SHG promotes labour sharing activity among farmers

There were the days where villagers used to come together and share the community activities in marriage, farming and other social activities. In similar, Bandhu Self Help Group is on a mission to over come the short of labourers in farming activity by engaging small and marginal farmers on labour sharing activity, where finding labours for agricultural activities is challenging task.

Pragathi Bandhu, a pioneer project of Sri Kshethra Dharmasthala Rural Development Project (SKDRDP) which has helped thousands of farmers in Mysore and Chamarajanagar districts through this programme.

From last three months SKDRDP is functioning in Mysore and Chamarajanagar and has to its credit 384 SHG's group with 1704 members (men) under Pragathi Bandhu and 12,420 Women Co-operative Societies with 1,50,000 members.

Mysore District Director Mahabala Kulal said that the scheme is getting popular in rural side gradually and has helped farmers very much in farming activity.

“Its compulsory every Monday a group of 8-10 farmers on a routine have to visit neighbourhood small farmer field and indulge in works like land leveling, house and shed construction, fencing, digging of wells, and many other farming activity.

“In the initial days, farmers opposed to work in others fields and after attending the awareness programmes their mindsets changed, and are getting convinced. The activities are very popular in Dakshina Kannada, Uttara Kannada, Udupi, Shimoga, Chikmagalur, Dharwad, Gadag,” he added.

Monthly once a group of farmers will be sent on Research Tour for other districts to share, learn and adopt the farming activity of other districts. Which will be indeed helpful for them to share the farming activity and learn new things. Farmers will also be engaged in social empowerment, transfer of agriculture technology through various extension activities, taking up farm mechanisation, new and varied cropping,

Apart this, three to five year farm plan will be prepared for implementation of various development activities like agriculture and allied activities, irrigation, and infrastructure. The required finance for these activities are mobilised through weekly savings which are distributed amongst the members as credit and redistribution of funds borrowed from the financing banks.

SKDRDP in district is intending to form many groups in coming days and implement several activities like the Pragathinidhi (micro finance), transfer of technology, social forestry, watershed activities, eco friendly energy programme and much more.

“From last two months I have attained four labour activity programmes. Officials provide tips on various issues including how to handle the situation during drought time,” says HD Kote Farmer Siddharaju.

Another farmer Kondiaha said that the programme is building good relationship with nieghbourhood farmers and strengthening their bond.

Biogas plant inauguration at Mysore Zoo next month

Starting next month, the cooking bill of Chamarajendra Zoological Gardens is all set to become slimmer as the bio-gas plant will become operartional. The Zoo requires around 30 LPG cylinders every month to cook food for the animals and once the new facility is in place then it stop using LPG cylinders saving Rs 13,000 every month.

The capacity of the proposed Biogas Plant to handle organic and bio-degradable wastes 1500 kg, while the zoo is already generating around 500 kg of animal and kitchen wastes daily. By just utilizing the wastes produced by the elephants and buffalos enough gaseous fuel will be generated to meet the demands of cooking.

Karnataka Zoo Authority Chairman Nanjundaswamy informed that the work has reached the finishing stage and will be ready for inauguration by next month. The generated fuel will be fed directly to the kitchen through pipes thereby reducing the usage of LPG.

Assistant Engineer Nagendrappa said that every month they need around 30 cylinders costing around Rs 13,000 which can be saved substantially if the bio-fuel generated in house is also made use of. “As the animal wastes and water are mixed in equal percentages (50:50), the resulting gas generated is quite sufficient", he added.

The cost of the project is Rs 20 lakh of which Rs 18 lakh will be funded by Mysore City Corporation under JNNURM and the remaining Rs 2 lakh will be borne by Zoo. The project is being overseen and implemented by National Institute of Engineering-Center for Renewable Energy and Sustainable Technologies (NIE-CREST) and the technology is developed by Babha

Atomic Research Centre. (BARC)

Drinking Water Facility

To ease the drinking water problem at Zoo, the authorities are setting up

drinking water tanks at three places. Even, water purification is done to

provide safe drinking water, which are also being readied by this month end.

