Together We Empoer 3rd Edition

Stay FocusedAs S M Sehgal Foundation work in four Mewat villages continued, the range of workactivities in the Integrated Sustainable Village Development model expanded in everyprogram area. ough the human and capital resources of the foundation had limits,opportunities to make a difference in the lives of villagers seemed endless. For identifiableimpact to be possible, the team had to keep their focus within the parameters of the“Four, Four, Four” campaign and try to resist the impulse to do more and more andmore.Building on the positive outcomes of Family Life Education skill-trainings, younggirls were offered an added opportunity to learn tailoring skills. e foundationestablished Life Skills Education centers in select locations and equipped them withteachers and sewing machines.Participants had to contribute toward the required raw materials: thread, needles, andcloth. is was the first project that finally persuaded villagers to actually make cashcontributions for their participation. e fee was tiny, about five rupees (less than tencents a month). But it was a start!Training sessions on tailoring skills (measuring, cutting, and sewing) were held threedays each week. Sessions on the other three days covered family life topics. Girls weretaught how to read and write and given opportunities for conversations on identity issues:life goals, emotions, values, gender stereotypes, physiological changes in their bodies asthey matured, and reproductive health. An outdoor recreational component (similar tobadminton) aided overall emotional and social development. As girls increased their

skills, their confidence was boosted, and their status within their families was graduallyelevated.To attract further involvement in Family Life Education, the field team spent timewith various groups to generate interest and obtain any needed consent. Separatemeetings and discussions were conducted with elders, adolescent boys, and parents,adapting the curriculum to each group. is program was cost-free, as no materials wererequired.e importance of preventive healthcare was generally agreed upon by everyone inthe community. Girls were permitted to attend educational training sessions. Duringsessions on topics such as handwashing, hygiene, and sanitation, the foundation physiciancovered facts and answered questions related to reproductive health.In conversations with adolescent girls, any reference to delaying marriage orchildbirth was in the context of empowerment and building self-confidence. e teamobserved how girls became more self-assured and expressive as the training continued.ey wanted to contribute in decision-making at home, particularly with decisions todelay marriage.e communication gap between the young women and their parents was oftenchallenging. Anjali Makhija, now supervising other staff leaders, integrated dialogues withparents on those issues into other topics presented in the sessions. A curriculum forparents was developed with a series of six focus-group sessions in each of the four villages.Conversations covered gender roles, relationships with children, and other personalfeelings, along with the value of literacy.Participating mothers were fully engaged, but fathers were less interested. Manydropped out or gave work as an excuse for not attending. A few men admitted thatdiscussing such personal topics made them uncomfortable.A new Family Life Education course offered to boys and girls in a cluster of sixteenvillages included the original Four, Four, Four villages. Based on an interactive coursedeveloped by the Centre for Development and Population Activities (CEDPA), boys inthe villages were presented for the first time with facts about gender inequality. e coursecontent was reviewed by some school principals, and approved by parents as well, so itcould be offered in a few schools within the cluster.To engage young boys in some form of gender sensitization, as groundwork for theireventual involvement in village development, was another challenge. e foundationteam launched a quarterly youth-oriented local newsletter called Vikas Patrika(development newsletter) as a forum for communicating news and information,celebrating local culture, and featuring role models for young people.During an event in Ghaghas to launch Vikas Patrika, the idea of a youth club wassuggested. e boys present were enthusiastic about establishing a cricket club. e SMSFteam supported their idea, covering 50 percent of the costs to form a club in Ghaghas and

one in Goela. As a component of the club, Family Life Education classes had the desiredresult of inspiring boys to begin volunteering in village development projects!Seventeen primary health centers, five community health centers, and one districthospital served the one-million residents of Mewat. While these institutions facedchallenges related to infrastructure, staffing, and administrative processes, they were a vitalframework for public health delivery in the region. At the village level, care is primarilyprovided in subcenters by auxiliary nurse-midwives and anganwadi workers, who played acrucial role in maternal and child health.11 In addition, local practitioners, often referredto as jhola chhap doctors, though non-degreed, were a common first point of contact formany residents. is highlighted the opportunity for further strengthening the formalhealthcare system with training, outreach, and collaboration.e foundation staff kept track of government-run health camps and mobile medicalservices to make sure that local people were aware of them. e team held regularinformation sessions on health issues for the community. Topics included basic hygiene,sanitation practices, nutrition, communicable diseases, and symptoms, prevention, andtreatment of fever, malaria, diarrhea, and tuberculosis. Jholas were also invited to thesetrainings.A project implementation team went door to door in each Four, Four, Four village toidentify those in need of medical care and assist in getting them to appropriate publicfacilities. A working relationship with the local auxiliary nurse-midwife was establishedfirst in Agon. She began visiting the local Family Life Education Center regularly,administering immunizations, and making referrals to functioning healthcare facilities asneeded.e foundation team took some basic but effective steps to address the high rate ofinfant mortality in Mewat. Most births in Mewat were attended by dais (traditionalmidwives) who, though usually illiterate and without formal training, had practicalknowledge and were familiar with childbirth complications. Young married men had littleunderstanding or knowledge about the reproductive health of their wives. Due to highneonatal morbidity, a key concern in the medical community was related to basichygiene. Home births exposed newborns and their mothers to increased risks. Somepractices, such as cutting the umbilical cord with any sharp instrument at hand, or thetraditional practice of rubbing a newborn’s navel with cow dung “to protect the childfrom evil,” added to the danger.e SMSF team conducted a series of training sessions for groups of dais (midwives)to promote cleanliness and use of a low-cost dai kit that included soap, a sterile safetyrazor, a polyethylene sheet, thread, and disinfectant. Simple actions such as handwashingbefore attending a birth helped to ensure safer childbirths. e dai training stressed the

“Five Cleans”: clean hands, clean delivery surface, clean cord cut, clean cord ties, andclean cord stump care.Sessions with parents and community leaders illustrated connections between largefamily size and poverty in a discussion about costs, risks, and benefits. In conversationswith religious leaders, Pooniaji quoted the revered Indian Nobel Prize winner ineconomic sciences, Amartya Sen. His work on the economic theories of famine and wellbeing of people in developing countries demonstrated that educated people and thosewith higher incomes had fewer children.e foundation team used this reasoning to illustrate to villagers that, when familieshad fewer children, it was easier to provide them with education, and they would bebetter prepared to earn higher wages. Women villagers had no trouble seeing theconnection between family size and shortages of food and water.In the Income Enhancement program, crop production practices were discussed withfarmers in meetings and conversations about decreasing costs and increasing productivity.Most farmers in the villages with sweet water were vegetable growers who were notgetting good prices for their produce. Most households had only one or two milkanimals, usually buffaloes. e plan was to convince farmers that new cultivation practiceswould improve their farm productivity, and their income would increase with directconnectivity to the market. As part of the initiative, villagers were educated about theavailable government agriculture and veterinary services and programs.e program leader contacted the largest distributor of milk, fruits, and vegetables inDelhi, Mother Dairy, to see what could be done to add Mewat villagers’ produce to theirmarket. ough larger farmers in India were able to deal directly with Mother Dairy,bypassing third-party middlemen, the small farmers in Mewat had never been included.Because Mother Dairy wanted a reliable supply chain that could deliver qualityproduce in bigger quantities, their representatives suggested that villagers form acooperative to link with larger organizations interested in buying their products. IfMewat farmers could join together, their milk and vegetable produce would be picked updirectly by Mother Dairy without added cost from third-party middlemen. e SMSFteam met with the farmers and explained, “If you pool your produce, you can create anorganization that large distributors will do business with.”When the idea of forming a cooperative was first suggested to villagers, they weresuspicious because the bank required an initial membership fee. So the SMSF teamoffered an agreement to pay a portion of the initial fees, with the expectation that thefarmers would pay back the money over time in small increments once their cooperativeassociation had its own bank account.e team explained that, as members of the Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association(FVGA), farmers could bring their produce for daily pick up by Mother Dairy. efarmers would receive payment for their goods within seven to fourteen days. Concerned

about the time lag between giving up their produce and receiving payment, farmersasked, “How do we know the organization will not just keep our money?”SMSF guaranteed the payment amounts in the beginning so farmers could see howthe program worked. Once this promise was made, the farmers agreed and immediatelyraised the money required by the bank.As promised, each participating farmer saw results in cash within two weeks. Creatingthese cooperative linkages with the milk and produce markets brought recognition to theIncome Enhancement program in the eyes of the local farmers.S M Sehgal Foundation’s agriculture interventions in each Four, Four, Four villageinvolved training at every level from seed to market. Farmers were taught proper soilpreparation, row spacing, plant-to-plant spacing, how to construct low-cost polyethyleneplant nurseries, and safe use of pesticides. Training was provided on crop diversification.Raised-bed vegetable cultivation was encouraged as a way to use less water and increaseyields. An interest-free loan provided to the Fruit and Vegetable Grower Association inGhaghas made it possible for farmers to purchase a bed maker (tractor attachment forforming raised rows for planting) and a chisel plow for soil cultivation.e first secretary of the Fruit and Vegetable Grower Association in Goela was the sonof a landless farmer from a lower caste.12 His father, Puranchand, was one of the firstfarmers in his village to take a risk and try some progressive agronomic practicessuggested by the SMSF team. With their assistance, he constructed a low-costpolyethylene plantlet nursery and produced healthier and more robust seedlings than hisneighboring farmers.His success with new methods, such as growing off-season seedlings on raised beds,was showcased during a “Farmers Day,” which SMSF held on his fields. By hosting 280farmers from three nearby districts, plus numerous scientists and agribusiness personnel,Puranchand gained respect in his community. Other farmers sought his advice on newagronomic techniques and growing off-season vegetable crops.Another farmer in Goela, Ayub Khan, tested methods promoted by the foundationteam on a quarter acre of his five-acre farm before scaling up. He saw the most benefitfrom intercropping and began mixing his crops systematically to enhance theircommercial value. Ayub learned the best intercrop combinations for different seasons,and which combinations helped prevent disease and pests in the main crop. He was soimpressed with his added production and income that he volunteered for every new cropproduction initiative.Ayub Khan was an early user of vermicompost to reduce chemical fertilizer usage,which decreased his production costs. A handful of farmers were each given a kilogram ofearthworms to establish pilot units to produce vermicompost to sell to other farmers.Vermicompost contains more nitrogen, phosphorus, and micronutrients than traditional

compost. Two-thirds of the farmers in this project were women, and almost allvermicompost units in six villages were run by women farmers.e significant breakthrough that finally came in the struggle to convince the villagersof Ghaghas to partner with SMSF in a substantial check dam water-augmentation projectcan be attributed to a slow and steady grassroots approach on the part of a projectimplementation team. A goal in every village was to identify a group of citizens interestedin the development projects, so that any successful activities created during thepartnership could be expected to thrive with or without the foundation’s presence.Sustainability was the hope and the most obvious measure of genuine results in anydevelopment undertaking. In the absence of a fully empowered panchayat, the creationof a gram vikas sanstha (village-level institution, or VLI) in Ghaghas turned out to be auseful mechanism for making decisions on behalf of the village.VLIs served almost like “shadow” panchayats in villages where local government wasnot working well, which was the case in most villages in the early years of SMSF’spresence in Mewat. To support the creation of a VLI in Ghaghas, the SMSF team reachedout to various demographic groups in the community, including those in different castes,different geographical areas, and even different kutumbs (ancestrally linked families).ey met with every identifiable subset of villagers in Ghaghas for focused conversationsabout working together for their own benefit. Each group was asked to choose a group ofrepresentatives to serve together to advocate for village needs, with the goal of ensuringsustainable development in their community. e villagers responded with interest to thisvery personal appeal.e newly created group, including dozens of villagers, was led by a sixteen-personexecutive group that included the sarpanch, members of current and past panchayats,several women, a youth member, and two staff from the foundation. From that point on,all SMSF activities in Ghaghas went through this body.e group’s first act was to create a five-person, including one woman, task force tomanage the check dam project. e term “check dam” was typically used to describe theentire system. e villagers were ready for action. For a community to actively assumeresponsibility for their own development was the exact result the SMSF team had hopedto achieve. e tide had finally turned in the direction of community involvement!rilled, the team suggested several ideas for how villagers could participate indifferent ways in the large water-augmentation project: e foundation would pay fordiesel fuel if a farmer used his tractor as his contribution to help with trenches or dig forwater storage structures. Perhaps one person in each of 300 households in the villagecould donate a day of labor. A farmer might donate part of a crop, such as mustard orwheat, when it was ready to harvest and put the money earned by selling it into the

