Author: Smita Mitra
Publication: Outlook
Date: August 22, 2011
URL: http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?277986
Introduction: A magical oasis right in the
middle of the suicide belt of Maharashtra, Hivre Bazaar village shows what
united thought and action can achieve
Between the dense outcrop of crooked trees
and wild grass, we spot two cheetal deer from the car. In a flash, they are
gone, the white underside of their tails flashing as they speed away. Only,
we aren't in a reserve forest or national park. Hivre Bazaar is like a miracle
smack in the middle of the driest, most drought-prone and arid areas of Maharashtra.
It gets an annual rainfall of 300-400 mm; in comparison, nearby Vidarbha,
the 'suicide belt' of Maharashtra, gets almost double. Across the village
borders, marked by big boulders, the terrain turns barren again, with a few
straggly trees fighting for survival. Smooth, paved roads criss-cross the
village. There is not one garbage heap in sight, not one plastic bag, no open
latrines. There are also no cows, buffaloes or pigs mucking about. The cattle
we spot are herded carefully by owners. Instead of rudimentary mud-and-stone
huts, there are pucca cottages, all painted in a soothing light pinkish-brown.
Hivre Bazaar is the very antithesis of the poverty-stricken, dirty Indian
village. A miracle? It is, when you hear its story, for Hivre Bazaar is not
far from the state's suicide belt. But it's a miracle that's wholly replicable.
Baba Ramji Pawar, 73, who rides into the village
square on his motorbike, stops to chat for a while about the village's dismal
past. "It used to be called a punishment posting by government officers,"
he says. "There were no roads or fields here, only stones and dry land.
Crops used to fail all the time because of water shortage. Our women had to
walk 2 km just to get some drinking water. The men used to be drunk all the
time because they were jobless. There used to be gambling and such violent
fights!" Since farming provided a meagre living, most families, sunk
in debt, opted to migrate to nearby Ahmednagar, Pune or Mumbai to work as
casual labourers.
This is how Popatrao Pawar found Hivre Bazaar
when he came here in the 1990s. He had left the village as a teenager to do
his masters in commerce and chase his dream of becoming a cricketer. But as
things turned from bad to worse in his village, he decided to return, despite
opposition from his parents. Mohan Chattar, an associate, says Pawar's "madness"
infected them all and swept them along towards prosperity.
"Unlike other places, party politics
played no role in our village. I was elected sarpanch simply because I was
educated and had a plan of action. Instead of being divided by politics, we
came together for the good of the village," says Pawar. His first step
was to hold gram sabhas where all the villagers, men, women and the youth
used to collect to discuss the problems and possible solutions. Pawar introduced
the concept of shramdan (voluntary labour) by everyone to improve the village's
condition. This free labour is what fuelled the tree plantation drive that
has now converted it into a green oasis. Now, a quarter of the village is
completely covered by dense woods.
"The forest department wasn't too happy
with us to begin with because the villagers used to cut trees indiscriminately
and the latter even tied up one of their guards when he tried to stop them,"
recalls Chattar. Several meetings later, the department finally agreed on
a joint reforestation programme: the plan was to plant only local trees, shrubs
and a hardy grass native to the area, which required only a little rainfall
to take root. Soon, the greenery started binding the soil and allowed rainwater
to percolate to the rocky water table. Cattle wasn't allowed to graze at will
and tree-felling was banned. Branches were allowed to be pruned for firewood,
however. And only the top of the long grass was cut for fodder so that the
roots remained undisturbed.
The village then decided to dig continuous
contour trenches across the hillsides to create water catchment areas. They
got technical and financial help from the state government. The next step
was to build bunds, percolation tanks and water storage areas that required
little maintenance. "Tube wells that suck water out of the ground were
only allowed within the village for drinking purposes. The fields were watered
from ordinary wells via drip irrigation instead of flood irrigation,"
says Pawar. Villagers found the government's drip irrigation of the "Israel
model" not workable; so they worked out deals with local contractors
who created and maintained drip irrigation systems suited to the local terrain.
