By Sukhada Tatke,
In a tiny home tucked away in a corner of
Kurzadi village in Wardha district, 41-year-old Ujjwala Petkar engages in
long discussions with her sister-in-law Usha Petkar (45) over which seeds can
be sowed this year, what kind of crop will grow the next and so on. If today
farming brings them together, just a few years ago it was tragedy. Their
husbands, who were brothers, committed suicide as they were buried under debts
and couldn't see a way out.
They were also confronted with a mountain of
problems. Getting their children an education and paying off their husbands'
debt was a priority but they had no clue how to go about it. "My world
came crashing down after my husband committed suicide in 2002. My two children
were young and not only did I not know anything about money, I didn't even know
the details of my husband's farm," says Ujjwala, whose husband, Prabhakar,
owed Rs 2 lakh when he died.
According to the rural development ministry,
rural women form the most productive workforce in the economy of a majority of
the developing nations, including India. Agriculture, the single-largest
production endeavour in India contributing to 16% of the GDP, is increasingly becoming
a female activity. Beyond the conventional market-oriented, narrower definition
of 'productive workers', almost all women in rural India can be considered
'farmers' in some sense, working as agricultural labourers or unpaid workers in
family farm enterprises, and sometimes a combination of the two.
Taking all this into consideration,
initiatives like the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation's Mahila Kisan
Sashaktikaran Pariyojana give a boost to women's involvement in agriculture. In
2008, the institute stepped into the scene with an aim to empower women hit by
the agriculture crisis. It decided to concentrate on Wardha and Yavatmal,
two of the most crisis-stricken districts of Vidarbha. The idea was simple:
institutional building through sustainable agricultural practices. The belief
was that by empowering the woman of the family, the children would
automatically benefit.
Soon, the Petkar sisters-in-law, along with
other women, started getting involved in the project, which covered around
1,354 women farmers organized into 86 women farmer groups across 55 villages.
More than three years later, the success is out there to see. About 100 women
farmers have undertaken some form of sustainable agricultural practices which
help them reduce the cost of cultivation and over 250 women have established
kitchen gardens which have helped them diversify their dietary basket and
ultimately improve their nutritional status.
Ujjwala now has managed to pay off a debt of
Rs 1 lakh and get her daughter admitted to a nursing college. She now grows
cotton, tur, soyabean and wheat on her five-acre irrigated land. She has also
managed to get the land transferred to her name, something that is important
after a man commits suicide. Usha, meanwhile, has managed to get one of her
daughters married, and the other trained in nursing. Her two sons have taken up
farming. "I am left with only Rs 25,000 of the Rs 1,60,000 loan my husband
had taken to repay," she says. Her husband, Kavdoji, committed suicide in
February 2006.
Kishor Jagtap, project coordinator at the
institute, says it will still take long for major changes to be seen.
"Along with women, we focus on children as well since they will inherit.
Last year, we conducted a massive drive and found that more than 50% women are
anaemic. So a holistic approach is needed while empowering women to take own
decisions. Once changes are seen in women, the children benefit
automatically," he said.
Indira Meshram from Takli village in Ralegaon
block of Yavatmal district became part of the project in 2009. "I didn't
know anything about farming; now I know everything from manure to the
importance of food security. I take all the decisions at home, not only about
farming but everything else as well. The decision to send my son for a
bachelor's degree in social work was also mine," she says.
The institute has helped form councils of
women which meet every once in a while to discuss issues. "One woman
teaches the other" is the mantra. Melas are held once a year for women to
meet and share their experience.
Going by the success of the initiative, in
2010, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee budgeted Rs 100 crore for the
Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana and decided to extend it across the
country. The programme became operational through the Union ministry of rural
development, which invited applications from competent NGOs across India for
the project, and the first review meeting took place in early April 2012, four
months after the NGOs had begun their work. Now, about 10 NGOs working in
Maharashtra, Kerala, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Andhra
Pradesh are partners in this project.
Medha Nanivadekar, director of the Centre for
Women's Studies at Shivaji University in Kolhapur, said that such programmes
are very important. However, the government needs to be flexible and able to
replicate them in different areas of the country based on their uniqueness and
context. "Usually, government schemes look fantastic," she says,
"but when it comes to implementation it is often not possible because of
ridiculous rules."
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