  

Nonagenarian pens book on freedom struggle

The books have been published in Kannada, English, Hindi laungauges and will be translated into Marathi and Gujarati shortly.

Express News Service

Mysore, August 16

As age passes by losing memory is a common sight. But, here is a nonagenarian who has penned a book at the age of 90, recollecting the days of struggle for India’s freedom, which is indeed a daunting task.

Being a freedom fighter Somaling Appanna Malagali, a native of Belgaum has brought out the book 'History of Indian Freedom Struggle and Gandhi', in Kannada, English, Hindi languages and will be translated into Marathi and Gujarati shortly.

He has gathered information about freedom fighters and social reformers since from 2006, by visiting Chennai, Kolkata, Delhi, Varda Ashrama, Sabarmathi Ashram, and many other places. He has even referred books on freedom fighters before writing the book and has published about rare 50 photographs in the book.

The books which starts with Jhanxi Lakshmi Bai chronicles ends with Gandhi struggle, and life history, movement struggle of Subhaschandra Bose, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sepaigala Kranthi (revolution of Sepais), Vallabahai Patel, Swami Vivekananda, Bhagat Singh, Veersavarkar, Tippu Sultan, Lokmanya Balagangadhar Tilak, Bengali Sanyasis, have been described in the book.

The wars of Independence – A bird Eye views, Freedom fighters of 18^th and 19^th century, All India National Congress, unique incidents of Sabrmati and Sevegram Ashram have been published in the book.

Somalinga Appanna said that “Gandhiji visited Udali District in 1937 and later Gandhi Bhavan was constructed in the place to mark his memory. During the time about 25 photographs of Gandhi were exhibited on the hall. But, due to rain the photos washed out and I was deep hurted by the incident. Later, I decided to bring back the glory, and started collecting the information about freedom fighters.”

Appanna has been jailed two times during times of Independence and he has meet Gandhiji twice at his Sabarmati Ashrama in 1944- 45. Achut Ramchandra Vadalli, an executive engineer has helped Appanna in his journey. Gandhian H Gangadharan released the book in Mysore on Friday.  

Intake of students at Maharani College exceeds two fold

It seems like in government colleges no rules and guidelines are applicable. The intake of a students for a class at Maharanai Women's Art and Commerce College has exceeded two fold, than the sanctioned strength for a class.

The College can accommodate about 2300 students, whereas now there are more than 4800 students. According to University of Mysore Affiliation maximum of 990 children for BA, 420 children for BCom, 180 for BBM can be enrolled. Whereas, so far 1027 have been enrolled for BA, 625 for Bcom and 225 for BBM and admission are still going on. In spite of this over crowding, with the announcement of Supplementary results another 250 candidates are still underscore to join for college.  

Being more generous for admission, the students are facing lot of problems due to lack of infrastructure and faculty. Girls were seen forcibly accommodating themselves for every bench 5-7 members. They even don’t have toilet facility, and rooms are not cleaned and lack hygiene.

In the available 57 class rooms, Arts, Commerce, Bcom, BBM, MCom, MSc, MA PG classes are conducted periodically for students. The government has also not taken any measures to provide basic infrastructure, in spite of ever increasing admission year to year.

Consequently, the hostel are full and over crowd. The capacity in hostel is 200, whereas 475 students have been accommodated. Due to lack of space the beds are placed vertically one above the above and in one row 4-5 girls sleep.
“Food and shelter are manageable. But due to shortage of lecturers we spend most of the time outside,” says student Rashmi.

College Principal Prof KS Lakshmana Gowda said that the strength has increased terribly and there is a government order to provide seats for students who seek admission. Guest faculty lecturers will be appointed shortly, and the interview will be held today (Thursday).