“check dam fund.” A villager with a job could contribute a portion of his daily wages. Anyidea was worth considering.e task force was responsible for all steps in the project, which included hiring thelabor; procuring construction materials, tools, and equipment; ensuring the participationof women; and resolving conflicts. As money was collected and used, the accountingprocess was tracked within the community. Wall-size balance sheets were hung in a centrallocation in the village for all to see. By the end of the project, the village had raised evenmore money in different forms than their promised contribution!For Ghaghas, the Water Management team suggested a comprehensive ridge-to-valleydesign for water flow into the storage pond (reservoir) at the bottom of the catchmentarea, which would revitalize the local water table and water supply. In addition to thecheck dam itself, other water-harvesting structures were part of the overall wateraugmentation system. For example, a series of small, loose-stone structures, called contourbunds, were placed high up in the catchment area. Loose stones covered with wire mesh,called gabions, were placed at intervals along the gulleys where the water flowed towardthe valley floor. Gulley plugs, similar to gabions but without wire mesh, also acted to slowthe speed of gushing water. Nallah bunds, created with bricks or stone masonry, wereplaced on slopes and in water catchment areas to slow or divert water. e structuresworked together to interrupt the flow of water, improve soil moisture, and allow morewater to percolate into the ground. e dry stone wall of the storage pond was layeredwith soil and covered with a polyethylene sheet to make the walls watertight. e storagepool structure was in place before the monsoons came in July.e groundwater level was raised by a full meter that first year! By the end of 2003,the stone concrete masonry dam wall was constructed in Ghaghas. e fully completedproject included water guiding walls, a cushion chamber for protection from heavy waterflow, spillways to direct excess water into adjacent pools, sluice gates to ensure desilting,and sand dune slopes cut at a stabilizing angle and covered with soil and vetiver grass. efinal parts were carried out over the next year.Any SMSF endeavors that were related to water security produced the most visibleand tangible results. Once a project was done and people could see noticeable differencesin their lives, villagers came forward with new ideas. Once villagers understood thepotential value of a particular project, they came prepared to contribute and activelyparticipate.When the community of Rangala Rajpur finally contributed toward their earthencheck dam project, the containment pool was also finished in time for the monsoon in2003. Each household contributed ten kilograms of wheat as well as cash and labor.When the monsoon came, the water level rose by six feet in the nearby village. Withwater percolating from the storage pool into the ground, previously dry wells began to fill

again. Vetiver grass was planted on the banks of the storage pool to enhance stability, anda series of additional storage ponds were under construction. Water from the RangalaRajpur check dam structures was also used to cultivate vegetation on ten acres ofpreviously fallow common land.SMSF helped to rehabilitate underutilized common lands in each village. Heavilydeforested wasteland areas were good places, depending on the soil, to plant fast-growingtrees for wood fuel or vegetation that could be used for animal fodder. Villagers dependedmostly on wood for cooking—not ideal due to all the unhealthy indoor smokeinhalation. But since few could afford propane gas or even acquire it in a village, woodwas a common necessity.Not all SMSF water-augmentation projects that year were as successful. For example,some environmentally sustainable crop irrigation technology developed by a nonprofitcalled International Development Enterprises was sound, but several complicationsquickly became evident. e system required a connection to a tube well, which only 30percent of the farmers in the entire district had. Many farmers had no water source at alland had to purchase water from elsewhere.e irrigation system itself had to be stored out in the open in the field, which left itvulnerable to theft or to damage from wild pigs or nilgai (antelopes). ese issues,combined with the high cost of the system, caused farmers to reject the technology.e Water Management team was challenged to find creative solutions to capture,store, and fairly distribute fresh water to more villages in desperate need. A multifacetedapproach was taken in each Four, Four, Four village in addition to plans for largerconstruction projects, such as check dams and ponds. e team encouraged thereintroduction of traditional methods for rooftop harvesting of rainwater as practiced inother water-scarce parts of the country, and introduced low-cost soak pits and soak wellsfor wastewater management. Education in water literacy became an ongoing campaign inevery village.Without sewer systems in the villages, wastewater ran in the streets. Effectivewastewater disposal was needed to improve sanitation, hygiene, and overall health. Simpledrainage structures were designed to facilitate the disposal, filtration, and percolation ofwastewater into the ground.A three-person project-implementation team conducted a door-to-door surveycovering 618 households in the village of Agon to assess water availability and see whichhomes had water taps or connections of any kind. Twenty-five homes were chosen tointroduce the use of taps and soak pits. e first few dozen soak pits were about three-tofive feet in diameter and depth. e below-ground pits were filled with layers of brokenbrick or stones followed by sand, which provided natural filtration of wastewater frombathing, cooking, or laundry.

e sand acted as a fine filter, allowing clear water to percolate into the ground. Toprevent clogs in the pit from the collected sediments, a trap designed to catch silt, grease,and soap residue was placed where water entered the soak pit. e trap needed cleaningtwice each week. For areas with homes too small for soak pits, a deeper soak well (up tofifty feet deep) was dug in the street, away from the houses. Each soak well was capable ofhandling the wastewater from twenty households.e revival of traditional methods, such as collecting rainwater from rooftops, wasimperative. Some people could purchase fresh water from a private vendor, but poorpeople did not have that choice.To illustrate a model, the Water Management team installed a rooftop rainwaterharvesting structure on the village mosque in Agon. Depending on the yearly rainfall, themosque rooftop could potentially harvest 205,000 liters of water. e water waschanneled to a defunct well and, from there, into the groundwater table. Water from thewell could now be used for watering animals.Lalit Sharma had studied the water-scarce regions of Rajasthan and Gujarat in hissearch for sustainable solutions before designing a rooftop rainwater-harvesting system tobe used in villages with saline groundwater. In his model, rainwater falling onto the roofwas captured, directed to, and then stored in a concrete masonry tank. e team installedthe system in some schools and held demonstrations to show how well it worked. Storingrainwater in concrete tanks for direct use also resulted in reduced runoff in salinegroundwater areas, decreased recharge of saline groundwater, and less pressure on thelimited sweet-water aquifers.Villagers liked the model, but the construction of a storage tank with the capacity tomeet the year-round water demand for a household was not financially feasible for mostvillagers. Lalit was challenged to find a cost-effective way to store water that did not relyon such a large, and expensive, concrete masonry tank. He approached the problem froma new angle to see if it was possible to eliminate or replace the tank in the system. Hecame up with an innovative concept for creating freshwater pockets within the salineaquifer.In conventional recharging of groundwater with harvested rainwater, water infiltratesinto the ground and forms a thin layer of fresh water, which keeps spreading over a largerarea of the existing saline groundwater as time goes by, maintaining hydraulicequilibrium. Left undisturbed, the two layers remain separate. To collect fresh water fromthat thin top layer, without mixing it with the saline water, was not possible. Amechanism was needed to relocate the fresh water to be below the saline groundwatertable as a pool or pocket of fresh water that could then be extracted.After several more years of experimentation in collaboration with the WaterManagement team, Lalit’s original design would be modified to accomplish this. Expert

hydrologist and geologist, Salahuddin Saiphy, who joined S M Sehgal Foundation in2009, was instrumental in the redesign.When the recharge well was made deep enough below the groundwater table, andhigh enough above ground, hydrostatic pressure created by the additional height anddepth made it possible to push away the existing saline groundwater, allowing theharvested rainwater to form a pool of fresh water inside, within the saline aquifer!e pressure exerted by the surrounding saline groundwater held the pocket offreshwater together. A pre-filter inserted above the top of the recharge well preventedfloating and suspended materials from entering the well. With this model, a sizablepocket of harvested rainwater was available for extraction with a hand pump. To makethe water safe for drinking, a biosand filter was used as a cost-effective and natural methodto remove disease-causing microorganisms and other contaminants. e pressurizedrecharge well concept was one of several innovations by the Water Management teamthat garnered quite a bit of attention and resulted in a series of awards for the foundationin the coming years.e near absence of basic household sanitation in many villages was another challengethat required continued innovative thinking by Lalit and his team. e lack of privacyand the indignity of outdoor urination and defecation was deeply felt by women andelderly people when there were no latrines and the nearby fields served as open-air toilets.e hardship and humiliation was even more profound for pregnant women and peoplewith chronic health problems or physical disabilities.e Water Management team was determined to find a way to provide affordablelatrines. Lalit developed a low-cost latrine model, with very basic precast concrete wallsand floor that could be installed within a few hours, even by an unskilled person. Manyvillagers agreed immediately that they wanted one in their homes. However, the villagersdid not come back with their required portion of money or materials.Lalit kept a constructed latrine handy in the community center in Ghaghas; if afamily agreed to provide their contribution in money or materials, the latrine could bedelivered the same day. e immediate delivery aspect worked in some cases. is projecttaught Lalit something more about the Mewati culture that was different from his ownbackground. He explained, “If a villager in Mewat is asked to agree to something, the firstresponse is always yes. In this culture, people don’t refuse. ey will agree to whatever youask. If you ask a second time, and they say yes, then you know they are interested.”When villagers later requested a more-attractive type of latrine instead of the precastmodel, Lalit developed a more appealing model and constructed about fifty for Ghaghasand other villages. Shortly after this development, the government began subsidizing thebuilding of latrines, and the foundation’s role shifted to creating awareness of the

government programs, facilitating the process for villagers to acquire subsidies forlatrines, and promoting more comprehensive water literacy programs.As useful and significant as the check dam water-augmentation systems were, localwomen reported that sanitary latrines were the single, most-important developmentaccomplished by the village-level institutions. An expanded campaign to build latrinesand soak pits in the villages of Mewat had an immediate and valuable impact on publichygiene. Women no longer had to resort to going out into the field early in the morningor late at night and suffer the indignity of open-air defecation. e relatively simple lowcost intervention made a profound difference to everyday life that went beyond otherimprovements to the physical infrastructure of the village. is was an important steptoward the empowerment of women in Mewat.A glimpse into the life of a woman named Shahida, in the village of Ghaghas duringthat same year, provided insight into the relationship between the main issues addressedby the integrated SMSF approach to partnerships with villages in Mewat and thepotential for women’s empowerment.Like most women in her village and other villages in Mewat, Shahida was acutelyuncomfortable with the lack of privacy and the indignity of outdoor urination anddefecation. She had to wake up at 4:00 a.m. to steal into the fields to relieve herself. Atypical nineteen-hour day for this mother of six began with washing clothes, cleaning,feeding farm animals, and the first of five prayer sessions each day. By 6:00 a.m. Shahidahad tea prepared for her family. Her husband Aalabar was home by then from his nightjob at the state Power and Water Department in Nagina village. eir four youngestchildren, two boys and two girls, were up by then. e two oldest daughters, ageseighteen and twenty-two, were already married and no longer living at home. Most girlsin Ghaghas were married by age fifteen.Shahida’s day included no time for recreation, socialization, or contact with others inthe community. In the gender-polarized social infrastructure of her village, most womenhad little contact with the world outside their home and surrounding fields. Most familiesat that time had no television, radio, or telephone, including Shahida’s. Socially isolated,most women in Mewat played no role in matters related to the village at large.By 8:30 a.m. Shahida’s two sons were off to school in Nagina. Any decisions related tothe education of their children were made by Aalabar. e family sacrificed dearly to payfor the boys to attend private school. e two young girls did not share that privilege;they attended the free village government school. e literacy rate among women inGhaghas was about 29 percent. Shahida was determined that all her children wouldbecome literate and finish a full curriculum through twelfth grade. Her married daughtershad only finished fifth grade.Once cooking and clean-up were done, and the kids left for school, Shahida disposedof the household wastewater in the street, adding to the muddy mess from her neighbors,

and headed for the field. She had to supplement her husband’s income with whatever shecould earn by raising crops. When she was not in the field, she collected fodder (plantleaves and stalks for the livestock) from the local forest area and common land. By thetime she stopped for midday prayers at 1:30, she had already collected animal manureand patted it into cakes to be dried and used as cooking fuel. Her typical afternoon wasspent cleaning up after and milking the animals. e kids came home by 4:00. e boyshad private coaching at a tutor’s home in the village. After dinner was prepared andcleaned up after and the children were in bed, the remaining household chores wereattended to and all prayer times were completed. Shahida was able to go to bed around11:00 p.m.At the SMSF team’s first community meeting in Ghaghas, no Meoni (Meo woman)participated. Meonis rarely strayed from their prescribed roles within the male-centeredpower structure. Women were not free to speak, but Shahida attended the meeting. Shesat in the corner, her face covered with the required scarf when in the presence of men.ough sociologist Anjali Makhija was a strong advocate for women, she and otherwomen on the team worked cautiously in the Mewat communities to avoid any abruptdisruption in the local way of life. Women field team members initially served as rolemodels for women in the villages, speaking up, expressing opinions, asking questions, andeven questioning the wearing of the traditional headscarf.Women from the foundation interacted with and supported Shahida from the start.ey engaged her in conversations about children, healthcare, and farming. By the fourthmeeting, when the foundation team spoke about the Integrated Sustainable VillageDevelopment model, Shahida began to speak. She asked questions.At one point a man “shushed ” her, and an elder told her to “settle down.” ButShahida did not “settle down.”When she became an active member of a village-level institution, Shahida facedresistance from her entire community. She took on a difficult role for any woman in astrongly gender-biased culture.Even the male members of the foundation teams had been resigned to thepresumption that women would not be allowed to take an active part in VLIs. isturned out to be another training opportunity for everyone involved, serving as areminder of one of SMSF’s important guiding principles—empowering women.Foundation team members were increasingly heartened by Shahida becoming vocal andexpressing opinions.Since she was responsible for all tasks related to her family farm, Shahida wasmotivated to learn the best agricultural practices introduced by the SMSF team. She usedraised beds for vegetable cultivation and operated a vermicompost unit on her land.Pleased with the results, she encouraged others to adopt these methods.

