Phone Conversation with Ajay on 2/11/2003

I had a very good phone conversation with Ajay, I am sharing the details
with you below. Ajay is very articulate and is able to easily communicate in 
English, there were no problems on that count.

I thanked him for the detailed report and told him that were were quite
pleased and impressed with the progress that had taken place. I learnt
some more details about the schools

* The most recent review meeting took place over the weekend in
  Jalampalli village.
* Construction of all schools is now complete.
* The schools are held from 9am-4pm with a 1-1/2 hour break. I forgot
  to ask how many days a week
* Two of the teachers are women, they are all intermediate pass, can
  read and understand english, though not very fluent in it. (I forgot
  to ask about the age group of teachers). They all reside in the
  villages.
* They decided to fire one of the female teachers, in Vasamadadi,
  as it was her husband who was doing the teaching, and even then
  there was a lot of absenteism. They had given a few warnings but to
  no effect.
* They are looking for donations of used/broken toys, charts, colorful
  picture books (Telugu or English), for the school children. They find
  that the children really like these (If you remember, no provision
  was made for such supplies in their budget). They have prepared
  pamphlets with this information and are circulating them amongst the
  public schools in towns. He wondered if we can help by sending such
  material.
* They are also looking at learning aids for children. One of Ajay's
  associates (Sekhar from Nellore) has prepared a learning kit consisting
  of games, toys and other teaching aids for students at the 0-3 level.
  Each kit costs ~Rs 2,300. They have invited this person for a
  demostration, and will look into purchasing at least one which may
  be shared between the schools.
* They also have the idea of creating a 'Tool Box' for the schools.
  The 'tool box' would consist of books, charts, a globe and other such
  material, and this again could be shared/rotated between the schools.
* He welcomed AID volunteers to visit and said that ideally 4-5 days
  should be set aside for a good visit.
* I asked him about the Malaria problem in the area. He mentioned
  that Malaria is endemic in the region. It isn't uncommon to see
  sick villagers lying out in the sun for relief from the cold
  shivers. Spraying is not an option. Govt. has no funds for doing
  this, their budgets for health have been constantly dwindling.
  Malaria deaths in Vizag district have also been going up.
  Their teachers are also constantly falling sick. The last meeting
  also, one couldn't attend as he was sick with malaria and had to
  be taken to the hospital. To tackle this problem, they recently
  had a training session where they educated the teachers about
  diagnosing malaria, its symptoms and care.
  Their idea is to have a first aid kit at each village, so that
  simple injuries and diseases may be treated before they turn
  into something serious, which is often the case. This is still a
  plan and there are resource and other constraints before it can be
  implemented.
* Their goal is to groom the teachers to be community organizers.
  Unless the teachers are involved in the community, they won't have
  to moral authority to bring about change.
  He mentioned a recent instance where a tribal from the plains
  beat up a Kondh tribal very badly. The school teacher sent the injured
  person to Praja Chetana and they registered a criminal
  complaint. They are constantly encouraging such involvement and
  the teachers are always involved in events, meetings etc. that
  relate to issues of the Kondh people.
* I told him about book 'where there is no doctor'. He's already
  aware of it, it is available in Telugu. He would like to purchase
  it for the teachers, but at Rs. 200 a piece it is a reasonable 
  expense for 10 books, and it may not fit in their budget.

* INTERESTING:
  Recently AID Saathis Ravi and Aravinda gifted them with a bijli bike.
  They plan to set it up in one of the older schools in Jalampalli.
  If it works well, they'll look into investing into more of them.
  ( None of the Kondh villages have electricity )
  On 16th Feb Sandeep Pandey and Medha Patkar will be in Chodawaram
  taluka for the NAPM yatra. Here at a function some of the children
  from the Jalampalli school will welcome them with a traditional
  Kondh song. Medha and Sandeep will present the children with the
  bike. I asked him to send us pictures of the event if possible.

* He invited us to look at the Napm yatra webpage for updates
  on the AP events. http://aidindia.org/desh/

  I promised to stay in regular touch on phone and he seemed quite
  pleased to do that.
  I also promised to proactively look into donations of books, charts
  etc., get in touch with AIDers and chapters in South India to
  check the level of interest and assistance they will be able to
  commit.

  We briefly talked about the Madduvalasa legal cell project. I didn't
  have too much to ask him. He told me that the Lok Adalats will be
  complete by Feb. Next time SV or Prashant can join and I will be
  better prepared with questions about this.

  Note to us:
  - There seem to be tangible ways to help this group which we should follow 
  up.


Thanks,
-Neerja.