IMPRESSIONS - Chetan

 

Impressions from Chinna Shodha Yatra 21
Chetan Jakkoju, chetan.j9@gmail.com
Chinna Shodha yatra-21 was executed for three days in villages of Guntur District.

Amazing Brigadier
I was amazed by the zeal of Brigadier to walk without no rest. He never sits and
he always talks and he drinks little or no water. Loves to have 2-3 cups of tea 3 times a
day. Most of the yatris there (including me) wanted to take rest for a while, sit and relax
but not him. It is very inspiring and I’m lucky to meet such a person.

When I first met Brigadier I got a chance to speak with him alone. I was surprised by the
fact that he remembered my professional details and healso remembered that I’m from
IIIT-H. There are around 30 yatris. This is very good thing and I learnt to remember the
specific details about people we meet in life. He said that he was in military for 35 years,
We spoke about Kargil war 1999.

Brigadier asked me about my current work that I do and I did say that i was working in
the field of Artificial Intelligence, in which we make smarter machines for huge
corporations, thereby reducing the amount of people required to perform a particular job.
He started an interesting debate saying that if I was helping corporations reduce its
man-power, wasn’t I harming people by taking away their jobs? I did have this doubt
previously, and I thought i was helping people in a way. He said that any innovation
should help more people and not the huge corporations.

Thanks to beautiful nature
I should thank nature for being so pleasant all the days. I got to see beautiful
sunset among the green and golden fields with cold breezes often hitting our faces. I
also got to see small ponds at the time of sunset, which made me feel strongly
connected to nature. Walks at the darkest of nights were a bit scary yet the combination
of cold weather and friends made the whole experience gracious.

Meeting co-yatris
Most of my friends are some way or the other are related to electronics,
computers and software. It was a new experience to meet people from wide variety of
backgrounds and age-groups. I got to learn few things about agriculture and I realized
that the field of agriculture is gigantic! I thank each and every yatri for participating in the
yatra.

Ideas from school children
Experience with Brigadier and Akhila talking to kids in classroom was pretty new.
I like the fact that children were so much engaged in classroom and they were pretty
spontaneous in answering tough questions asked by brigadier. Its funny, I realized later
that even I was engaged in it and started participating with them. The perspective of
children is so new and original. I do agree with Brigadier that we should follow a system
where children say what is missing in country and governments and corporates should
implement and execute them. Akhila’s game of idli ,dosa ,vada, coffee and tea was
pretty interesting. I thank her for making the children and co-yatris laugh. It was lovely
experience to talk and engage with kids - pure innocence and fresh perspectives.

Interesting perspectives on Development in rural setting
Early in the morning, Brigadier asked every yatri to come up with their thoughts
on the “meaning of development in the villages” by the evening. There was discussion
on this topic in the evening. It’s amazing to see so many perspectives on this topic. Few
perspectives stuck in my mind are:

1) Make the right use of technology to make money from agriculture comparable to
the average wages in cities. This reduces the movement of people from villages
to cities, and also people in villages would be comparably rich.
2) Funny yet true, some person who stays in village said that development would
make people in villages lazy.
3) Another interesting perspective where development is equated to success and in
another perspective development is equated to happiness.

Herbal healers conference
In the afternoon, Brigadier was talking about the conference that was conducted
in Hyderabad for herbal healers from AP. I was really amazed to know that 60 patents
were recognized. And also 30 more patents from another area. This clearly does prove
that there is lot of innovation happening within villages, which can help the lives of lot of
people in the world. Really glad to know that this is one of the main motives of
Palle-srujana.

Experience with scorpion
It was around 8 AM in the morning and I was lucky to get a slot for bathing in one
of school’s bathroom. I personally didn’t know anything about scorpion's apart from the
fact that they are poisonous. I went inside the bathroom and I saw a scorpion. It was light
brown in color and seems it is adjusting its posture for better comfort. I didn’t really feel
threatened by it, hence I continued to take bath with eyes on the scorpion. After the bath
one of the yatris went inside the bathroom to take out the scorpion from the bathroom
and said that, it was the biggest scorpion he has seen his entire life and I had a great
experience of feeling scared and lucky at the same time.

Three old ladies
On the way, we met three old ladies, who were in their early 60’s and seem tired
from walking. Upon enquiring, they said that they walked around 2km to collect their
pension of rupees 1000/- per month. I was little moved to know that they don’t have any
other source of income and they have to make their living with just Rs 1000/- per month.
One of the lady’s situation is very much moving, she said that her husband and all her
children are dead, though she was bit sad about their deaths for a very brief movement,
she started smiling back at us. Very glad to meet such a brave woman with a innocent
smile.

Great teacher: Pothu raju gaaru.
It's a great honour to meet Mr Pothu Raju, he is 100% whole heartedly dedicated
to teaching. He is modest, down to earth and successful teacher that I have seen in the
whole yatra and in recent past. I particularly remember his answer to the question “How
he creates interests on subjects and also makes sure that students follow up on all
subjects”. He said that before even beginning to teach any chapter of any subject, he
starts with its uses in practical world that a child can understand. This was missing when
I was in school and felt really glad that he follows this. He also said that sometimes,
repetition and special classes to students are mandatory for overall improvement.

Extreme conditions lead to innovations
At one moment, Brigadier was talking about how extreme conditions lead to
better innovations. I didn't realize this fact earlier. But I saw a real example in my own life
at a young age. We used to visit my father’s village in summers. It was so hot in that
village and only few people could afford an air-cooler. I went to a poor farmers home and
was stunned that he “hacked” and made his own cooler with the help of table fan and
wet-cloth behind it.

There is innovator in everyone of us
This is a small incident happened within the yatra. Every day after taking bath,
we used to have around 20 mins of time to “dry” our towels. Since my towel being a bit
thick one, it does require more time to dry. I was actually scouting for a better way to dry
it. After careful thinking I found a place for drying my towel using stones on two poles in
the middle of the ground with abundant sunlight. I was amazed at my own
quick-and-dirty innovation. Though this is a very small example. I do believe that when
necessity arrives, each and everyone of us can innovate.

Some harsh truth revealed by farmer
We were speaking to one of the farmers on the last day of the trip. He offered us
oranges from his home grown trees and was explaining us that they are grown with zero
pesticides. I thought that was not a great thing. Later he went on to explain that every
farmer does use lot of pesticides and that is the only way they could ever make profit. He
gave a statistic that, in cities an average person consumes roughly 2 KG of pesticides
per annum. He also warned us to cook and eat at home compared to eating in hotels. I
was shocked and sad to know that we have no option but consume a lot of pesticides.
Wish there was a device which can detect the amount of pesticides in a particular dish
before consuming it. We have to contact Narsimha perhaps.

Conclusion
To conclude, it was an amazing learning experience for me. I know about villages
previously yet i did learn new things from the trip. Which reminds me of quote “Every trip has
new experience”. For people who never visited villages, it would have been even more impactful
experience. Would love to participate in the coming yatras and if possible would invite few
friends of mine. I would also like to explore entrepreneurial opportunities in future with Palle
srujana. I hate to see innovations go in vain. Given opportunity, I would love to meet great
personalities like Narasimha and also have a look at his workshop I thank everyone once again.

Cheers,
Chetan