She was active in the check dam project and made sure her family contributed theirportion. Due to her persistence, Shahida’s was one of the first few households in Ghaghasto have a latrine. She felt so strongly about the need for latrines that she lobbied SMSF tohelp those who could not afford latrines.When the concept of soak pits was introduced to deal with household wastewater, sheimmediately wanted one. But when Aalabar found out that his wife was activelyparticipating in the meetings against his wishes, and voicing her opinion in front of men,he strongly objected. He tried to forbid her from leaving the house at one point.Observing the conflict between Shahida and Aalabar, SMSF team members werekeenly aware that the issue was not just inside the family. Aalabar also faced pressure fromother men who were not happy with women behaving assertively. Sensitive to issues raisedby the changing roles of women, the team knew they could not simply attempt toempower women without addressing the situation from all sides.Men on the SMSF team took great care to provide support and counsel to Aalabar.Encouragement from the team included illustrating how Shahida’s willingness to speakout resulted in tangible benefits to her family and the community.As Aalabar was able to appreciate the value of these improvements, he experienced achange of heart. Not only did he begin to support his wife in her association with theVLI, he began playing a larger role at home and in the field. Such surprising changes hada powerful effect on Shahida’s self-confidence. No longer shamed for speaking out, shewas proud to be offered a chair at VLI meetings and to share the forum with men. Similartransformations spread to other women and families.Observing the experiences of Shahida and other women in Mewat prompted theSMSF team to further strengthen their work on women’s issues. Sessions were held ongender sensitization for all team members. With the imperative to be more proactive inincluding women in all facets of the work, the team gradually witnessed more activeparticipation by women in SMSF projects. e first two women’s self-help groups wereformed in Ghaghas.Progress in this direction was slow but steady. As with every strongly embeddedcultural mindset, the struggle for gender equity remained an ongoing challenge.11. Anganwadi centers were established in rural areas as part of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS)government welfare program begun in 1975 for children under six and their mothers. Benefits include primaryhealthcare, preschool education, food, nutrition information, and referral services.12. ough the social stratification of the caste hierarchy in India is far less rigid than it once was, members of lowercastes can experience social isolation and discrimination even in the poorest communities.

Seeing Is BelievingIn spring 2004, the S M Sehgal Foundation team met to discuss progress made in the firstyear of the “Four, Four, Four” campaign. Employing the Integrated Sustainable VillageDevelopment (ISVD) model was improving the quality of life in all four villages and thesurrounding settlements as well. Flexibility in the model allowed each of the fourprograms to have differing levels of application, depending upon the individualcommunity’s needs. Team members were able to emphasize or adjust programcomponents as necessary for greater impact.About a third of the foundation expenditures that year went to support incomeenhancement and promote best agricultural practices. e next largest amount went tothe water management projects and infrastructure development. e Rural Health andFamily Life Education programs remained effective and low cost. Numerous small stepshad been taken, and each small success made the next more possible. Good planning anda balance between short-term and long-term strategies were making a difference in subtlebut substantial ways.e Four, Four, Four campaign began with the intent of “walking before running”:developing successful models for each program, reviewing and improving models wherepossible, and replicating the models that proved to have larger impact. And now reach ofSMSF programs expanded from four to eight villages, and high-impact programs wereinitiated in satellite villages. Strategy sessions focused on identifying where the greatestimpact could be made since this expansion was a test of the concept of replicatingprograms in village clusters.

A strategic alignment process was used to decide which programs, and which activitiesand interventions within each program, to “scale up” to make the most significantbeneficial impact. Program leaders determined costs and timelines and evaluated thepotential benefits, community responsiveness, and sustainability issues before the decisionwas made.e team’s steady, holistic approach to integrating the issues within each communitylaid the groundwork for sustainable development. e phrase, “Small Interventions, BigImpact,” was reworded slightly. Small fulcrum-like interventions were good, but the timehad come to think big. e updated phrase was “Small Is Beautiful, But Big MakesImpact!”A new level of sophistication was evolving within the SMSF team as the organizationreaffirmed and crystallized its mission statements and participated in team-buildingexercises. As their roles shifted from initiating to facilitating with various communities,each team member (whether core team, field team, project implementation team, orother subset of the larger team) maintained a shared organizational mindset thatremained fresh and free from dogma.SMSF’s position as an advocate for women, children, and the poor was affirmed andfurther clarified as strictly “nonpolitical and nonreligious.” ough certainly not a newposition, it made good sense to formalize and publicize that commitment in light ofdeeply rooted fears expressed by some villagers from time to time within the moreconservative communities. By then, international visitors came frequently to see SMSF’sagriculture and water-augmentation projects.Preserving credibility and mutual trust within the community remained the toppriority. e team had no intention of compromising the authority of village elders orreligious leaders. Reminders from the implementation team of the SMSF commitment torespect all religions were often shared, especially if any concerns were raised within acommunity.SMSF employees came from diverse backgrounds and represented a broad range ofbasic competencies. With social scientists at the core, access to top-notch internal andexternal experts, and valuable linkages with community organizations, the corporatesector, academic institutions, and government, SMSF maintained the essential tools fortransformative insight. Just as training opportunities were provided for villagers andcommunity leaders, education sessions and advocacy workshops were continuallyavailable to all team members.e organization’s pool of talent was further enhanced by the expansion of the Boardof Trustees to include eminent experts in various fields of business, academia, anddevelopment. e new trustees brought fresh perspectives and a willingness to help guideprogram leaders and provide peer review of the work whenever needed. Board membersserved as SMSF ambassadors and proactively engaged with their contact networks.

e business culture of the foundation, which had developed in a nonhierarchicalenvironment of collaboration and mutual respect, extended naturally to thecommunities. Staff and team members served as powerful role models, working alongsidevillagers to realize their goals. e field team set a strong example of hard work, oftenshowing up early and staying late into the evenings if needed for a project.Strong role models inside the community were even more important to truly inspirethe confidence required for people in impoverished circumstances to take advantage ofopportunities for self-development. To help identify such individuals, especially youngpeople, and provide them with the support they needed to take a more visible role intheir communities’ development, the team created a new training program. e peoplewho agreed to be these “home-grown” advocates were called “village champions.” equalities sought in these individuals included literacy, enthusiasm, compassion, and acommitment to social development.e training curriculum, which was made available to other organizations as well, wasdesigned to provide tools to help village champions inspire others within theircommunities to join in the quest for a better life. e program covered leadershipdevelopment, project management, fundraising, program details, and processes forsetting up village-level institutions and facilitating VLI activities. ese energetic youngpeople would be champions of the development models in their communities. e firstsix village champions were ready to start training in early 2005 at the new communitycenter SMSF was building on the outskirts of Ghaghas.An original SMSF intention was to create a community center on common propertynear a village cluster, build rainwater-harvesting structures for demonstration, andeventually give the community center back to the village community. When the Ghaghaspanchayat was not able to provide SMSF with a large-enough piece of property, thefoundation purchased an acre of land by the road in 2003 that was big enough to be ademonstration center for water harvesting, solar energy, and agriculture practices. ewell-equipped center, with a training hall, modest residential facilities, and a kitchen, wassituated where people from nearby villages came for training sessions and Life SkillsEducation classes.Leadership training provided through the village-level institutions in each communitygave more people the skills and confidence to maintain the project infrastructures. Asvillagers began to see the results of some of the longer-term projects, trust in theirpartnerships with SMSF grew. More often now, villagers knew what needed to be done,and only required some assistance to execute their own solutions. Each new achievementreinforced their momentum.Tangible results were being seen in all four key programs. e team observed adifference in the attitudes of villagers who began to take an active part in their owndevelopment; people went from watching things happen around them to making things

happen. e only initiative that did not move forward that whole year was an effort toinstall solar streetlights. e community was unable to maintain the lights and a viableend-to-end solution had not yet been found.e completion of the two check dam projects in Rangala Rajpur and Ghaghasfurther illustrated how “seeing is believing.” e Ghaghas check dam and recharge wellsuccessfully reversed the depletion of groundwater in that area. In Rangala Rajpur, thewater table rose by 1.5 meters. Open wells in the village rose by seven feet after the firstmonsoon, and the once-dry wells began to fill. e large single dam structure was dividedinto three pools. One served as a recharge pool. Two others were storage pools, one ofwhich was seeded with fish larvae.Villagers began to grasp the enormity of the amount of water that had been wastedfor so long. Seeing a large body of water in a landscape that had been arid for decades hada profound effect on the mood of villagers. Bodies of water as part of scenic vistas instillednew feelings of optimism. As Nabbi, an opinion leader in Rangala Rajpur, stood gazing atchildren playing in the water, he commented to a member of the SMSF implementationteam, “Just seeing this mass of water soothes us and gives us hope.” He then announced,“We are ready to work with you for further improvements in our village.”With the improved moisture level in the soil adjacent to the water storage pools,water was now available for irrigating nearby community land. As water awarenessincreased, villagers built more rainwater-harvesting structures and adopted conservationmethods. When a small leak developed in the dam structure, the villagers rushed to repairit themselves. When the water-harvesting achievements were noted in local newspapers,visitors came to see for themselves how water availability and quality had improved.e entire community contributed money to dig a new well when the panchayat wasunable to pay for it. In some villages, residents of particular streets agreed on their own toaccomplish specific focused initiatives. ese successes appeared to be a result of peoplebeing able to see immediate results that benefited them directly.Water literacy campaigns were held wherever possible and integrated into Family LifeEducation, Farmer Association meetings, and self-help-group gatherings in schools andhealthcare venues. e local wisdom regarding the importance of percolating rainwaterinto the ground was explained in simple terms, “Where water is running, make it walk;where it is walking, make it crawl; and where it is crawling, make it stop.”Community water audits, facilitated by the village-level institutions, were effectivecommunication tools for positively influencing the community to conserve water andmake well-informed choices about wells, wastewater, and soak pits. Besides promotingmore recharge wells, the Water Management team promoted the construction ofplatforms to prevent contamination from dirty water around open wells used for

drinking, washing clothes, and watering animals. e dirty water around the well waschanneled into a soak pit.Open public water-pipe outlets were replaced by stand-post taps. Here again,wastewater was directed to a soak pit through an underground pipe. is simpleintervention helped keep streets clean. e Public Health Department became a partnerto promote this activity in Ghaghas. Dozens more were constructed in Goela and Agon.Chisel plowing before the onset of monsoon season resulted in rainwater percolation,which improved subsoil moisture. To promote chiseling, SMSF shared the cost withfarmers. Results varied from crop to crop, but all farmers reported higher production andbetter quality produce. e number of overall irrigations needed was significantlyreduced, causing use of this intervention to spread to neighboring villages.Appropriate management of the water supply in general led to better agriculturemanagement, and better sanitation led to better health. In the process, participating ruralcommunities became increasingly empowered by their successes and improvements.Village-level institutions became more responsive and began making more positivechanges in the community.e VLI in Ghaghas was officially registered as a community-based organizationunder the Societies Registration Act, and began undertaking projects in partnership withSMSF that went beyond building and maintenance of water-related infrastructures. efoundation served as a catalyst with School Management committees (school boards) tohelp fill gaps in government-mandated services.As part of an initiative to improve the quality of schools, repairs were made to theGhaghas school boundary walls. e Village Education Committee was revitalized. Ashortage of teachers was a perpetual problem that Ghaghas tried to address. SMSF assistedthe village by providing funds for two teachers for one year. Parent-teacher meetings wereintroduced to increase parents’ involvement in their children’s education.To make preventive health a priority for villagers, the foundation team worked onfurther strengthening the links between the community and available health services andhelped form a health committee in each village. e team assisted the Ghaghas panchayatin applying to the State Health Department for funds to set up a subcenter in the village.Goela, a small village of 205 families, lacked amenities in every area. Its health centerhad been abandoned for years. e school building had a leaky roof and only one teacherfor 200 students in different grades. Poor income on the part of Goela farmers was aresult of their outdated agricultural practices. Added community meetings were needed tomobilize villagers to join the foundation in efforts to kick-start their development. Aninterest group was formed to work with the panchayat that eventually completed a fewsmall projects.Eventually, Goela’s VLI, which had been dormant for months, became active. ecommunity adopted vermicompost units and began raised-bed cultivation. ey

succeeded in reviving their Village Education Committee and hired an additional teacher.e community agreed to provide 50 percent of the teacher’s salary. e vacant panchayatbuilding was repaired and converted into a community center with a water storage tank.e SMSF team helped the Goela VLI register officially as a community-basedorganization. As a registered VLI, the community could more easily apply forgovernment assistance programs, which Goela readily began doing. Village leadersmobilized to meet with government officials to address water access and electricityproblems, and push for road improvements.As a result of the community’s request for assistance with latrine construction, theDistrict Rural Development Agency agreed to help subsidize each latrine constructed forall panchayats in Mewat. is was a celebrated achievement! Attempts to revive the Goelahealth subcenter, which was essentially defunct, were more difficult.e Agon VLI eventually registered as a community-based organization and beganrepairs on their community meeting space. Agon’s women’s self-help group, comprisedmostly of landless laborers, decided to start a group enterprise. With training from theSMSF team, they set up a nursery for growing gliricidia, a fast-growing tree that is a goodsource of green manure, among other uses. e women took turns guarding the nurseryfor three months until the saplings were ready for sale. As part of the promotional plan,the foundation purchased the produce and marketed it at subsidized rates in severalvillages. e self-help group made a profit that was shared by ten women who used someof the money to rent land for creating another nursery enterprise.S M Sehgal Foundation teams established a growing number of self-help groups inMewat villages. e women in self-help groups were receptive to new ideas and proved tobe reliable in paying back loans. By pooling their savings in order to access credit, poorwomen gained a voice with banks and other institutions and had the financial ability tocreate businesses.A woman named Kavita joined a self-help group organized by the foundation inGoela to get out from under a loan from the dudhia (milk collector or middleman).Similar to about a third of the population of Mewat, Kavita supplemented her family’sincome by selling milk. Families generally borrowed money from a dudhia to buybuffaloes to start a milk business. Imposing two unfair conditions on the loan, the dudhiarequired that he be the only buyer of Kavita’s milk, and he also got to set the price.Kavita was able to break this exploitative cycle by using her self-help group loan topay off the dudhia and start selling her milk at a higher price to a new mini-dairy in hervillage. Within three months, she paid back her loan to the self-help group. Shortlythereafter, Kavita used another self-help group loan to buy a second buffalo. is allowedher to meet her family’s milk needs and sell extra milk for cash. Kavita succeeded inincreasing her income by 155 percent.