Admitting the increase in strength has lead to multiple problems, he said after the announcement of supplementary results, the intake has much more increased and  there is a huge demand for admission to the graduates courses in the Arts, Commerce stream.

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The city's famous Maharanai Women's Art and Commerce College is imparting education since 97 years for girls. Though there are other four government first grade colleges, the college holds first place. Being situated in heart of the city,   college attracts students from across State, in which majority of them are form Mysore, Mandya, Hassan, Chamarajanagar, Chikamangalore and Kodagu.

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Due to lack of funds book purchase has been minimised by District library

About 250 libraries don’t have basic facilities in district

With the intention of providing open access of information for public,  specially students residing in rural ares, Public Libraries were started at every gram Panchayat. But, unfortunately the situation in Mysore Library are in a very deplorable condition.

In one side rural side libraries don’t have sufficient books, while in other side City libraries are not been updated with new books, due to lack of funds. In total 276 libraries comes under District Central Library (250) and City Central Library (26).  In which, about 250 libraries don’t have basic facilities like water, sanitation and light.

In another side there is a drastic decline in footfalls of readers to libraries.
Mysore district with the population of 26.41 lakhs, the members in the libraries are 89,451. In which 45,800 come under City Central Library

Some of the readers claim that the books are very old and are not being updated from long time. 'Majority of the books are novels, literature’s. Measures should be taken to update the books and keep academic related books in more number,' says regular reader Ravi.

Deputy Director of public libraries B Manjunath who admitted the books are old and some are not in readable conditions said that due to lack of funds they have minimised the purchase of books.

'Corporation has not cleared us the CESS amont of Rs 7 crore from which majority of the library works are pending. If the officials provide us the money, measures will be taken to provide basic facilities at Libraries and replace some of the old books.'
 
He also said that Gram Panchayat, Town Panchayat members have to take initiative of providing basic facilities for the libraries in rural side with the collected CESS money.

New building for District Central Libray

The District Central office will be having its own building shortly at Saraswathipuram. The other libraries which have own premises are
Periyapatna, Hunsur, KR Nagar, HD Kote Taluk Library branches and
Marballi, Turaganur, Tagadur, Bedarahalli, and Singavaranahalli. Construction work for the two libraries at Hadinaru, Doodaragowdahalli are under way.

Two libraries which comes under city central library (JP Nagar and Vivekananda Nagar) in city have been shifted to new building and measures have been taken for renovation of Saraswathipuram and Kuvempunagar libraries.  

Lady conductors are ogled, groped in buses

The Wednesday's incident of a passenger behaving indecently with a KSRTC lady conductor is just a tip of an iceberg. The fair sex who not so long ago made their entry into the male dominated profession have been silently suffering such treatment day in and day out.

When, Express spoke to some of the lady conductors in the backdrop of the Wednesday’s incident, they uncovered several shocking facts. They say men usually take disadvantage of the crowded bus to molest them. More shocking is that the elderly passengers misbehave more than youngsters. Most of them address them singularly while some use vulgar language, which is a nightmare for them.

“Sitting in the last row of the buses, it is common for group of boys to pass cheap comments, watch obscene photos in newspapers and magazines in front of us. As my bus driver was not friendly, he never bothered what I pass through. But, my other colleagues asked me to face the situations boldly. Later, I handled the situation by collecting the tickets before they get into the bus. So that, my problems was solved,” says one of the lady conductor who dint wished to be named.

“Some passengers deliberately stand near the entrance of the bus door, blocking our way. While some others intentionally climb buses with lady conductor. There are many incidents where women have left the job, not revealing the genuine reasons. Left with no other option we do our duty by not taking such incidents seriously as it is a question of our bread and butter,” says another conductor.

“Though we do our service sincerely to eke out our livelihood, people should understand our helplessness and co-operate with us. They should not look down upon us in low esteem,” says Amrutha, lady conductor who is serving from past 8 years.

