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INTRODUCTION:
Gyan Shodh is a journey for searching of knowledge,
creativity and invocations at grassroots as well as
understanding people and their lifestyle in rural
villages. It is very important to study the rural
lives for development of the nation. Gyan shodh is
not only for documentation of traditional knowledge,
Men, women and children of village are taken into
consideration equally to contribute to Gyan Shodh
and to the society.
NIF: The department of Science and Technology
help establish the National Innovation Foundation (NIF)
of India, on Feb 28th 2000 , with the main goal of
providing institutional support in scouting,
spawning, sustaining and scaling up grassroots green
innovations and helping their transition to self
supporting activities. The foundation has a
Governing Council chaired by Dr.R.A.Mashelkar,
Former director general CSIR and President Global
Research Alliance. Professor Anil K.Gupta, President
SRISTI and Professor Indian Institute of Management
Ahmadabad, is the Executive Vice chairperson of NIF.
For the last seventeen years the Honeybee Network
and Society for Research and Initiatives for
Sustainable Technologies and Institutions (SRISTI)
have been scouting innovations by farmers,
artisans,women, etc., at the grassroots level. The
main aim of NIF is to help India become an inventive
and creative society and a global leader ins
sustainable technologies without social and economic
handicaps affecting evolution and diffusion of green
grassroots innovations.
HONEYBEE NETWORK: The Honeybee Network
is the biggest network of grassroots creative and
experimenting farmers and artisans in the world. It
provides a voice of creative farmers, artisans and
grassroots innovators. The network identifies
creative unsung heroes of the society, supports,
rewards and facilitates the protection of their
work. Innovation augmentation and sustainability of
solution is core to the network philosophy. The
Network works with people working on sustainable
technologies based on traditional practices or
“green” innovations.
SRISTI: Sristi which means
creation, was born on 1993 essentially to support
the activities of the Honey Bee Network to respect,
recognize and reward the creativity at grassroots.
Based in Ahmadabad, Gujarat, SRISTI (Society for
Research and Initiatives for Sustainable
Technologies) is a registered charitable
organization that is devoted to empowering the
knowledge-rich economically poor people by adding
value in their contemporary creativity as well as
traditional knowledge. It has helped establish
GIAN,NIF, MVIF and AASTIIK. SRISTI was set up to
provide organizational support to the HBN. The
objectives were: systematically documenting,
disseminating and developing grassroots green
innovations, providing intellectual property rights
protection to grassroots innovators, working on the
in situ and ex situ conservation of local
biodiversity, and providing venture support to
grassroots innovators. SRISTI manages the Honey Bee
database of innovations, and supports the
publication of the Network’s Newsletter in three
languages, English, Hindi and Gujarati. Lately,
SRISTI has being focusing on more concerted ways of
hitherto neglected domains like women’s knowledge
systems, value addition through a natural product
laboratory, and innovations in education.
FIELD VISIT: NAARM (National Academy of
Agricultural Research Management) had taken
initiative to organize Gyan Shodh in collaboration
with NIF(National Innovation Foundation) and
Honeybee networks. We 16 students of Post Graduate
Diploma in intellectual Property and technology
Management in Agriculture (PGDIPTMA) of NAARM were
participated. 16 of us were divided into four
groups, each group consists of four. For Gyan Shodh
four villages were selected near to Dornala and each
group was allotted a village for scouting and
documenting Traditional Knowledge and invocations
(if any)
Dornala is a village and a Mandal in Prakasam
District in the State of Andhra Pradesh in India.
Gyan Shodh was held on 11th to 13th September, 2009.
The four villages which were part of Gyan Shodh are
mentioned below:
1. Pedda Manthala (22kmfrom Dornala)
2. Korraprolu (15km from Dornala)
3. Chintala(14 km form Dornala)
4. Thummala bayalu (17 km from Dornala)
Team members are:
• Amol Nalawade
• Nagababji Nepalle
• Purwa Rathi
• Sahida Kamri
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CHINTALA:
We four team members
visited Chintala, in Nallamala forest of Andhra
Pradesh. Chenchu tribes live in the village;
population is approximately 250. Their traditional
way of life has been based on hunting and gathering.
In general, the Chenchu relationship to nontribal
people has been largely symbiotic. Some Chenchus
have continued in collecting forest products for
sale to non-tribal people.