Self-help groups continued to empower women economically and inspire theirincreased participation within the family and in the community. ese women were keento improve sanitation conditions in their villages and took part in SMSF trainings ondevelopment issues and technical and business skills to strengthen their entrepreneurship.ey spread positive messages among other women in the community as well.Nasra, a thirty-five-year-old agricultural worker and mother of six from a self-helpgroup in Agon, went on to become a swasthya sakhi (community health volunteer).ough illiterate, she was able to complete all training assignments for being acommunity health volunteer, with occasional help from her children for the written parts.Training components included sanitation, cleanliness, immunizations, illnessmanagement, safe childbirth methods, and reproductive health issues.When Nasra began in her new role, other women were jealous. But she soon wonover the trust of the women in her village with her sincere interest in their healthcare. Shegained the respect of the auxiliary midwife as well and was enlisted to help her distributemedications and birth certificates. When Nasra elected to undergo a tubectomyprocedure, she became a willing resource to other women with questions about familyplanning methods.Well-trained swasthya sakhis like Nasra perform a valuable service to theircommunities by helping to dispel myths and ill-informed practices, such as treatingdiarrhea by reducing fluid intake, or thinking that immunizations cause impotency. Nasraclarified the misperception by explaining the relationship between immunization andreduced infant mortality. ough some people remained skeptical, most participated ingetting immunizations.Many SMSF swasthya sakhis went on to become government ASHA (accreditedsocial health activist) workers. As a result, SMSF was asked by the government to provideASHA training to government workers in Mewat.13Triumphs like those with self-help groups that were attributed to S M SehgalFoundation pointed the team in more directions not originally imagined. SMSF wasinvited by the United Nations Development Program through India’s Ministry ofTourism to set up self-help groups and provide training in entrepreneurship in the townof Jyotisar in the Kurukshetra district in Haryana. e results were outstanding.Jyotisar, a significant tourist attraction for Hindus, is believed to be where LordKrishna recited the Bhagavad Gita to the warrior Arjuna. Hundreds of visitors travel toJyotisar each day. However, the local residents derived no benefit to their livelihood fromthe many visitors.A proposed joint project had two goals: to preserve India’s cultural heritage bycreating a richer tourism experience for visitors, and to find a way to generate sustainableincomes for the local villagers, particularly women. e second goal was key to the

foundation mission. Two-thirds of the women in Jyotisar were without marketable skills,and one-third were illiterate.A women’s self-help group trained by SMSF in Jyotisar succeeded over the next fouryears in creating several business ventures to attract tourists, such as clothing and craftsshops, eateries, lodges, and street entertainment. ese persevering women became theinstruments as well as the beneficiaries of the local tourism economy.A women’s self-help group, called Kriti Kendra (creativity center), included about 200women and was registered under the Societies Act. During the same four years, socialissues such as sanitation and literacy were addressed in Jyotisar and its surrounding villageswith the help of community health volunteers, a drawing contest for schoolchildren onthe theme “Our Village, Clean Village,” street theater (nukkad natak) by a youth group,and support work from the team that revitalized the panchayat. e SMSF teamdeveloped a village youth drama group, called Abhinaya Samooh. eir street playsconveyed the benefits of basic hygiene and sanitation.e benefits of group ventures were already being appreciated by the farmcooperatives in Mewat. e accomplishments of the farmers’ associations resulted in adecision by Safal, Mother Dairy’s Fruit and Vegetable Division, to set up a local collectioncenter in Goela. Instead of going through Safal’s centralized facility, vegetables reachedthe retail market directly after quality screening at a local center. is change made itpossible for farmers to also use or sell their unsold produce in the local market while itwas still relatively fresh.Job market issues remained challenging in Mewat. SMSF continued to sponsorworkshops for young people on skill development and entrepreneurship. Two youngmen from Agon, Ghanshyam Sharma and his brother Amar Chand Sharma, participatedin an orientation workshop for village youth. e brothers both had welding jobs in ashop in Ferozepur Jhirkha. After attending the workshop, the Sharmas were encouragedto join RUDSET Institute to learn to set up their own business and attend a fifteen-daytraining in fabrication and welding.With help from RUDSET Institute and SMSF, the brothers were able to submit aproject proposal to the local bank. ey procured a loan to open their own shop. SharmaWelding Workshop became a successful enterprise. With increased earnings, the Sharmaswere able to pay back the loan and further expand their business.While the direct-service programs and projects in the Integrated Sustainable VillageDevelopment model continued in the villages, SMSF maintained its ongoing outsideefforts to promote sustainable agricultural practices, crop improvement research,biodiversity, and genetic conservation. S M Sehgal Foundation became a member ofICRISAT’s newly created Hybrid Parent Research Consortia on Pearl Millet, Sorghum,and Pigeon Pea, and joined the United Nations Foundation World Heritage BiodiversityProgram for India (WHBPI) with the Ford Foundation, ATREE, and the Government of

India. To strengthen maize research in India, SMSF provided support to theInternational Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (Centro Internacional deMejoramiento de Maíz y Trigo or CIMMYT) of Mexico for their corn research in India.Expanding foundation linkages markedly in public and private sectors throughout2005 resulted in recognitions that would help to further extend the organization’s reach.SMSF was granted Consultative Status with the United Nations Economic and SocialCouncil (ECOSOC) in recognition of its support of the ambitious UN MillenniumDevelopment Goals to reduce poverty around the world.SMSF had given financial support the year before to nonprofit organizationsresponding to the earthquake and tsunami that killed 250,000 people in Indonesia, SriLanka, ailand, India, and Malaysia and helped to raise resources to help the victims ofthe tragedy. As a partner in the Clinton Global Initiative, SMSF made commitments toreduce poverty in rural India; and as a member of the newly formed consortium ofvoluntary organizations, Credibility Alliance, the foundation endorsed the creation of anethical code of conduct for NGOs in India.SMSF was recognized by the Centre for Development and Population Activities(CEDPA) for implementing the Better Life Options Program for adolescent girls inIndia. More than 200 girls across six villages completed the Family Life Education course.For more than 100 girls who could not attend the six-month course, intensive fourteenday Life Skills Education curriculum camps were offered four times in four villagesduring summer vacation.e results of pre- and post-assessment questionnaires demonstrated that the girlsstarted to adopt better hygiene habits and became actively involved in communityprojects. Significant improvements were seen in the young women’s attitudes towardgender equity and marriage age, as well as their self-confidence, communication skills,knowledge of reproductive and child health, legal rights, and setting life goals.A girl named Hayfa was a participant in the foundation’s Family Life course inGhaghas. Hayfa was the fourth child of a poor family of eleven. She had never been toschool. In the classes, she learned how to read and write, and how to sew garments. Whenshe turned sixteen, her father arranged her marriage to a young man from a nearbyvillage. However, within two weeks after the wedding, Hayfa became a target of herhusband’s violent temper. He was mentally ill and often physically abusive to her. Whenher father-in-law started behaving in sexually inappropriate ways toward her, shecomplained to her husband. As a result, Hayfa was sent back to live with her parents.anks to her sewing skills and education, this was an acceptable, and highlypreferable, alternative. Hayfa could earn extra income for the family and help her motherwith her younger siblings. She made money tailoring clothes and worked as a substituteinstructor in the Family Life Education Center. SMSF provided her with an embroiderymachine. Hayfa filed for divorce from her abusive husband and decided to pursue a

formal education. She started school for the first time in the fifth grade class at agovernment school. Hayfa’s life changed for the better thereafter.e entire range of new projects throughout 2005 had been extensions of the fourprograms in the Integrated Sustainable Village Development model, which continued tobe fine-tuned. Community libraries were opened in Agon, Ghaghas, and Goela. SMSFheld health camps and immunization drives. A partnership with All India Institute ofMedical Sciences was instrumental in diagnosing villagers with cataracts, supporting theirability to travel to a hospital to have corrective surgery, and facilitating their follow-upcare in the village. A camp was organized to immunize kids from polio. Work inpartnership with the Delhi Council for Child Welfare helped kids with polio to accessdisability aid, physiotherapy, and hospital care.Health checkups were provided for girls in satellite villages, and more women’s selfhelp groups were formed. Women in the groups were provided training in areas such asraising fruit trees.Weather stations were installed in Ghaghas, Goela, and Agon to observe rainfall,humidity, and temperature for crop planning. Camps were held for soil and water testing.e Education Implementation team joined schoolteachers and others going door todoor to enroll more children in school. Many parents, illiterate themselves, were notconvinced that literacy was necessary for their children, especially for girls. Girls were lesslikely to attend school if there were no latrines or if their mothers kept them home towork in the household.Benches and rugs were supplied to refurbished schools. e foundation teamsubmitted applications to the director of the General Education Department and to thedistrict education officer to fill vacant teacher positions in the model village schools.e introduction of the newly trained village champions (VCs) into the communitiesin advocacy roles proved transformative. VCs from the villages now spoke up boldly butrespectfully in conversations with their elders. ey had taken on their role withenthusiasm. e first six VCs were divided into three teams to compete in thecoordination of a community mobilization project to construct water-harvesting systemsin three schools in the Four, Four, Four villages. VCs coordinated all aspects of theproject, including community involvement, cost-benefit analysis, technicalconsiderations, accounting, and then presenting the final project to the community. eGhaghas school won the competition.All three teams felt a strong sense of pride in making such a visible contribution totheir communities. VCs helped out with library projects, agricultural practices, and arange of water projects, such as building hand pumps and digging wells. eirinvolvement created additional goodwill in the communities as VCs began spontaneously

taking on small projects. One VC conducted, on his own initiative, an informationsession for fifty people on the topic of HIV/AIDS.Any occasional suspicion and criticism from the villages for SMSF involvement in thecommunity was dealt with head-on by VCs with thoughtful direct communication. eirteam spirit of cooperation and good-heartedness made the difference in winning overtheir detractors.A second batch of VCs began training.e positive influence of VCs was seen in a number of areas. A drawing competitionwas held on Environment Day for school-age children in three villages. When asked todraw something about the environment, an eleven-year-old girl, Arsheeda, surprised theteam by writing on her drawing in English, “Water is important for our life, and weshould save it.”e facilitator asked Arsheeda where she learned English. She explained that she hadattended an English-medium school (where English was the primary medium ofinstruction), but her parents took her out of the school, deciding she was ready to be awoman and focus on household chores. A village champion from the same communityjoined the SMSF team for visits with Arsheeda’s family on several occasions to encouragethem to allow her to go back to school. With the helpful influence of the VC, her parentsfinally agreed. Arsheeda was very happy. Her family and others in her community wereeventually uplifted by seeing a young girl empowered by education.Suri and Edda Sehgal along with other trustees and team members were very pleasedto see all the programs making a such a profound difference. Everyone involved feltgratified by each achievement carried out in the Integrated Sustainable VillageDevelopment model. e model was clearly working. e programs were replicable, andseveral interventions were proving to be sustainable. However, the SMSF team could notcarry out all programs in a continually increasing number of villages. ey needed to finda different way to expand.With lots of individual activities underway in eight villages and their satellitelocations, the team faced the ongoing challenge to identify which programs were havingthe greatest impact. e most concrete and measurable results were associated with watermanagement and agriculture development. Health and Life Skills Education were harderto quantify. e team could count participants in training or immunization programs,but measurement of qualities like self-confidence or the exact nature of a community’shealth could not be determined in a fixed way.Suri Sehgal challenged the team to take a larger view of how to demonstrate theimpact made by each completed project. He asked them to consider how they couldmake the best use of SMSF capital in the areas of greatest impact and with the mostpotential for sustainability.

e team had learned a great deal from its mistakes as well as its successes. Was itpossible to do more to share this information with others who had the same goal ofhelping the rural poor?Could SMSF accelerate the development process in Mewat and other rural areas bypursuing partnerships with other NGOs, or by creating different types of linkages?Was it possible to expand geographically with fewer programs?More sharp minds were invited to join the conversation. Scientists, economists,anthropologists, sociologists, and experts in agriculture development and water resourceswould gather together with SMSF staff and community leaders from the villages ofMewat throughout the next eighteen months to answer these questions. As 2005 came toa close, SMSF broke ground on a major three-year construction project that would playan important role in the expansion strategy.13. A key component of the National Rural Health Mission is to provide an ASHA worker to every village in India.is person serves as a liaison between the community and the public health system.