“When I was conductor on the Hebbal route, a passenger used to wait for hours to board my bus. Intentionally, he used to give me change of Rs 1, Rs 2, one after just to touch my hands. In spite of I warning him, his torture took such an ugly turn that I had to change my bus route itself for some time,” says Veena (name changed) another lady conductor.

KSRTC Divisional Controller (Urban) MN Srinivas said that “women oftenly complain about the misconduct of passengers while issuing change. Unless they give written complaint, no action can be taken.” KSRTC Divisional Controller Naveen (Rural) said that no such complaints has been reported.

While, 98 women conductors are working from both divisions. Since 2005, 16 women have left job (rural), while its 3 from from last three years (urban).

Only 3 sewage cleaning machines for 9 lakh population

Though it might sound a bit strange, yet its a fact. To clean the city's sewage and manholes, Mysore City Corporation (MCC) has only three drainage cleaning machines (jetting machines) besides ten automated sewer cleaning rodding machines.

The three drainage cleaning machines, which have both blowing and sucking features are driven all over city to clean the sewage pipes and remove blockages. The machines are used for cleaning manholes, a jet of water pumped at high pressure through a long hose pipe to clear the blockages while another pipe sucks up the dislodged debris.

While one was bought wayback in 2001 (4,000 liter capacity), the remaining two were purchased in 2009, which cost around Rs 40 lakh for each are of 8,000 liter capacity. Of the 10 rodding machines, two have been provided for Zone 9, while the remaining zones with one each. The machines cost around Rs 50,000 for each.

With daily around 90-130 complaints being registered from 65 wards, with population around 9 lakh, it has become challenging task for the workers to attend all the complaints. Specially, during rainy season, its an unimaginable thing how workers manage to clean the city's drainage. According to sources from Corporation, they are failing to attend all the complaints in a day, and they attend the complaints in next two-three days.

Corporation's Junior Engineer Kempegowda said a proposal to purchase two additional sewage cleaning machines and four D-silt cleaning machines (which is already in the possession of Bangalore Corporation) was submitted to former Corporation Commissioner KS Raikar and the same proposal made once again to the new Commissioner, but so far no action has been initiated.
 
Mayor Rajeshwari said that plans have been made for machines under 13th finance plan.

Suttur Mutt: A new ray of hope for children of lesser god

They had never dreamed of going to schools, or indulging in sports and cultural activities, nor learning other languages. What they just knew was to rush forest and create handicrafts in whatever raw materials they obtain. Thanks for the initiative of JSS Mahavidyapeeta Suttur Mutt, which is tracing out such children of lesser god and bring the children into the mainstream of society by imparting free education.

Now, the Mutt is slowly gaining popularity in north-eastern parts of India too, only through word of mouth. In which, the strength of north-eastern children in the Mutt was around 40 in 2002, while down the year the strength has steadily increased to 320. Children from Meghalaya, Manipur, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Maharashtra are studying here in different levels.

Hailing from poor families, some children are orphan, while some or single parent. Apart from retaining their culture, the children are imbibed with our culture and traditions and have learnt to enchant vachans, bhajans in Kannada.
The children will be provided with free shelter, food, education and medical treatment. They will be also entitled for various government facilities.

In total, including both boys and girls around 4,000 children have been accommodated here. In which, 118 children from Meghalaya and 55 from Manipur are studying in JSS Akkamahadevi Girls Hostel, Suttur Mutt and  hundreds of boys have been accommodated at JSS Basaveshwara Boys Hostel from various part of State.

JSS Institution Suttur Mutt Co-ordinator Tripuranthaka said that “already being economically-socially backward, there is no proper education facilities in north-eastern parts of India. Even more number of tribal reside there. Hence, the children are brought here with the help of various organisations and are being educated at Mutt.”

Teacher Nirmala says, the children are very talented in cultural, sports, debate competition. They have took part in many state-level competitions and have bagged many prizes. Even they are non-vegetarians, after joining Mutt, they have adopted our tradition and culture.'

