Using cattle rearing and khadi spinning to tackle unemployment

Like millions of youngsters who leave their villages for a good education and a stable future, Ashok Kumar from Gopalganj in Bihar and Ajit Singh from Sonepat in Haryana have managed to secure some space for themselves in a metro.

But unlike those who forget their roots, Kumar and Singh want to do something for their rural bretheren back home and address socials evils such as dowry, female infanticide and issues such as migration of rural children to cities.

“We want to create steady jobs for our gaonwallas, so that they don’t have to migrate to cities or live a life of hunger and abject poverty,” echo the two sturdy men, who are presently studying in Pune.

And the best way of job creation, say Kumar and Singh, is by convincing their gaonwallas to use the bare minimum available resources in an optimum manner and to fashion out services that can create a regular pipeline of income.

Thus Kumar, who is a graduate in political science, is set to teach his folks the multiple benefits of cattle rearing, while Singh, who is a post graduate in political science and currently preparing for the IAS, wants to kickstart the practice of spinning khadi among village women.

Kumar says that amongst the agrarian community of Gopalganj, everyone in a farmer’s family, from parents to grandparents to children, work in farms from dawn to dusk, but still are barely able to make ends meet.

“As the entire family works in the field, children are deprived of education. The farm produce is sold at very low prices, which are hardly enough even to buy the food which they themselves grow,’’ says Kumar, adding that this leads to a vicious circle of illiteracy, unemployment and migration to cities.

Kumar says he has seen a majority of kids from Gopalganj dropping out of schools by age 14, running away to New Delhi or Kolkata to escape poverty, engaging in risky work in chemical factories, tanneries, welding, etc, and leading a life of distress and turmoil.

“Hence there is a pressing need to address this situation by creating regular channels of income for adults, so that they can educate their children, who then can get some jobs,’’says Kumar.

He adds that though agrarian in outlook and tradition, districts like Gopalganj are difficult terrain for cultivation, with scarcity of water and electricity, coupled with droughts and floods.

“Cattle rearing is something which is neither seasonal, nor gets affected by drought or floods. If farmers also rear cows, along with farming, not only can they sell the milk and earn minimum Rs200 per day, but also pool in that money and educate their children,’’ says Kumar.

Likewise, Singh says in Sonepat, he wants the women folk to become self-sufficient and financially independent, so that they gain confidence and raise voices against social evils such as dowry, and female infanticide, which are rampant in Haryana.

“I plan to start a Gram Samaj, an association that will teach cloth making, specially spinning khadi on a charkha to the rural women, so that they can earn some money. I will convince these women then to start spreading awareness against practices such as dowry and infanticide,” says Singh.
He has already made video clips and presentations on his project and is
lobbying for an audience with the Haryana government.

Both the projects are simple to execute, requiring not much financial investment.

Kumar and Singh, who are pursuing a masters programme in government at the MIT School of Government in Pune, say they will use their education, which teaches them the functioning of the political establishment right from the panchyat to the parliament level, to create their social ventures at the grassroots level.

“We are already keyed in to the problems faced by our villagers with whom we have lived all our lives. Now we will get the much needed confidence and exposure to actually implement our ideas into successful projects,” says Singh.