Time to Scale UpFrom their business success, Suri and Edda Sehgal brought their belief in what Suri calleda “loose and tight” organization: tight on the principles of honesty, integrity,transparency, and fairness, and somewhat loose and flexible about day-to-day operations,giving staff flexibility in decision-making in how they carried out their work within thatframework. e team learned by example to stay focused and never deviate fromprinciples. Promises must be honored with commitment.In their business model, leadership defined the big picture and provided staff withample opportunities to create innovative solutions to achieve overall goals. SMSF staffand teams were given a free hand to test ideas, learn, and grow. ey were encouraged toexperiment with what worked in the villages and “learn by doing.”From part-time drivers to the full-time CEO, equal treatment and consideration forevery person remained paramount. Each foundation team member, whether an executiveleader, laborer, housekeeper, or staff person, is considered an equal partner in the workand treated with the same respect. is philosophy motivates and allows people to feelauthentic ownership of their work. e Sehgals understood that ownership is key to jobsatisfaction in any field, but it is particularly important in development work, which isdifficult, sometimes unpleasant, and requires great patience and persistence to accomplisheven a small victory.Administrative Director Ramesh Kapahi explained, “e atmosphere within S MSehgal Foundation is one of trust and respect. You can’t buy that. at is something thatmust be practiced to be felt by people. Staff members have told me they didn’t experiencesuch respect anywhere else.”

Every member of the foundation team was actively involved in the ongoing groupstrategy meetings. Conversations were lively, and each person was invested in thepossibilities for growth of the organization. Scalability and sustainability of programswere discussed in every session. ree ingredients were identified as needed for scaling uptheir program operations: expertise, trained people, and funds. Without question, thefoundation had accumulated and developed the expertise. Essentials in short supply werea larger number of trained, skilled people and the added funding to expand operations inorder to take the Integrated Sustainable Village Development (ISVD) model to fortyvillages.To have enough village champions for that many communities, a larger interactivefacility was needed where they could be trained quickly. Along with Rural Research andother programs, training was the first identified purpose for the new office building underconstruction. A proposed name for the new facility was Academy of Rural Research andDevelopment. To be more inclusive of other potential uses for the building that wentbeyond training and teaching, “Academy” was soon changed to “Institute.” e Instituteof Rural Research and Development (IRRAD) would be an ideal space to showcase thefoundation program models being used in Mewat. Examples of technology andinnovations created by the SMSF team would be displayed alongside photographs andother media presentations.Financial realities brought a sharp focus to foundation goals with the reminder that,although the needs of the poor in rural India were seemingly endless, SMSF funds had aceiling. e Sehgal family could not indefinitely continue to finance all projects as it hadfrom the start. Paying for the replication of the ISVD model in more and morecommunities was not possible with the limited funds of a single NGO. Raising capitalfrom other sources was necessary.Finding out how that process might be handled required further research. Expertspointed out that fundraising was usually more difficult when a family name is associatedwith a philanthropic enterprise. Using words in a name that conveyed an idea of theorganization’s intent would attract interest. e discussion about names evolved into theidea of changing the name of the entire organization to Institute of Rural Research andDevelopment.is notion appealed to the founders for another reason. Suri and Edda Sehgalpreferred that their organization have its own identity or “personality.” e possibility ofthe NGO that they founded to someday become an independent, self-sustaining entitythat could move forward whether or not the Sehgals were a part of it was an exhilaratingthought for Suri and Edda Sehgal, similar to imagining an infant learning to walk.e Sehgals looked into the course of action for changing the legal name, and theCommunications team began creating a new branding identity for the organization.While the name-change effort was in play, the foundation was called IRRAD (an initiative

of S M Sehgal Foundation). However, due to technicalities in India’s ForeignContribution Regulation Act, the formal name change was never made. S M SehgalFoundation remained the name, but the organization won a few awards during thatexpansion period under the IRRAD name.e concept for the use of the new building facility in Gurgaon, called Phase 1,evolved over the next year as construction continued. e land was about threekilometers from the current SMSF headquarters. When the property was purchased in2002, with enough land for two large buildings, the Sehgals made a decision to ensurethat any building constructed on that land would be ecofriendly. Suri and Edda insistedthat their buildings meet the highest level of efficiency and sustainability set by the U.S.Green Building Council. e Phase 1 building would meet every requirement forachieving the highest level “Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)”certification, a platinum rating. Suri Sehgal reaffirmed, “We must practice what wepreach. We can’t tell villagers to harvest rainwater if we don’t do the same.”A search was conducted for an architect with experience in “green” building design.Not only would the facility be used to demonstrate the foundation’s program innovationsand technology, the green building itself would be a demonstration model.Modern office towers, residential complexes, malls, hotels, and other large buildingswere popping up all over Gurgaon, as they were in some other cities in India. emetropolis was now being referred to as the “Millennium City” due to its rapid expansionand leadership in finance, information technology, and other industries. Gurgaon becamea popular home for young professionals, the upwardly mobile middle class, and thewealthy. A glaring flaw, however, was a lack of city planning. Urban development wasallowed to take place quickly, with inadequate infrastructure and little oversight orenforcement of building codes. Every new building seemed to have its own generator todeal with the frequent power outages. e resulting diesel fumes had a negative impact onair quality. Few buildings complied with water-harvesting directives, which led to rampantoverextraction of groundwater.e foundation would demonstrate a better alternative. Suri and Edda Sehgal said,“Our building will be a model for others to see and consider emulating as their buildingsare constructed. Our campus will lead by example, combining simplicity of design withthe latest knowledge and environment-friendly technologies.”e phrase “Lead by example,” represented the intent to “practice what we preach”regarding responsibility for the environment throughout the construction. All uses ofenergy, materials, and water had to meet international standards for recycling,environmental preservation, energy efficiency, and conservation. e structure would beequipped with solar power to meet its energy needs along with a complete rainwaterharvesting system, groundwater recharge, and wastewater recycling to reduce off-site

pollution. e building would be a zero-water-runoff site with total gray and blackwastewater recycling. A 400,000-liter-capacity tank would collect rainwater for reuse, andexcess would flow to groundwater recharge.Ramesh Kapahi, as the foundation’s director of Finance and Administration, wasinvolved in each aspect of the Phase 1 construction: government documents andapprovals, water and electrical connectivity, and building-completion certificates. Hejoined Jay Sehgal in meetings with architects and other experts. He explained how hard itwas for some people to imagine the unique vision for this building, saying, “e onlyother platinum LEED certified building in Gurgaon had been commissioned by a hugemultimillion dollar conglomerate. For a small NGO to take on this type of project was asignificant challenge. But Dr. Sehgal told us, ‘Nothing less than the highest standards areacceptable.’”Finding an architect with the needed experience, and who shared a passion forenvironmental issues, and also understood the green building concept was a challenge.e architect chosen, Ashok B. Lall, had the interest and passion. ough this was his firstgreen building, he was fully committed to the task at hand. He said later, “It is everyarchitect’s dream to work with a client who not only shares his values and dreams but alsoinspires and challenges him to excel. e challenge was straightforward: make a campusthat reflects the ethos of the foundation, build it well but without ostentation, make itenvironmentally and socially responsible, take full ownership, and we will support yourefforts!”A complication was the lack of available skilled construction workers. Rameshexplained, “We had to hire and train the workers on-site ourselves, and our choices ofmaterial and equipment were dependent on what was available locally. We emphasizedand followed safety measures to avoid any accidents on the construction site.”Ashok B. Lall and/or his assistants were on-site daily, selecting materials and guidingworkers. A general perception was that buildings of this sort were very expensive, but thecost of construction was on par with any other building “because,” Ramesh pointed out,“we kept things simple. ere is beauty in simplicity.”e team did not use expensive materials, such as glass paneling or carvings. edesign was modest and uncomplicated. e goal was to capture and use maximumsunlight, reduce the burden on energy, and recycle waste materials on-site. Constructionmaterials were chosen for low energy consumption. e building used very fewtraditional burned bricks and was virtually free of aluminum.Bricks were made on-site using surplus earth from the basement excavation. Woodcame from Indian-certified and controlled teak forests. Rapidly renewable bamboo wasused for the wall panels. Some internal walls were paneled with leftover wooden shuttermaterials. Wood pallets were recycled for use as flooring in the atrium.

According to Ramesh, obtaining approvals for various stages in the constructionprocess was sometimes slow, “but teamwork and guidance from Dr. Sehgal was helpfulduring those challenging times.” Having worked previously with the Sehgals at Proagrofor many years, Ramesh was comfortable and familiar with the Sehgals’ “loose and tight”approach. Treating people with respect and transparency kept the team working at peakcreativity.Ramesh said, “We were very diligent on every aspect of the construction process. Dr.Sehgal always told us, ‘Be patient even if it takes longer.’ We always presented a completeplan. We never indulged in unethical practices, bribes, or kickbacks. On the contrary, ifthere was any deviation or anything found to be wrong, we were willing to pay therelated taxes and fines, and fix the problems as per government policy and procedures.”Jay Sehgal added, “e architect was entirely cooperative with the intent, andconscientious about the goal of perfection in all aspects of the building process.”From day one of construction in 2006, Jay opened the Phase 1 work site for tours,with no restrictions on who might come to watch the project unfold at every stage.Students, architects, civil engineers, and anyone else interested in learning more aboutenvironmentally sustainable building design were invited to walk through the site andwatch how each system and feature was being assembled.Visitors could watch how bricks were made on location from the excavated soil, orwatch the installation of the 57.75 kW photovoltaic solar panels on the roof thatprovided energy-efficient heating, cooling, and lighting. Landscaping around the atriumand courtyard of the building consisted of indigenous plants supplied by Dharma VanaArboretum of Hyderabad (now called Dharmavana Nature Ark).e hope was for this “smart” facility to inspire similar efforts. e team took time toshare information at every opportunity so that visitors might be inspired to adopt theirown resource-efficient environmental practices as a result of seeing the Phase 1demonstration model. e construction was covered extensively by the media inmagazines, newspapers, and dailies, sparking various conversations about the need to “gogreen.”Suri Sehgal frequently used the metaphor of a pyramid for the foundation team’sapproach to program development. e base of the pyramid was wide, to include manypilot projects. Staff was given a lot of freedom in choosing ideas to try. e team wastasked to select whatever worked and was cost-effective; and if an idea was good, theywere free to run with it. e intention was still to reduce the number of activities to thosewith the most impact and greatest potential for sustainability within the communities.Programs at the top of the pyramid would be chosen to scale up. Other programs, even ifsuccessful, would be phased out if they were not sustainable.e cultivation of jatropha, sweet sorghum, and a few other biomass-producing plantswas being promoted in the country for biofuel. e team shied away from

recommending their cultivation because of the strong belief that biomass production forfuels was not a good choice on land that could be used for food or fodder production.However, the agriculture team experimented with the cultivation of daincha (Sesbaniabispinosa) in saline soils and low-lying areas to improve the soil quality and make biomassbriquettes for fuel. e briquettes project had business potential but needed furtherexperimentation to make it cost-effective.In most villages, when wood was not available, women used cow-dung cakes oragricultural waste for cooking fuel. Either way, the smoke was a known health hazard. Asafer and more-efficient alternative cooking fuel, biogas derived from animal manure, wasmade with a simple process whereby bacteria decomposed the manure anaerobically. eteam set up a model biogas plant in Goela to demonstrate its benefits. Again, thefoundation remained in a support-only role with this initiative.e extensive process of constructing the new building to house IRRAD gave thefoundation team time to think about how the organization might scale up. ey were stillfeeling enthusiastic about taking the Integrated Sustainable Village Development modelto forty villages, if they could find a way to identify sources for the needed funds.Staff engaged in a comprehensive evaluation of the Four, Four, Four campaign thathad expanded by this time to cover seventeen villages and satellite communities andhamlets in the Mewat and Kurukshetra districts of Haryana. As the team reviewed thework completed during that period, they experienced what Suri Sehgal described as a“rude awakening” concerning the nature of rural development.“Although progress was being made in the communities, we had little to show for it,even in the first four villages,” Suri recalled. “ere was no hard data. Our people were sobusy doing the work, we hadn’t done much to document our successes. We realized thatour goal of expanding the ISVD model to forty villages was wishful thinking. In thebusiness world, we were used to seeing exponential growth rates, but here, we were stuck.Development was a painfully slow and complex process. Sustainability was a mirage thatwas hard to accomplish even in four villages.”ough the comprehensive changes the team had hoped for in the first four villagesdid not occur as dramatically as envisioned, many successes were achieved. Better farmingpractices were being tried and proven productive; several communities had more access topotable water and conservation technologies; and hundreds of incremental changes weremade in projects related to agriculture, health, and life skills development. More girlswere back in school in many villages.Anjali Makhija observed the changes she saw in women’s confidence. “e veil isremoved, there is openness in body language. Women are learning about reproductivehealth, and marrying a bit later. Field team members have evolved as well. ese socialaspects, however intangible, change whole lives and will affect future generations as well.”

