By HH Mohrmen
More often than not we hear murmurs over the lack of development in the rural areas and the complaints are not unfounded. There is indeed much left to be done in villages of the State. Villages in the state are a neglected lot is a common refrain but this can change if we have a proactive District Rural Development Agency (DRDA) at the District level. Change can happen if government officials do not confine themselves to a work schedule of 10am to 5pm, but instead go an extra mile if need be to complete the job. More importantly we can bring change only when we have people at the helm of thing who think out of the box, to achieve the goal.
West Jaintia Hills District (WJHD) is one of the eleven districts of the state which came into existence after the erstwhile Jaintia hills district was bifurcated into East and West Jaintia hills on July 31, 2012. WJHD with Jowai as its headquarter has an area of 1693 square kilometers and it is bounded by Assam in the North, East Jaintia Hills in the East, East Khasi Hills in the West and Bangladesh to the South. The district comprises of one civil subdivision that is Amlarem and three Community and Rural Development Blocks, namely Amlarem, Laskein and Thadlaskein.
As per the last census the District has a total population of 2, 70,352 of which 1, 34,406 are males and 1, 35,946 are females and the density of population is 159.69 per square kilometre. It is believed that the total population of the district has now crossed the 3,00,000 mark and only 63.23 % of the people are literate. The district is therefore ranked as one of the most illiterate in the state.
Talking about development there are no dearth of schemes and projects at the state or the country designed at improving the lives and the economy of the people in the rural areas. But the problem is to arrive at the correct methodologies to implement the same so that it reaches and benefits the people for whom the plans or projects are intended for. The state on its own already has various missions like mission on agriculture, horticulture, pisci-culture, apiculture, green campaign and others, but the big question is whether it reaches its intended targets or not.
The crux of the matter is the delivery mechanism which is used by the respective DRDA to reach its targets. One such mechanism used is the convergence of different government schemes wherever it is feasible. Earlier departments implemented their programmes in silos and there were cases where only certain individuals received all the benefits provided by various departments. Now with the implementation of MGNREGA the Village Employment Committee (VEC) using Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) method identified the 20 poorest of the poor in the community known as Bottom -20. This is the concept introduced by State Rural Employment Society (SRES) and the goal is that the B-20 will come out of poverty in 3 years time.
It is a known fact that MNREGA has had a huge impact on the villages which have successfully implemented the scheme, and it was a pleasant surprise to see in the newspaper that now Universities have awarded PhD to scholars who researched on the implementation of the scheme. MGNREGA is therefore a game changer and the successful implementation of MGNREGA in WJHD was because of the vision to bring the government to the doorstep of the villagers by using MGNREGA as the rim and the grease which help move the wheel of progress in the villages. This is an innovative idea which the DRDA in the district devised to help different government departments and agencies to work together to achieve maximum benefit to the target groups.
The foundation of this vision was at the grass roots level when villages (represented by their VECs) come up with their own mission statement which is also part of the implementation of MGNREGA. Each village particularly the award winning VECs are encouraged to start a Knowledge Resource Centre (KRC) of their own which will document stories related to the village and also serve as village library.
The KRC also have in its custody village resource maps which provide detailed information on the resources available in the village which they have to prepare as part of the implementation of MGNREGA program. And the resource map can be used by different departments for reference in effective implementation of their respective schemes and projects. Under MGNREGA all VECs are expected to prepare a shelf of projects for 3 years and a perspective plan for 5 years but the DRDA WJHD went one step further by conducting regular block, cluster and VEC level meetings for better planning, evaluation monitoring and implementation of the schemes.
If DRDA is the hub of the wheel of progress in the rural areas then the office of the respective Block Development Officers is like an axle which holds the two wheels together because everything happens at the Block level. To ensure smooth and speedy implementation of the various government schemes and project, DRDA WJHD introduced a face time concept in which the BDO interacts with all MGNREGA, PMAY, NRLM and line departments every Tuesday.
To create livelihood opportunity for the villagers MGNREGA was converged with the Meghalaya State Livestock Mission (MSLM) and the District has achieved 100% of the target to construct 4348 sheds for the year ending 2017-18. In an effort to achieve the twin objectives of going organic and creating livelihoods in the community, MGNREGA was converged with Integrated Basin Development and Livelihood Program (IBDLP) and also with Agriculture and Horticulture Departments to train the farmers on 18-day composting. In a major achievement for the district, Laskein C&RD Block has recently supplied 10 tonnes of the compost it produced to Raj Bhavan, Shillong.
The other innovative idea of the DRDA is encouraging VECs to start community nurseries in convergence with the District Basin Development Unit, WJHD and they have not only been able to supply saplings for planting in the entire district but more importantly the saplings were indigenous trees, endemic to the area. The success of this project encouraged DRDA WJHD to replicate this idea and MGNREGA was converged with other departments like Soil and Water Conservation, Water Resources, Agriculture and Horticulture to start community nurseries for planting of fruit trees, spices, agriculture crop and even coffee.
Different government departments organise awareness about the various schemes and projects at their own convenience, but now they are encouraged have inter-departmental interaction; to coordinate with each other and jointly organise their programs with the VECs so as to save time and resources for both the government and the community. To ensure inter-department cooperation a district level implementing agency was instituted in which the DC is the chairman and is assisted by the Project Director DRDA and District Planning officer and all district heads of various departments as members of the committee. The BDOs are chairpersons of the meeting at the block level.
The other unique effort made by the DRDA WJHD is to have a thumb-impression-free muster roll and it was successfully implemented by Amlari Model VEC which is under Amlarem sub division. The idea is to indentify beneficiaries of government scheme who still use thumb impressions and the VECs are tasked with the job of mobilising teachers or youth to help teach them basic skills like writing names, filling up forms and reading newspapers. To achieve this objective MGNREGA is converged with the Education Department and the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan (SSA) wherein teachers and even students and youths are encouraged to voluntarily help teach the beneficiaries to at least learn how to sign their names.
The DRDA WJHD through its Project Director has been able to give a sense of direction to all the different departments working for rural development in the district. Like a hub it has helped move the wheels of progress by making departments realise that they all work for the same purpose and they need to work together.
No wonder DRDA WJHD was the only district from the State to receive the Award for effective implementation of MRNREGA from the Ministry of Rural development this September 2018. In the 9 categories of awards only Meghalaya represented by DRDA WJHD and Mizoram received awards this year from the entire North Eastern region. In a major achievement, it is calculated that the district will receive an amount Rs. 92,96,23,200 (a little less than one hundred crore) for the implementation MGNREGA this financial year. This is possible because DRDA is like a well- oiled hub which helps move the wheels of rural development in the district.