Culture:
The Chenchus are referred to as one of the Primitive
Tribal Groups that are still dependent on forests
and do not cultivate land but hunt for a living.
Caste Hindus living among them rent land from the
Chechus and pay a portion of the harvest. Dalits
also have settled among them with the help of of
Chenchus and learned agriculture from them,and the
nomadic Banjara herders who graze their cattle in
the forest also have been allotted lane there. The
Chenchus have responded unenthusiastically to
government efforts to induce them to take up farming
themselves. Because of their long association with
Hindu hermits and their refusal to eat beef, Chechus
are considered an unpolluted group by caste Hindus.
People have lots of livestock such as cattle, goat,
sheep, hen etc.,
OBJECTIVES OF GYAN
SHODH:
Gyan Shodh, as a major scouting, networking and
dissemination program, was being carried out with
the following objectives:
1. To know the culture of the villagers and their
way of living by meeting oldest man and women of the
village, sharing our knowledge and feelings to them.
2. to learn about the experiences of the farmers
engaged in organic farming and inform other farmers
about the same.
3. to document their traditional herbal practice and
how they mange with natural calamities.
4. to know vast Biodiversity of Nallamal Forest.
5. to know process their way of hunting and
gathering goods from the forest.
6. to encourage the curiosity of the children about
variety in organic farming and to discover the
knowledge of bio and crop diversity among rural
people.
7. to meet the people who solve their problems
through their presence of mind and inborn ability,
store their knowledge and felicitate them.
8. to compile and disseminate the knowledge, which
is fast disappearing and establish a dialogue
between the old generation and future generation
9. to know the recipes which are adopted by the
villagers and their food habits.
10. to identify the talents and knowledge of the
children of the village.
PURPOSE OF GYAN
SHODH:
Gyan Shodh was first time done by NAARM. We had
completed Gyan shodh successfully with the following
purpose.
• To build linkages between excellence in formal
scientific systems and informal knowledge systems
and create knowledge network to link various
stakeholders through application of information
technology and other means.
• To promote wider social awareness, and possible
applications, of the know-how generated as a result
of these initiatives in commercial or social spheres
and encourage its incorporation in educational
curriculum, developmental policies and programs.
• To document available traditional practices from
extinction and protection of those knowledge by law.
Documentation also gives proper rights to the
knowledge holder and prevents misuse of it.
• To create awareness about the importance of the
knowledge present within rural people and how it is
necessary for development of the nation. Without
rural development, progress of a nation is not
possible.
• To understand the degree of implementation of
various government policies and awareness of
different government schemes among the people.
• To understand and experience of rural verses urban
area, what we lag what they lag. Observing the
nature closely because if full of knowledge.
OUR SUCCESS MANTRA:
We had take Gyan Shodh as a learning as well as
enjoyable tour. This we could work hard with
enjoying each activity. We were very close to nature
and natural lives. We respected them as well as
their culture, thus they could also consider us as
one of them during 2 days stay.
METHODOLOGY:
FIRST DAY OF GYAN SHODH:
The first day of Ghan Shodh started from Dornala to
Chintala village in Prakasam District in Andhra
Pradesh on 9th Sep, 2009. The planning and
preparation before the Gyan Shodh had set the stage
for the realization of an exotic experience beset
with tantalizing challenges. We reached to Chintala
village within 30 minutes and school us our entry
point in the village. The coordinator who is
accompanying with us introduced us to the School
Head master and teachers, and then he left from
there. Then the time came for us to really start our
work with our own. This is the residential school of
about 250 children and we enquired about the school,
from where these children are belong to.this is the
way we entered into the village.
TITLE OF ACTIVITIY:To familiarize with the village
Purpose of Activity:
Visit of first day is just to make familiarize with
people in the village and know about village and
their activities. To make the people in the village
about, whom we are and why we were here. Main
objective is to find out what are innovations exit
in the village and as well as traditional knowledge
and their cultures.
Strategy Adopted:
The Village is concentrated in heavily dense
Nallamlai forest areas that combine inaccessibility
with limited political or economic significance.
Their main lively hood depends on hunting and
gathering form the forest, it is principal
occupation and some people will be carrying out
farming or agriculture activities. The cast system
which is originated long back however has not
changed and village belongs to single cast know as
Chenchu’s. The majority of people are illiterate
where we find only few people whose education is up
to secondary education.