e programs were working, but something had to be done to show concrete,measurable results that demonstrated the impact in a more visible and sustainable way. Inlight of the slow, lengthy, and capital-intensive nature of development, the foundationteam had to find a “magic formula” for sustainability to be able to scale up.Understanding that the scaling-up process would be just as slow as every other aspectof their work, the team recognized a new opportunity related to the new building underconstruction. e large, three-story building, with a basement level as well, had far morespace than the foundation needed. e offices, exhibition galleries, auditorium, cafeteria,classrooms, interactive training rooms, library, and program areas could all beaccommodated on the ground floor. Village champion training and job skills trainingwould continue at the community center near Ghaghas that contained ample workshopareas and classrooms. e community center was a more appropriate and comfortablevenue anyway for small training sessions. Any unused offices in the new Phase 1 buildingwould be made available for rental to tenants who preferred an upscale, modern, andecofriendly venue. e foundation would use the rental income to help sustain ongoingfield operations.Following the team’s well-established practice of concentrating on finding solutions,Suri shared an idea he had been considering for some time: “We may not have the capitalor the time to convert lots of villages fast, but what we can do is synthesize our expertise.”He described his vision for expanding the foundation into a research-basedknowledge institute. Since expertise at the grassroots level was their strength, the teamcould assemble, synthesize, and document knowledge and information they gatheredfrom the ground level about what it takes to fully develop a village, while alsoacknowledging the conflicts and barriers they confronted along the way. ey wouldshare all steps in their learning processes, the proud achievements as well as every mistake,no matter how minor. e ability to learn from any experience was the team’s addedadvantage. As research was done and knowledge was generated, it would now be madeaccessible to others.e overarching goal in establishing the foundation in the first place was to promotemore sustainable development in India. Considering the magnitude of the need, manypartnerships would be needed to further that goal. Documentation of all the learningprocesses would also demonstrate to the team, and others, what the foundation had beenworking so hard to achieve in Mewat. e group’s enthusiasm grew as they embraced theidea of sharing their knowledge, proven interventions, and sustainable skills in a largercontext.e team had already been creating stronger linkages and partnerships in the publicand private sectors to accelerate the development process. Research findings and otherinformation would now be submitted to and promoted in academic journals andtechnical and nontechnical publications. Documentation of the foundation’s baseline

surveys, agriculture development, needs-based studies and assessments, and field researchwould be shared in training workshops and local, national, and international conferences.e foundation would provide evidence of programs and initiatives that had shown thegreatest potential for impact. Others interested in development would be able to take theideas, modify them as needed, and replicate them elsewhere.By strengthening and utilizing relationships with state government bodies, SMSFcould become a leading resource organization with access to government andnongovernment funds. With information about poverty and livelihood dynamics, andthe ability to discern poverty indicators not already being addressed, the foundation couldserve as a globally recognized think tank! e foundation could play a role in advocatingpolicy at higher levels of government and in the private sector. As a premier knowledgeinstitution and learning platform for rural development and poverty reduction in India,impact would be assured.e team had lofty aspirations to discuss at a forum hosted by the foundation in April2007 that brought together a group of inside and outside experts to examine whether thefoundation was on the right track. e group discussed in depth the efficacy of thepractical solutions proposed for the foundation’s future work. Academicians, economists,and scientists shared their views on the challenges and opportunities for replicating theIntegrated Sustainable Village Development model across India. e experts agreed thatlinkages were crucial ingredients. More robust documentation was a necessity forreaching any of the goals being discussed, particularly if any research findings were to beconverted to policy papers.e structure, vision, and mission of the organization were reviewed and reconfirmedin a discussion of the synergy between the main program centers. On top ofimplementing programs and experimenting with rural technologies, a new RuralResearch Center would undertake research, analysis, and synthesis of information onrural development for dissemination. More research staff would be hired to assist inconducting baseline assessments and surveys, evaluating the impact of specific programs,and identifying those that had the greatest impact. e idea was to reduce programs withlimited impact or where impact could not be quantified. As Suri Sehgal often said, “Ourprograms must have an impact, and they must be sustainable besides being replicable andscalable. If we can’t measure it, we must not do it.”Programs such as Life Skills Education, which by this time had graduated 387 girlsfrom seventeen villages, definitely had impact, but the question bothering the team waswhether the impact could be quantified. Skill-building programs also needed to bequantified for their impact. A Capacity Building Center would provide training to villagechampions and people in each program development area so they would help supportand build the capacities of village-level institutions to better meet their communities’needs. Such a center would promote greater citizen participation in the villages as well as

support national policies on rural development. A decision was made to hire more peopleso that each center had a leader.Work done in each of the centers was conceived as interactive and interdependent.e scope of the Capacity Building Center expanded in collaboration with other traininginstitutes and government agencies. Hosting and attending conferences and trainingsbecame regular events. Rural Research Center activities further expanded linkages withacademia and other research institutes and organizations. Impact assessments wereconducted to evaluate the direct effects of foundation models. Overall researchemphasized uncovering needs not already being addressed.Linkages with state government occurred with specific projects throughout 2007. Forexample, the Public Health Department contributed to a water tap campaign in threevillages and assisted with a rainwater-harvesting project for a hospital. e Water Supplyand Sanitation Department took part in public water supply, storage, and disposal worksin Rangala Rajpur.SMSF partnered with the Department of Health and Family Welfare for theprevention, diagnosis, and treatment of polio and tuberculosis. Eye-care camps wereorganized with a government hospital to help people with vision impairments receiveneeded treatment interventions. e Department of Education referred governmentteachers for field training provided by SMSF on the composition, responsibilities, andimportance of School Management Committees.e State Horticulture Department provided vegetable-washing machines to farmersat a 75 percent subsidy and thousands of fruit trees for commercial cultivation. edepartment subsidized vermicompost units and seed storage tanks; supplied free seeds,sprays, and fertilizers; and provided training in water and soil health testing andimproved horticulture practices. e Animal Husbandry Department organized trainingon dairy development in Taoru village, and the District Rural Development Agencyprovided solar lamps at a 65 percent subsidy in Taoru.Each of the current projects led, step by step, to more opportunities for villagers toreceive the help they needed. But for citizens to access their full benefits and assistancefrom programs intended for the poor and to take advantage of publicly sponsoreddevelopment opportunities, everyone involved needed more training and information.e Constitution of India guaranteed a wide range of rights to its citizens and, whilepolicies have long reflected progressive intentions, implementation challenges sometimeslimited their full reach.e SMSF team recognized a pivotal opportunity to support rural communities inaccessing government programs by enhancing their understanding of how to engage withpublic systems. With a goal to create awareness and build the knowledge and skills neededfor people to navigate the services with confidence, the team worked with local residentsin community trainings, participatory forums, and capacity-building workshops to

demystify processes and clarify how various services could be accessed. ese efforts wereto equip even the most marginalized citizens with the knowledge to identify relevantprograms and take informed steps to benefit from them.By focusing on strengthening grassroots leadership, the intent was to complementgovernment initiatives by bridging information gaps that often stood between policy andpractice. Informed and empowered communities would be better positioned to engageconstructively to ensure that they received the services meant for them.During strategy meetings with the team in the fall of 2007, Suri Sehgal was feelingincreased urgency about achieving some concrete “breakthrough results” in the villages.Reminding the team, “Seeing is believing!” he said, “Seeing a clean, developed village—that would inspire people in more villages to get on board!” His voice betrayed a littlefrustration when he asked, “Will I ever see such a village in my lifetime?”e group directed its attention to an examination of what characteristics would bepresent in a “developed” village. What would a truly developed village look like? Stafftalked at length about what they had learned so far in the many types of work they hadaccomplished in different villages. As they imagined the best physical features of a clean“developed” community, water innovations had to come first. Every building would havewater collection and storage structures, and wastewater disposal. Every home would havea toilet. e school would be clean, with intact or rebuilt boundary walls, appropriatefurnishings, available water for drinking and meal preparation, and separate toilets forboys and girls. At least one teacher would be female.A developed village would have a clean and staffed primary healthcare clinic and awell-equipped, sanitary delivery hut for childbirths. e streets would be paved withbrick, and lit at night with solar streetlamps. Shade trees would be planted along thestreets to offer relief from the blazing summer sun, with guardrails to keep the animalsfrom eating saplings.A clean and furnished community center nearby with a library would be in usefrequently for events, trainings, and meetings of village-level institutions and panchayats.An all-important ingredient would be an income-generating enterprise such as a fruitorchard, that would create a continuing source of income for the sarpanch’s use to assurethe sustainable maintenance of the village infrastructure. is component would dependon the village leadership and, in particular, the honesty of the elected sarpanch.Excited conversation in the group moved quickly to the possibility of creating a singledemonstration village that met all the criteria they described. His own enthusiasmmounting, Suri proposed, “Let’s choose one village as a demonstration model on everylevel, a model that others can learn from, a model that can be replicated elsewhere. Wewill make it as self-sufficient as possible. We can see for ourselves if this is the goal we areshooting for, and we can create ambition in the minds of people from other villages whohave only experienced impoverished conditions. We will bring them to the

demonstration village so they can see what is possible. at will motivate them to want toachieve more too. ese people have seldom, if ever, seen a city; they have no easy accessto public transportation; they are not aware of anything else. Let’s get them out of theirshell. Let’s choose a village and get it done!”Edda Sehgal was present, as she was in all meetings, providing her perspective andspeaking up for the issues dearest to her, especially advocacy for women’s empowermentand any project focused on sanitation and cleanliness. She served as a motivating force tothe foundation team in general. Her presence and kind, caring nature always addedharmony to the team. She was in full support of Suri’s idea, as she was with each of thefoundation goals and objectives. She loved the idea of a clean village and shared herhusband’s enthusiasm. Edda agreed that seeing the final result would inspire other villagersto want the same level of development in their communities.A few on the team were a bit hesitant about the idea at first, unsure that doing somuch for a village would have the desired result from the community. e team in generalhad learned, and often relearned, that sustainability could only be assured if thecommunity was convinced that any project was their own and not a project of afoundation or any other outside group. e people had to have a vested interest in thesolutions.With this in mind, the choice of village was critical, just as it had been when the firstfour villages were chosen in 2002. Such a demonstration village must have an activepanchayat with a sarpanch who was a strong and inspiring leader.e team agreed that the 160-household village of Notki was a viable option forproposing the idea. e village-level institution and panchayat were active. e sarpanchwas a dynamic and honest woman.To turn Notki into a demonstration village in record time, the foundation wouldfund 90 percent of the costs. In essence, the Notki conversion was another pilot project,another experiment.When the idea of being a demonstration village was proposed to the people of Notki,they were interested and willing to participate in the work, but they did not share theteam’s sense of urgency. ey no doubt found it hard to fully imagine the outcome thatwas possible in their community.Sanitation was an immediate and pressing concern in Notki. e foundation teamtook villagers on a collective visit to one of the dirtiest areas in their community tointroduce the idea of making Notki an open-defecation-free village. e group stood nearthe local school where the abundance of human excrement was vivid. After discussingconcerns about children’s health, and hearing about the advantages of sanitation, thepeople agreed to adopt a community-led total sanitation approach to making Notki anopen-defecation-free village.

roughout the village, men, women, young people, and even children soon begandigging latrines. Within two days of their decision, thirty-five households had latrine pitsalready dug near their homes, more than doubling the number in the village.An official from the Mewat district commissioner’s office observed all the peopledigging and asked the village sarpanch if there was a new government program thatinspired this activity.e sarpanch looked up from her own digging and said, “Hum bana rahe hain!” (Weare constructing them!)e sanitation drive was so successful that the program was extended to all seventeenintervention villages, increasing the number of latrines in every village by at least 50percent from the previous year for a total of 1,813 new latrines. As the word spread,sarpanches from the region, villagers from neighboring communities, governmentofficials, and private-sector entrepreneurs began visiting Notki to see for themselves thetransformation taking place.