"The idea was to save and utilise every bit of rain we got." So
instead of growing thirsty cash crops like sugarcane or bananas once a year,
the villagers grew onions, vegetables, fruits, bajra, jowar and wheat through
the whole year.
Next, the village put a stop to the thirst
of another kind-it banned liquor shops and all tobacco products. The panchayat
came up with alternate sources of income for people running the liquor vends
by helping them acquire cattle or open village shops. They also started a
scheme to support the girl child. If any family had a second girl, her expenses
were borne by the village panchayat.
These steps were tough to take and even tougher
to implement. But the villagers stuck to them and the gambit has paid off.
Today, Hivre Bazaar's per capita income is Rs 30,000, thrice the national
average. Farmers are tilling their land with tractors instead of oxen or buffaloes.
Sahiba Chuduman Gaikwad is one of the poorest landless peasants in the village.
He works on others' fields and sells milk to the dairy cooperative, but says
he saves Rs 20,000 a year because daily wages in Hivre Bazaar are way above
that in other villages.
Gaikwad is a great example of how the inclusive
growth model adopted by Pawar has worked. As a landless peasant who found
no work in the village, he had left in 1995 with his family to earn a living
as a casual labourer in Mumbai. He returned recently as incomes in his village
grew. Six months ago, he bought buffaloes by taking a bank loan. "Normally,
a bank would never give a loan to a casual labourer like me. But the gram
sabha stood guarantor, so I was able to buy these buffaloes," says Gaikwad.
In time he hopes to turn in enough profit to call back his son who is still
working in Mumbai. He is among the 100 people who have returned to the village
in a case of reverse migration, unheard of in other parts of Maharashtra.
The Bank of Maharashtra opened a branch in
the village last year. It has given out Rs 6 crore in loans till now and there
has not been a single defaulter. Besides short-term loans for seeds and other
agricultural inputs, the bank has also helped "refinance" loans
taken from sahukars from neighbouring villages. The moneylenders charge Rs
2,500 a month on a loan of Rs 50,000. The bank charges Rs 3,500 per year for
the same amount. It has also collected Rs 3.5 crore in savings accounts maintained
by the villagers. There are more than 50 villagers with Rs 10 lakh in their
bank accounts. "Ordinarily, a bank takes about 8-10 years to show this
kind of growth. We've done it in one-and-a-half years," says A. Bhatamrekar,
the manager. "Now I see Std II students opening and operating accounts,
saving up their pocket money." Young Vaibha Vaitkar, only 11 years, remembers
his balance by heart. "It's Rs 7,366," he chirps.
As incomes shoot up, several other changes
have occurred. Cleanliness is scrupulously maintained. Every house comes with
its own attached toilet. Open defecation is banned. Biogas supplied to each
home has reduced the dependence on trees for firewood. A constant supply of
clean water from hand pumps, not ponds, has led to a fall in malaria and other
water-borne diseases that used to plague the village. The school used to be
a one-room shack, with classes only up to Std IV. Now, it's a modern building
and has classes till Std XII. The villagers also got together to build a little
mosque for the only Muslim family living there.
The next step is to take brand Hivre Bazaar
to the world. The village will soon have a market that will sell organic milk
and value-added goods like packed chutneys, spreads, pastes, preserves, fresh
bottled fruit juices and flour. And Hivre Bazaar hopes the thousands who visit
the village to study its success from around the world-MBA students, workers
and executives from voluntary groups, farmers from across India and global
agencies like the World Bank-will be its customers.
Pawar is now focusing his energies on the
nearby Vidarbha region, which has been hit by farmer suicides. "Government
subsidies are just handicapping the region," he says. "Centrally-administered,
arbitrarily disbursed loans and packages to individual farmers are simply
wasted-on weddings, on alcohol or repaying old debts to moneylenders. The
key lies in giving the power back to the panchayats, which will find local
solutions instead of leaving it to visiting government officials or worse,
the netas." Starting with Amravati district in Vidarbha, Pawar wants
to transform this troubled region, village by village. Like in Hivre Bazaar,
hopefully, his madness will soon catch on.
