
Jan
9th, 2000
Srikanth
Recent
developments at the Voice of People (VOP) project in Calcutta, where
Asha is
funding construction of a school, was presented by Srikanth.
After
several delays, construction is being started on the school. VOP has
requested
Asha to release the last installment of $3000 so that they can take up
and
complete the construction on a war footing.
It was
decided that Asha should wait for a little while more till photographs,
receipts
and a report from the first phase are received before sending the final
installment.
This will be consistent with the standard practice Asha follows
with
other projects.
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Voice
of People
August
27th, 1999
The Voice of People (VOP) project proposal for
construction of a primary
school in South 24 Paraganas, West Bengal, was discussed and put to vote.
The project had been site visited and approved for funding in late 1997,
but did not go through due to some communication gaps between them and
Asha. VOP had requested Asha to reconsider the proposal again recently.
VOP sent replies to the set of questions which came up at the last Asha
meeting which discussed the proposal.
A total funding of $6000, to be sent in two installments over the next 10
months, was decided on by a majority vote. A concern was expressed that
Asha might be indirectly forcing VOP to focus on education vis-a-vis their
other grassroots level involvement, by funding the school at a time when
VOP is facing a fund crunch. It was decided to inform Mr. Joy Kar, the
consultant-advisor for the project, that VOP should look to actively
continue the other social agenda they had been working on, in addition to
education.
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Voice
of People
July
11, 1999
- Voice
of People (VOP) project was discussed. VOP is based in the South
24 Paraganas
Dist of West Bengal and is active in the fields of prevention
of
child labour, women's empowerment and other social issues for the past
10
years.
The
project requests a funding of Rs 2.4lakhs for construction of a pucca
building
in place of the existing dilapidated structure for a school. It
had
been visited by Abhijit in 1997. Subsequently, a decision was made to
fund
it, but it fell through due to communication gaps with the project.
VOP
approached Asha for funding this year again with essentially the same
proposal,
the costs having increased by 20% over the previous one.
A list
of questions have been sent to VOP to understand the ground
situation
currently and their responses are awaited. Some expressed the
opinion
that since Asha has sort of made a committment of funding to them
in the
past, it should not be treated as a new project and not be
subjected
again to a time-consuming review. The necessity of understanding
the
changed situation was however appreciated, and the funding decision
will be
made after consulting with the project co-ordinators about their
present
priorities.