A Magic Formulae demonstration village experiment was in its early stages in February 2008 when adirector was hired for the Capacity Building Center. Attorney and legal literacychampion, Ajay Pandey, joined the foundation team after fourteen years of legal aid workand a master’s degree in clinical legal education he earned as a Fulbright scholar atVanderbilt University. Clinical legal education, fundamentally an experience-based “learnby doing” teaching method, has two primary objectives: to develop skills in the learnersand, at the same time, promote equity.e foundation team had envisioned the Capacity Building Center as a vibrantplatform for discussion and promotion of villagers’ awareness of, and participation in,local government processes. e main objective was helping rural villagers learn aboutgovernment programs and directives that applied to them, so they could voice theirconcerns in any appropriate forums and have a voice in their local communities.is concept was in alignment with Gram Swaraj as promoted by Mahatma Gandhi,which focused on rural villagers taking an active part in understanding their rights andduties to enhance their own development and empowerment. e team grappled with theoperational aspects of meeting this objective. Staff already understood the importance ofcitizens’ awareness and participation as important features of any project or initiativecarried out in their communities, but the team’s challenge was how to most effectivelyengage the people of Mewat.In team discussions, Ajay framed the challenge in terms of the essence of thedemocratic process, which can only be achieved through effective citizen participation.e largest democracy in the world, India was home to millions of vulnerable poor

people who were not well informed about how to participate or represent themselves inthe democratic process, or even how to access information about government programsthat might benefit them.e capacity-building trainings offered previously to panchayats and othercommunity leaders by the foundation team had focused on enhancing awareness,strengthening leadership skills, and enabling better access to government programs andservices. But Ajay knew that providing people with information about their rights andentitlements as citizens was not enough. He described the predicament the foundationteam knew well. People who reside at the bottom of the social hierarchy did not feelempowered. Many villagers, especially women, were hesitant to speak out. Traditionallylacking opportunities for education or to acquire influence, many poor people werefocused on basic survival from one day to the next. ese people needed support to voicetheir concerns and challenges to those in power, particularly when those in authority werenot necessarily accustomed to hearing directly from them.Knowing that not all villagers could fully comprehend how laws would actually makeany difference to their lives, the team had to better demonstrate how change couldhappen, and sometimes happen quickly. e mission was to empower citizens to use theirvoices, despite the challenges, so they could see for themselves that they could influencethe shape of their village councils. Shifting a culture to one of empowered selfrepresentation would illustrate how citizen participation is an effective path to achievingthe life of dignity envisioned in India’s constitution for all the country’s people.Ajay stressed that no matter how fervent the team might feel about their objectives inthis regard, any decision or plan had to come from the villagers themselves. efoundation was to remain a catalyst for change, a medium only, not the changemaker.e team’s role would be driven only by the wishes and needs identified by thecommunity members themselves.More experts were consulted and two more team members were hired over the nextcouple of months. Enthusiastic discussions continued about these concepts within theteam and with small groups of villagers in Mewat. By summer, a one-year trainingprogram was conceived.Drawing from his work in legal aid and human rights, his study of clinical legaleducation, and his years of training paralegals, Ajay proposed a hands-on clinical legaleducation approach. Trainees from villages could start right away without waiting for theentire program design to be fully completed before jumping into action. “Learn bydoing” was the exact approach the foundation team had embraced from the beginning intheir development work, so this hands-on, action-oriented method resonated deeply withSuri Sehgal, who strongly believed in its effectiveness.Six villages known to have active village-level institutions were chosen to holdmeetings about citizen participation. rough these initial meetings, trainees were

recruited for a program that would teach them the components of effective citizenparticipation in their local groups to make a real difference in their communities.Foundation staff and village champions helped spread the word and invited villagers to acentral location in each community, usually a primary school.Ajay welcomed each group of villagers and opened the discussions by acknowledgingthe difficulties affecting their communities—poverty, low education levels, poor localgovernment response and accountability, and so on. ough the people nodded inagreement that these were generally their experiences, they appeared to be resigned to thisreality. Many villagers openly expressed doubt that they could do anything to changetheir circumstances. “Kuch nahin hoga, eisa hi rahega” (Nothing will happen, andeverything will remain the same.)Ajay spoke about India’s long and difficult struggle for independence from Britishrule and the hard-won guarantee in India’s constitution of a dignified life for all citizens.At the same time, he acknowledged the obvious “disconnect” between that guarantee andthe realities in the villages of Mewat. He then told three stories to illustrate ways thatchange can occur.He asked his listeners to focus on the overall message in the first story, saying he couldnot verify the facts as the story was told to him as a child: A woman put a lamp outsideher house every evening after sunset. Her neighbors found this peculiar and ridiculed thewoman for being more concerned about lighting the street than lighting her own home.Local villagers even doused her light. Nevertheless, she continued to put a lamp outsideher house every evening. Over time, neighbors started noticing the convenience ofhaving light on the street at night. One by one, they began putting lighted lamps outsidetheir own homes each evening. Every neighbor on the street eventually followed thispractice, and the ongoing use of streetlights was adopted by the entire community.Ajay’s second story was a personal one about how being cheated as a consumerinspired him to become a lawyer: While on summer break from university, at home inEtawah, his mother asked him to get the cooking-gas cylinder refilled.As he was paying for the refill at the gas agency, Ajay was asked for ten extra rupees.e agency man’s odd explanation for a mandatory added fee did not sound legitimate toAjay. As he argued with the agency man about the extra fee, customers in line behind Ajaypaid attention, and some agreed right away that the excuse given for the added fee wasquestionable. is prompted Ajay to challenge the matter further through appropriatechannels. He paid the extra amount in order to take the gas refill home, but also told theman and his colleagues that such an added fee was “unwarranted and illegal,” and theywould eventually have to pay everyone back. e gas agency men just scoffed and daredAjay to try getting his money back.Ajay’s suit against the gas agency went on in the district consumer forum of hishometown for four years. e media supported the cause, the law supported his action,

and Ajay won the case!He explained, “is was an empowering experience despite the hurdles. As soon as thecase was accepted by the consumer forum, the practice of collecting extra money fromconsumers by all gas agencies in my hometown stopped forever.”With each group of villagers Ajay spoke with, he shared different aspects of hisexperience during those four years that motivated him to become a lawyer and to use lawas an instrument of justice, equality, and empowerment.His third story was about organizing a community luncheon where villagers were toassemble in a common place to help with a meal preparation. In an announcement madethe night before, each household was asked to add one glass of milk to the large commonpot for the meal.When the villagers gathered the next day for the big meal, the common pot was filledonly with water! Each person assumed that all the others would add their fair share ofmilk, and no one would know the difference if “some” water was added instead.Ajay explained, “is is the story of the way we ended up with so many disconnects inour democracy. We all pour in water, thinking everyone else will pour in milk. emessage is: we all need to participate effectively in democracy to strengthen it. We musteach realize that, If I don’t participate effectively, nobody else will! Engagement with ourgoverning organizations has the power to effectively address citizens’ poverty, illiteracy,the sense of helplessness, and everything else that is ailing our democracy!”He stressed again and again, “We have the power” to be responsive and supportive—and effective citizen participation is the true key to addressing “the disconnects we allknow so well.”e people in the group began to grasp his meaning. eir eyes revealed glimmers ofunderstanding as they finally agreed that, as citizens, they all needed to participateeffectively in the system to make it better.Ajay told each group that he was seeking thirty-five trainees to learn more about howto be effective citizen participants. He added that the training group would actually bethirty-six members, because he included himself as one who would also be trained and“learn by doing” along with the others. Ready to move ahead with a willing team oftrainees, he assured them, “I will wear your shoes and work with you.”He made it clear that the foundation was not “in charge,” not leading this trainingprogram. is would be a citizen-led initiative in the villagers’ hands. Participants woulddecide what issues to confront. Villagers would choose the time and place for trainings,their personal level of involvement, and so on.People listened attentively as Ajay said the teaching aspect would be more of adialogue than formal training. He had approached the villagers with his own passionateconviction that there was no other choice but to partner effectively in democracy if theywanted to bring about effective citizen participation and to realize the true objectives of

the Constitution of India. In addition, Ajay stressed that the initiative could not succeedwithout equal participation by women. He likened effective participation to serving agreater cause. He asserted that, together, this group was about to achieve something “trulygreat.” He repeatedly declared, “We will serve the cause of truth and achieve the dignifiedlife that everyone deserves.” He asked people to stand together and work for that cause.Ajay observed a growing enthusiasm among the villagers as he described the resultsbased, “learn by doing” approach he proposed to each group. In each of the six meetings,he could feel relationships being forged. He felt a resonance and power in theseconnections. He encouraged people from every sector to consider being trainees: farmersand landless people, elected leaders and laborers, the illiterate and the teachers. Anywilling adult who agreed to participate for a full year of training was welcome.Transportation to the training center and lunch was provided each day that trainees met.Nominees came together for a group discussion and were asked questions todetermine the sincerity of their commitment and their availability. Evaluators, includingrepresentatives from the villages, assisted in the final selections.Having all kinds of citizens included in the training was a unique experience forordinary citizens who had been left out of the democratic process for far too long. ese“ordinary” citizens were the people with the power to sustain the values of democracy.With effective citizen participation, change was possible. “In fact,” Ajay asserted, “the skyis the limit!”e team originally found it particularly challenging to convince women toparticipate in the training. But Ajay was adamant about equal participation. ough hewas not sure he would attract 50 percent participation by women in the first year, he said,“We must try.”He explained more about why the involvement of women was vital to their quest forequal representation and fairness in community decisions. In their culture dominated bymen, their reality would be “business as usual,” and no change would be possible. Heexplained that women who had been isolated at home for the most part were less likely tobe familiar with, and thereby more accepting of, the existing economic and politicalpower structures and mindsets. Ajay’s explanation of the “learn by doing” concept wasnot easily grasped by the villagers, but their further understanding would come in timeduring the process. Only nine women were in the initial group of trainees.e training program began with fifty days of classroom instruction, held three days aweek in combination with two days in the field. e format was designed to provide abroad perspective on rural citizen participation; an understanding of the roles ofpanchayats and other functionaries, institutions, and mechanisms of rural government;and a basic review of the most important government programs to benefit poor people inrural India. e training helped illustrate to villagers how shortcomings in many of the

programs designed for their benefit were the result of a lack of transparency andaccountability.e foundation sponsored a series of panel discussions in the fall of 2008 tocomplement the training and create more community interest in effective citizenparticipation. Speakers came from various levels of government, business, academia, andthe media. e village trainees, community leaders, and the foundation staff, trustees, andboard members all attended and participated.One of the panel discussions about the current status of the Public DistributionSystem spurred trainees to gather information from ration card holders in their villages.ey collected a list of all citizens with yellow cards, which indicated that they lived belowthe poverty line; and a list of pink-card holders, the poorest of the poor who were entitledto food grains. Interviewing these people about the quantity of rations they received,what rates they were being forced to pay, and the behavior of depot holders toward them,highlighted numerous specific shortcomings to address in the system.In one example, the quantity of rations distributed to every family was the sameregardless of the number of people in the family. And the amount was insufficient for anysize family. e rations were poor quality. Some villages had no ration depot at all.Once people could see how they as citizens had the power to shine a light on theseissues, they understood that they could play a role in bringing about transparency andaccountability in the programs they cared about and needed most.When a meeting was held in the Ghaghas Community Center to discuss how toaddress these inequities, two depot holders from the surrounding region showed up,pretending to represent below-poverty-line households. ey were disruptive and tried tosabotage the gathering with threats. However, the villagers who organized the meetingstood strong, firmly demanding reasonable improvements from the depot holders. eNotki depot distributed rations to eligible villagers that very same evening!Seeing genuine results occur so quickly impressed the villagers and inspired them tostay active. Similar successes were soon seen in all six communities where village traineeswere working. Ration depot managers cooperated in eliminating problems in the PublicDistribution System in each village. Some depot managers asked the trainees to guidethem in setting prices and quantities.In cases where only partial improvements occurred, villagers kept track of theprogress and continued to make appropriate demands. When people saw more results,they began to feel empowered to take more actions. Trainees gained a positive reputationin their respective villages for their work. Meetings were held with stakeholders, such aslicensed depot holders, school lunch program cooks, and ICDS (Integrated ChildDevelopment Services) workers and helpers in the six villages.Each trainee took some personal action to make a difference. Some inspected depotsto evaluate their functioning. Some went to schools, inspected the meals, and made lists

of the number of children being fed. Women trainees visited and inspected anganwadi(childcare) centers to determine if and how childcare was being conducted.Village trainees wanted to find out why certain poor people in the village of Agonwere denied their 100-square-yard plots under Mahatma Gandhi Grameen Basti Yojana, arural housing program instituted in 2008. As a result of villager inquiries, the districtadministration required redistribution of the plots to include any eligible people who hadpreviously been excluded.Such victories helped to convince residents of all six villages that they were indeed therightful owners of the democratic process. Village trainees in good governmentadministration went beyond their districts to share and implement their learnings for thelarger good in other villages. As people in all parts of village life began to increase theirawareness and engagement, panchayat members were better able to appreciate theirpower, roles, and responsibilities as citizens.During this same period, the foundation achieved several milestones within theIntegrated Sustainable Village Development (ISVD) model. Water literacy education wasfurthered with the help of children and young people. Schoolchildren began callingadults’ attention to situations where water was being wasted. Parents were ofteninfluenced by their children to change their behaviors in favor of more sanitary practicesand better disposal of wastewater.By measuring the impact of children’s street theater performances promoting “OurVillage, Clean Village” in Jyotisar, Kurukshetra, the Rural Research team saw theeffectiveness of this novel approach in creating increased awareness among schoolchildrenas well as parents and members of the panchayat. Water literacy street plays were taken tomore villages where people were entertained, and more minds were changed. Each watermanagement innovation spread as well. Two new check dam water-augmentation systemswere constructed, and more were planned.Farmers resource centers in five Mewat villages were now active as informationdissemination hubs, providing monthly training events for farmers. Inter-village groupvisits showcased field demonstrations of new and improved practices, such as the balanceduse of micronutrients, intercropping, pulse (bean) cultivation, crop diversification, andbetter livestock practices.e Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association in Mewat was strengthened byagricultural workshops, trainings, and “exposure” visits. Exposure visits were intended toshow the often-isolated farmers the larger communities outside their own. efoundation team helped village volunteers, called kisan mitras (farmers’ friends), buildfarmers’ aptitude and capabilities. ey went from village to village, and walked fromfarm to farm, providing information about sustainable agriculture. Farmers were invitedto training events and meetings, called kisan gosthees, to demonstrate agricultural