“We were not aware of any other languages, when we came here. But now, I know Kannada, English, Hindi, said Sphishisya of Meghalaya, who desires to become doctor.

About Mutt
Suttur Mutt which is popular world-wide for its philanthropist service activities. The hostel facility was established in 2001 and was inaugurated by former President Dr APJ Abdul Kalam. It was the dream of His Holiness Jagadguru late Dr Sri Shivarathri Rajendra Mahaswamiji to begin pre-school in Suttur. The dream was fulfilled by present Suttur Seer Sri Shivaratri Deshikendra Swamiji. Now, there are about 300 education institutions across Karnataka under JSS Mahavidyapeetha. For orphan children free education will be provided upto Higher Education.

Shortage of Madilu kits in the district

In order to provide basic post-natal care to both mother and the new born baby, the State Government come out with an ambitious plan of supplying 'Madilu Kits' to mothers delivering babies.
But these kits are in short supply in the district, with increase in the number of new born babies. According to sources the shortfall is sometimes an alarming around 40 per cent which means that for every 100 births only around 60 people get the kits and the rest are sent away empty handed.

Under Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY), when a women get conceived she will be provided with mother card in the PHC's. The card will be provided for both above poverty line families and below poverty line families, in which free treatment will be provided till the child completes 30 days. But, Madilu Kit will be provided only for the below poverty line families, who deliver babies in government hospital.

According to sources from KR Hospital Health Care Workers, since February they have supplied 650 madilu kit, and from May the supply of Kit has been stopped and the beneficiaries are sent empty hand.

The officer say, 'per month 1,000 of children take birth in hospital, in which above 60 per cent them belong to BPL families. Withing 30 days the card holder should collect the kit. Due to acute shortage of supply, with no other way we are sending the mother-children in empty hands.'

District Health Officer Dr SM Malegowda acclaims that there is no shortage of Kit, but the supply has been stopped since May. He said by this week they will distributing the kit.

When contacted District Nursing Officer Hosamani her answers were quite deteriorating. She said “as we doctors are protesting, until our demands are fulfilled we will be not reporting anything to the doctors. From May we have not supplied the kits.”

The kit consisting of 19 essential items like Mosquito curtain, carpet, bedsheet,  blanket for mother, Bathing Soap, Washing soap, Cloth to tie abdomen of mother, Sanitary pads, Comb and coconut oil, Towel, Tooth paste and brush, bed spread over rubber sheet for the baby, Diaper, Baby vest, Sweater, cap and socks for baby, One plastic kit bag and much more.

BJP’s ambitious Bhagyalakshmi scheme grounded

No bonds issued in last two and half years

The BJP government got its third Chief Minister in four years on Thursday. But one of its ambitious programme – Bhagyalakshmi, launched with much fanfare during its first year of rulke, has failed to take off since more than last two and half years.

In Mysore district alone, 10,518 applications are pending due to lack of funding and support by the government. The programme seeks to provide financial security to girl children hailing from economically weaker sections, where Rs 1 lakh bond will be given in the name of newborn girl child which she can encash on attaining 18 years.

According to sources in the Women and Child Welfare Department not only in Mysore, many other districts in the State to are also waiting for the bond.

Moreover, even the applications of those who do not have permanent BPL cards are being rejected. This inspite of the Food and Civil Supplies having stopped issuing permanent cards since several months. This has resulted in drastic decline of number in registrations for the bonds. While in 2008-09 about 17,093 got bonds, the numbers fell to 15,591 in 2009-10; 13,614 in 2010-11. But in 2011-12 only 5,240 have registered their names, which is less than 40 percent of the previous year.

Women and Child Welfare Department Deputy Director NR Vijay said that the
reason for sharp decline in number is that most of the families don't own permanent BPL Cards.  Earlier based on Income Tax certificates, BPL families were getting bonds. Later a circular said that bonds can’t be issued based on temporary BPL cards and income tax certificate.

