2250 Bengali families are residing in Sindhanur Rehabilitation Project

JANAKALYAN


About 2250 Bengali families are residing in Sindhanur Rehabilitation Project (Raichur district, Karnataka) since 1968 without basic development facilities reaching to them. Janakalyan took birth to stand beside these communities. Janakalyan is a society registered under Karnataka Societies Registration Act, 1960. Janakalyan's origins can be traced back to educational initiatives by Vivekananda Education Society promoted by the refugee youths for their community. Janakalyan is an offshoot of the Vivekananda Education society, founded in 1997, focusing on social and economic development for the Bengali refugees resettled in Sindhanur taluka of Raichur district, Karnataka, India. The key focus areas of intervention have been improving livelihood of marginalised farmers of this community through various technical (intensive integrated farming system), economic (enterprises) and social (community institutions) interventions. The activities implemented by the organization are based on four key principles namely- Women; Soil/Land; Livestock and Water.

Janakalyan's vision is stated as "creation of an enabling healthy environment where all individual has equal access to and control over the social, cultural, educational and political institutions with an economically secured livelihood". The organization aims to convert agriculture into profitable enterprise so that illiteracy, indebtedness, unemployment and poverty are reduced for the marginalised section of the community. Janakalyan's activities revolves around seven components viz. Community Mobilization; Community Farming; Financial Protection; Community water resource; Community Solidarity; Community Education) and Community entrepreneurship. The organization is governed by 9 professionals having different background of which 7 are male and 2 females. The total staff strength is 16, of which 3 are women.

The thrust area for Janakalyan in the recent years has been on building capacities of farming community, strengthening their SHGs and other institutions, promoting adoption of intensive integrated farming system, working on the production to consumption chain of paddy and other selected commodities (including marketing support), promoting system of rice intensification (SRI), initiating credit+ facilities (GNAN), supporting milk producers' cooperatives and other such livelihoods interventions.

Janakalyan has been successful in establishing a women's cooperative, GNAN (Garibi Nirmoolan Avarthan Nidhi) to improve availability of credit + facilities to women. GNAN now has 451 shareholders with total funds of Rs. 54.0 lakh. Janakalyan have successfully established a 5 acre IIFS self sufficient livelihoods model. Similarly the organisation has innovated on providing marketing facilities (Apna Bazaar), in entrepreneurship development among youth, in education, water and sanitation and other services for the target population. Clearly, Janakalayan has facilitated processes and have been successful in several instances. Activities implemented by the organization provide a holistic development for the tail-end farmers and the socially marginalised community in rural areas of the district that fits very much within the Sustainable Economic Development policy of HIVOS.