techniques and also to teach marketable skills to village youth. Skill centers trainedstudents in computers, typing, apparel design, electrical work, and plumbing.Rural health support included more eye clinics, cataract surgeries, immunizations,disability rehabilitation, and nutritional studies of children. Random-sample surveysgauged the continuing positive impact of the Life Skills Education programs. Despite thestrongly patriarchal culture of Mewat, gains in female empowerment were noticed inevery area.e foundation’s crop improvement work in Hyderabad continued to enhance thediversity of the maize germplasm and identify inbred lines that combined well with otherlines to develop high-yielding corn hybrids tolerant of biotic and abiotic stresses. In lightof recent intellectual property laws in India, the foundation team took steps, in keepingwith their policy and strong commitment, to make sure that elite germplasm did notbecome the exclusive property of the private sector. e foundation continued to makegermplasm freely available to anyone as long as they did not seek intellectual propertyprotection on the seed.With so many changes going on in the villages, the foundation team organizedinterdisciplinary workshops that included government and religious leaders, localprofessionals, and panchayat members. e idea was to make sure that anyone who mightfeel threatened by (or resistant to) changes would hear all sides of the discussions aboutdevelopment activities. Guest speakers were invited from Muslim universities and otherinstitutions to speak to foundation staff and engage in brainstorming about religiouslyacceptable ways for Muslim women to engage in personal and village advancement.e foundation’s Communications team played an important role in knowledgedissemination, bridging the gap between communities and the broader public. roughin-person engagement, print, digital platforms, and on television they amplified voicesand shared critical insights. As community interactions intensified with frequent events,meetings, and brainstorming sessions, the team ensured that impactful stories reachedwider audiences. eir contributions extended beyond outreach—academic papers onwater, health, and life skills found space in professional journals, while popular articlesappeared in newspapers, magazines, annual reports, and on the foundation’s website.Vikas Patrika, the foundation’s quarterly Hindi newsletter, became an influentialplatform for villagers to express their views. Field team members contributed firsthandaccounts of development efforts, while the Communications team facilitated interviewswith villagers and field writers to bring their personal narratives to life. e newslettercovered vital topics such as water literacy, newly implemented check dam systems,maternal health initiatives, training programs, and recognition for the foundation’ssuccessful projects. A compelling series of leadership case studies was compiled in a book

titled Small Interventions Big Impacts that highlighted exemplary villagers, which inspiredothers to take charge of their communities.By the end of 2008, the Phase 1 building of the foundation campus in Gurgaon wascomplete. e foundation and its Gurgaon campus were still being referred to as theInstitute of Rural Research and Development, or as “IRRAD, an initiative of S M SehgalFoundation.” e demonstration village of Notki was three-quarters finished, and thetime had come to celebrate.e new headquarters was inaugurated by the Honorable Governor of Haryana, Dr.A.R. Kidwai, on December 2, 2008. A choir of village girls opened the program bysinging the national anthem. e festive event was covered by a few dozen nationalnewspapers in Hindi and in English, seven television stations, and numerous mediawebsites.e daylong celebration was attended by staff from Gurgaon and Hyderabad,villagers and friends, dignitaries and funding partners, and the Sehgal family. In theauditorium, Suri Sehgal’s welcome included a description of the history of the foundationas a learning journey from its inception. He emphasized that poverty in rural India couldbe alleviated if the development funds allocated by the government actually reached thevillagers, and if there was transparency and accountability for the funds in the publicsector. He invited people from every sector—public, private, and other NGOs—to worktogether as partners in progress to empower rural India. After a few words from JaySehgal, an enlightening speech by the governor, and a luncheon, everyone was invited towander around and explore the dynamic new space.ough the LEED certificate itself from the U.S. Green Building Council would notbe presented officially for another thirteen months, the final Phase 1 building met all therequirements to attain the platinum (highest) LEED rating envisioned by the founders.Now it was the second building in Gurgaon to achieve this distinction, the fifth buildingin all of India, and only the seventy-fifth building in the entire world.Guests were able to see all aspects of the eco-friendly building while learning moreabout the range of foundation work in the villages. More workshop tours anddemonstrations were held over the next few days. At the community center in Ghaghas,visitors saw training workshops with equipment and tools for cellphone repair andcomputer training. Villagers greeted Suri and Edda Sehgal affectionately, putting acolorful turban on Suri and a shawl around Edda’s shoulders.e tour included a look at demonstration fields that showed crop diversification,experimental rows of crops in raised wooden beds with drip irrigation, and avermicompost display. Near a large check dam basin in the Aravalli foothills, a descriptionof the water-augmentation system included explanations about water collection andstorage, and groundwater replenishment.

A visit to the demonstration village of Notki included a tour of a new two-roomchildbirth delivery hut with privacy screens, modern equipment, and supplies thatincluded dai delivery kits. Diagrams on the walls illustrated preventive health procedures.e space was clean and hygienic. anks to solar panels, continuous electricity wasavailable for lights and a fan. Villagers in eight surrounding villages now had a safealternative to home births.In a classroom at the nearby school, bright-eyed little girls wearing headscarves sat inrows. Suri spoke to the children in Hindi and asked them questions. e children wereeager and expressive in their replies.Large wall paintings and signs hung in prominent places, illustrating projects thevillagers had undertaken to turn Notki into a clean village. Members of the educationteam spoke, acknowledging the villagers’ participation in cash and in-kind workcontributions.Men and children of the village gathered close to hear what was being said. Womenmore often watched from a distance. e villagers appeared pleased with the cleardifferences in their community and proud of their part in the conversion process.Many households in Notki now had latrines. New recharge/soak wells had been dug,and new pipes, storage tanks, and soak pits had been installed. e main streets werepaved with cement. Solar street lamps were in strategic locations throughout the village.An orchard had been planted on 4.3 acres with 897 plants of thirteen species.e final stages in the conversion of Notki to a clean demonstration village wouldoccur over the next year and include a nearby hamlet. Promotional materials and articlesabout Notki invited others, including corporations and philanthropists, to adopt a villagelike Notki to help foster this type of change all across rural India.e Integrated Sustainable Village Development model continued to have a lot ofmoving parts. e foundation team was convinced from its successes that this elegantapproach was absolutely needed in every poor village in the country. Scaling up was stillconsidered the only way to reach more communities in need. However, when the teambegan to solicit partners for the ISVD model, they realized right away that no othersingle partner would want to become involved in funding so many complexinterconnected components. As Suri and Edda Sehgal had learned when they createdtheir foundation, other NGOs focused only on single programs. Partners in generalpreferred to choose one project at a time that could demonstrate specific observableobjectives.Despite this reality, the foundation team recognized the importance of maintainingan integrated approach to development. Year after year, they observed that no issue in avillage existed in isolation—each challenge was deeply interconnected with others. Withso many complex and interrelated problems, each concern naturally led to the next—

poor nutrition, a sick child, no access to healthcare, no water, girls unable to go to school—whatever the issue, each was linked to the other.Suri Sehgal observed, “For anyone who feels compassion in the face of such difficultcircumstances, moving from one solution to the next is as natural as breathing. Withoutmore and more money, we couldn’t keep doing it all, but we would not give up either.”He explained, “e solution in this case was to limit the Integrated SustainableVillage Development model to our twenty-village cluster, and not scale up further unlessmoney came from other sources.”e team could continue to experiment with what worked in those villages, refine themodels, test and adapt new technologies, and continue to gather and report theirfindings. e team had expertise in each area of development, which would be shared inthe form of education, training, interactive dialogue, advocacy, and support whereneeded.Jay Sehgal’s relocation to the United States fit well with these plans. By working in theDes Moines, Iowa, office of Sehgal Foundation (SF) in the US, Jay would be able topursue linkages with research and donor organizations and development institutions inthe US. His goal was to solicit funds and attract volunteers, students, and postdoctoralcandidates from the US to visit S M Sehgal Foundation (SMSF) in India and considerinternships there. By seeing rural India, young people would hopefully continue to beinterested in rural development work when they returned home.An ideal ongoing collaboration began with the World Food Prize Foundation, alsoheadquartered in Des Moines. Selected high school and early college students receivingBorlaug-Ruan International internships worked with researchers and practitioners on theground in the field to address food security and similar pressing problems throughout theworld, including SMSF.Until the right person could be found to become the new CEO in India, Jay wouldcontinue in his leadership role and travel back and forth to India every few months.When in the US, he stayed in regular contact with his team by phone, email, and online.He was confident that, with discipline and good planning, this arrangement would workfor the interim.e SMSF team was an “empowered” group. e dozen or so members of the coreteam functioned almost like a tight-knit family. With Jay at a distance, program leadersstepped up and took on added responsibilities. Staff maintained smart access toinformation and each other through an intranet, which helped with transparency andcoordination. ough they missed Jay Sehgal’s supportive day-to-day attention tooperations, and his presence in the villages, program leaders were able to carry onindependently.Grassroots awareness and civic engagement were gradually taking root in the sixcommunities where the trainees worked, but formidable barriers remained. Generating a

greater sense of civic awareness and responsibility was an ongoing, albeit slow, process.Some local civil servants resisted change and were often hostile and dismissive of newlyempowered poor people, refusing to answer to those at the bottom of the social hierarchy.is common dynamic inspired the SMSF team to refine its strategic approach todevelopment in 2009.From the beginning to this ten-year mark, empowerment had always been the keyingredient in the Integrated Sustainable Village Development model. With a strongerunderstanding that overcoming poverty was a matter of human dignity and deservedentitlements, the team’s approach to development shifted from a “needs-based” to an“equity-based” model. e SMSF team recognized advocacy for citizen participation asan effective tool for putting more “muscle” into the empowerment of villagers in Mewat.By putting an overarching focus on awareness of, and skills to access, governmentprograms and services, SMSF finally had the “magic formula” Suri Sehgal had long beenlooking for to ensure sustainability of program interventions on the grassroots level. isapproach emphasized the empowerment and accountability that would mobilize morepeople in the villages to break free from their entrenched mindsets and be inspired tojump-start their own development through effective citizen participation. is focus hadalready demonstrated a potential for meaningful transformation in the villages of Mewat.While the new strategy was being refined and tested, Ajay Pandey and the traineescontinued efforts to empower people to demand honest implementation of governmentprograms. ey hung posters and created wall paintings throughout the villages.Illustrations showed the correct allotments and benefits of various entitlement programs.e trainees found that the Mid-Day Meal Scheme, a program intended to providefree lunches to schoolchildren, was so unevenly administered that the food was ofteninedible. is lunch program, the largest in the world, was tasked to provide one freemeal a day to approximately 120 million students, ages six to fourteen, in governmentfunded primary and upper primary schools.In some cases, school administrators and principals had been personally keeping thegovernment money allocated for the Mid-Day Meal Program and education facilities. Sothe foundation team created wall paintings in public places in the community thatillustrated what was supposed to be included in the meal plan, which had the desired effectof visually highlighting the profound discrepancy between the intent of the program andthe outcome in the community.e images on posters and walls created greater awareness and inspired villagers todemand from their school committees that services be delivered properly. As villagersspoke up, with support when needed from field team members and trainees, and askedfor the correct quality and quantities of goods, administrators began delivering more ofthe required items.

Change was happening, but it was slow. Foundation teams and trainees facedresistance from various stakeholders in the programs, including some of the workers,depot holders, teachers, and others.Ajay was having a conversation with trainees and fellow villagers one day in March2009, discussing the importance of citizen participation in shaping their communities.He spoke with passion about the potential each individual holds to contribute to positivechange—especially when they are informed, united, and engaged. He emphasized that ascitizens in a democracy, they have the authority and the ability to make their voices heardand influence development around them. His words struck a chord with the group,reinforcing their belief that progress begins with awareness and collective effort.He described the tremendous power people have—if they only knew it. Hisimpassioned discourse was motivated by a book by Dipankar Gupta, called e CagedPhoenix: Can India Fly?, about how the growth that had occurred in some parts of Indiahad never reached millions of rural poor people. Gupta lamented, “. . . we have the vote,we should all be in a hurry.” Ajay’s voice rose a bit as he said to the group, “It has beensixty-two years since India’s independence! We are voters in a democracy! We have theultimate power to bring about desired changes!”Inspired by Ajay’s words, the villagers responded, “Yes! Yes!”e group broke into brainstorming mode as the villagers imagined the features oftheir new campaign. ey discussed a wider, more holistic view of citizen participation,not just with respect to a few segments of rural life. ey talked about something greater—the idea of creating such a powerful culture of effective citizen participation whereinthe welfare of citizens would be a clear priority. e group became increasingly excited asthey imagined the possibilities.Chief components of the new campaign were the basic characteristics in the trainingprogram design. e program integrated community involvement, women’s leadership,supportive citizen participation, coordination of actions, and zero tolerance forcorruption, with a goal of obtaining the most needed, basic services as a starting point.People from the community could see that these tenets held the promise for raisingtheir standard of living and enabling them to make better use of resources andopportunities, and ultimately lead to a more just society. Trainees made posters depictingthose six key components of the campaign and placed them in each of their six villages.As the first training module was nearing its conclusion before the summer of 2009,villagers who participated were asked to cite one good thing and one bad thing abouttheir training. ey each stated that there was “nothing bad” about the training. e goodpoints were primarily about the personal changes they felt. Trainees describedexperiencing a new sense of empowerment. ey appreciated being aware not only oftheir rights but also of their duties. ey now felt that, if the system did not workproperly, it was their personal duty as citizens to take measures to correct the problem—