Mangala says, “there is lot of confusion to obtain bond. We are fed up approaching offices to obtain permanent BPL card. Gopvernment should provide bonds based on Income Certificate, if not let it withdraw the scheme.”

Food and Civil Supplies Assistant Director Devaiah said that “the process of providing permanent card is on and about 50 franchisee are working across district from past one week. Shortly permanent cards will be issued for all those hold temporary card.”

DDMP have not been updated from many districts in State

As per the Disaster Management Act 2005, it is mandatory to prepare and revise the District Disaster Management Plan (DDMP) of each district in the state on yearly basis, has not been updated from past two years from many districts in State.

These plans aims to continuous and integrated process of planning, organizing, coordinating and implementing measures which are necessary at district level to manage any kind disaster situations.

According to the statistics provided by the State Disaster Management Authority (SDMA) only Mandya, Bijapur, Bagalkot and Raichur have updated the plan and other districts are in the process of reviewing the plans for the year 2012-13.

As per the Disaster Management Act 2005, once the plan is prepared, it has to be reviewed annually. But many of the district administration have not taken any measures to update the plan. The officials in the SDMA are writing letters reminding the officials to update the plan.

These plans are aiming to identify hazards, vulnerability and risk involves in the districts based on which proper planning needs to prepare considering cyclic process of disaster management such as mitigation, preparedness, response and rehabilitation. And also create awareness among community/public about risks involved with different disasters and measures to be taken in the respective locations. Hence it is very much essential to timely review and update DDMPs of the entire district to reduce the disaster risks.

Dr R Dharmaraju of Center for Disaster Management (CDM) at Administrative Training Institute Mysore said that as per the guidelines provided in the Disaster Management Act, consultative workshops have been conducted in all the districts in the state for preparation of DDMPs by CDM. Now all the districts have District Disaster Management Plan and further it is the responsibility of the district administrations to review the plans every year.

Even DDMP of Mysore have not been updated from past two years. When contacted Mysore District Deputy Commissioner PS Vastrad in this regard he said that measures will be taken to update the plan in the coming days. Meantime, the officials of SDMA claim that they are in a better position in implementation of Disaster Management Act.

Cops continue to be humiliated from their bosses

Compared to earlier days, today more number of highly qualified such as Degree, Post-Graduate and even Ph.D holders are joining the Police Department. Without breaking the tradition, even now top officers continue to order their juniors to do works like fetching vegetables from the market, drop children to schools, supply coffee and tea to visitors at the Police station, the situation becomes humiliating for these highly qualified junior officers.

It seems like Police Department which stands first for discipline is also notorious for harassment meted out to its staff. In spite of adopting a slew of measures to modernize the department, hundreds of Police personnel in the lower cadre are suffering silently the dominance meted out from the top officials.

A few PCs (Police Constables) and Head Constables sharing their bitter experiences with the Express on condition of anonymity, alleged that they are being harassed more by Sub-Inspectors and not from other higher officials.

“We are addressed singularly without due respect, some times calling us with filthy language. If we dare to reply back, the senior official threaten to file an adverse report about us, forcing  us to keep quiet. We often get the feeling why we joined this department for suffering this inhuman treatment ,” says another constable who has been assigned by his senior to drop children to their schools daily.

“I joined the Department with lofty dreams of serving people. Only later, I realised the real situation is quite different. I was asked to serve tea to the accused visiting police station, facing criminal charges, with political connections. It was the biggest insult for me," says one Head Constable.

“We work round the clock. But, we are not allowed to take leaves, even at times of emergency in our families. Former DG and IGP Ajay Kumar Singh brought some reforms in the department for which we are very thankful for him,” said the Cops.

Ajay Kumar Singh said that “either its constable or any senior cop, every body is a Police and due respect should be given to subordinates'.