National Rural Livelihood Mission - Statement of Purpose

I have been deeply moved by the agrarian crises, the spate of suicides that consumed over two and a half lakhs farmers’ causing immense distress to the families. My thoughts also centred on food and environment security in coming years and our moral responsibility towards our children and coming generations, if this crises persisted.

Rather than just brood and fret about it, I decided to do something about it. In the year 2008, the first opportunity came to study the impact of a few projects of inclusive growth in the states of Kerala, Tamilnadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

The key finding of this study was that even as there were some attempts at inclusion of poor and deprived sections, there was concomitant process of systemic “exclusion” that was driving a much larger section of people into poverty and deprivation. For a long time, I wondered why people should bear with such an exploitative and extortionary system. Why were government and non-government programs focused on wider and sustainable development oblivious to this aspect?

The key challenges were pricing of farm and other primary produce in the rural areas and the kind of education and skill-building programs that children and youth were being subjected to. There was also the issue of social and cultural alienation of people educated in ways that drove them away from their roots. The pricing failed to cover the higher input costs, risks and uncertainties of rural production where as the education and skill development seemed to be at odds with their basic needs.

For the next 2 years, I was involved in the anti-corruption movement but that too was confined to Delhi. I did explore staying in a rural area for a period to study and understand the situation at the grassroots level. It was only in Feb. ’13 that the first opportunity to do so arose.

This was as a week-long workshop in a village called Govindpur khiri in Bijnaur district in Uttar Pradesh. This was addressed by noted expert on traditional socio-economic system in India Sh. Ravindra Sharma. This opened my eyes to an alternative development model that’s truly inclusive and sustainable unlike the current model. This also gave me an opportunity to stay and feel the beauty and richness of traditional village life and how it was being ruptured by misplaced notion of development.

A further opportunity came to stay in a village near Wardha in Vidarbha where I could reflect upon what I had learnt from Sh. Ravindra Sharma. I stayed for over a fortnight with the Kathiawadi cowherder community in a village called Tigaon-Amla. With meager resources, this community of about 40 people is able to look after about 400 Gir cows.

This is a hardworking community where women and children are integral to the overall work responsibilities. They supply valuable milk to the nearby town of Wardha. They follow natural breeding, keeping and pasturing practices as a result of which their cows are in good health and have fairly good milk productivity.

They migrated nearly 5 decades back to Vidarbha and other parts of Maharashtra. This is a close-knit traditional community that has stuck to its roots even as it has adapted reasonably well to local conditions. By the estimate of one of their elders, the number of Gir cows in Maharashtra reached a peak of 50lakhs about 10 years back and has since declined to 13 lakhs.   

Yet, because of Pricing and Education, the community faces a crises in various proportions. There are a variety of reasons due to which milk being a valuable and essential commodity in many households has not been able to find an appropriate price point.

First and foremost, as a perishable commodity with a shelf life of just a few hours and even less during long summer season, milk producers are at a loss. This also cannot be sold to faraway markets. The price distortion is forced upon them by the government machinery that administers the price of milk. In search of a stable customer base, the cowherder community which is already pressed for time and is under great stress due to depleting pastures, rising fodder costs, cost of living and the distraction of its younger generation who are under various pressure to move away from their traditional sources of livelihood.

So, when I assessed the situation on the ground, I advised them to process milk and to sell value added products such as butter and ghee, with longer shelf life. Butter and ghee, along with butter milk from this source, produced in a traditional way, fetches a high premium in markets both as medicine and food. There is also a medicinal market for cow urine and cow dung from this source, which could reduce their dependency on selling milk to buy fodder for cows.

This will also allow them to get a better price for their milk commensurate to the input costs, the efforts put in and the risks and uncertainties. Without that the younger people of the community are tempted to sell the calves and thus deplete their asset base for some easy money.

Ironically, the Education of these children and youth leaves a lot to be desired in learning appropriate skills and to enrich their lives. The more therefore “educated” they are, the more distracted they get to veer away from their traditional livelihoods. This is indeed a tricky issue of freedom of education and needs lots more attention.

During my stay, I explored how milk could be supplied to the adjoining village community, which I was told does not consume milk. The grapevine was that they would rather pay lots more for country liquor than pay for milk. It was also shared that their children were not adapted to taking milk. However, when I met up with the children in the village school, I found that the reality was very different than what was gossiped. The children did want milk and said so vocally in front of the principal and other prominent people of the village, who I accompanied. In fact, they did produce some milk in the village from the local Gavrani breed that sold at Rs. 40 per litres while the Kathiawadi community was selling milk more than 10 kms. away for Rs. 20 per litre.

The main reason for this distortion was lack of education and awareness about how locally available cow milk from the Gir cows could be a valuable source of nutrition for children, which that children asked for, but were denied because of cultural alienation.  

These were just some of my findings. Even as I had to cut back a detailed study and action to keep up with my family responsibilities in Ahmedabad. Yet, given an opportunity, I would like to work on increasing rural livelihood opportunities, productivity and the quality of life.

In course of my stay, I met with Smt. Sarada Muralidharan, COO of NRLM at a recent meeting in a nearby village in Pavanar. I am enthused that a program such as NRLM can bridge the gap in Pricing, Education as shared above and various others as we have come across. Many of these learning as studied.

With the recent meeting with Sh. Shravan Hardikar with my associate Col. Alok Asthana in Mumbai, I am enthused that NRLM in Maharashtra may be a good opportunity to work on this subject, so close to my heart. With well-designed leadership development and training programs, we could help the rural sector strengthens its roots as well as adapt to the modern idiom, in an assured manner.

We learnt in our schools that India lives in its villages. That message is finally coming home.