Culture & Tradition:
The villagers depend on nature for ninety percent of
their food supply. Traditionally Chenchu’s roamed
the jungles, living under trees and in rock
shelters. The common food was honey, the roots of
trees, plants and the flesh of animals caught and
hunting. A typical day was spent in gathering the
fruits and root s to be eaten that dya. People leave
home in early morning between 5 – 6am and around 10
to 11 am they comeback from forest. Gathering may be
done in small groups but is still today a solitary
activity without cooperation from others. Hunting is
also a solitary rather than cooperative effort that
rarely produces much game. Hunting is done with bow
and arrow, occasionally with a gun. No trapping or
snaring is done. Very few things are cultivated –
mostly tobacco, corn, and some millet – and little
provision is made for “a rainy day’ (i.e. there is
no storing of grain). There is division of labour
between the sexes. Men hunt, gather honey, and make
baskets; women most of the household works as well
as prepare food. Gathering is done by both sexes
although the men may go further afield, even
spending two or three days away from the community.
For their protection they use bow and arrow which is
made by them. A few buffalo, cows may be kept in a
village for milk but are not eaten. There was an
interesting that they never sell their milk or curd,
they just share between them. They live in hurts but
it is very neat and clean. They use cow dung in
their courtyards which provides smoothness and
absorbs rain water.
Language:
In this village people talk in Chenchu’s language
with the telugu accent. Their language is also known
as Chenchucoolam, Chenchwar, chenswar or
Choncharu.In general physically they are short in
height with long head, well defined eyebrows with
the flat nose. They have jet black curly hair and
their complexion varies from wheat gray to
brown.People have broad faces. They are
characterized by independence and personal freedom.
Young people are free to marry whomsoever they like
and can get apart whenever they like. Their present
habitat is confined to the rocky hills of the in the
Nallamalai hills, extending on both sides of the
Krishna River. They live in bee hive shaped tiny
huts with wattle walls. They are appreciated as
great climbers.
Religion:
They worship number of deities. They mainly believe
in bhagaban taru who lives in the sky and look after
them in all their doings. Another deity they worship
is Garelamani Sama, who is Goddess for forest. She
is believed to protect them from the danger,
especially when they are in the jungle. Apart from
these they pay homage to Postamma, - the God who
curses the diseases like the small pox and Chicken
pox, Gangamma, the diety of water, Mayasamma, the
diety who protects the them form enemies. They have
also adopted certain religious practices from
Hindus.
INNOVATORS/KNOWLEDGE PEOPLE:
Searching of knowledge holder is also major task for
us, so far what we scouted every street and we could
catch few of them. It was big difficult for us to
explain to the knowledge holders about our purpose
of talking to them. They were not accepting us to
share their ideas, they just showing that they
forgotten everything and now saying that they are
not knowing anything. Thanks to Hanumaiah the
village president (head) had explained about their
marriages how it was usually happens. Generally the
old man in the village act a priest for deciding the
date and venue. If there is difference between
parents of bride and groom about their marriage
acceptance then they will ran away to the forest and
spend time in the forest for about 10 days. Then
after returning back, they will accept them. We
reached Dornakala at 8 pm it was very tiring day
then after completion of our dinner, we had a review
of our first day experience in the village with our
mentor Brig Ganehsam. We shared our experience
enthusiastically.
First Day experience:
We started at morning 7am of second day of gyanshodh;
it was a sunny day So we had taken all necessary
things like water bottle, biscuits, umbrella and
honey Magazines, Gifts,Shawls etc., In our team,
Shahida and Ramjan Fast so that Rest of us had
Breakfast in Harita Resort at Dornola. Then we moved
towards Chintala Village. We are very energetic and
ready to explore the our village. We reached at
7.30am , First we went to school, all students
welcomed us by stood up. Students having common
breakfast on the ground which is in front of school.
Idli & Sambar is the menu in breakfast. They offered
us and we tasted, it was really delicious. Then we
met all the teachers and explained our activities to
them and they had positively responded and they gave
assurance us that they are going to help us in
talent-hunt. Then we started to explore the hidden
creativity of chintala village. We started from last
corner of village & from last house. There we met
old woman of village her name is Nagamma. When we
entered in her home she was cooking food. She
welcomed us initially she was thinking that we all
came from Government. Then we introduced ourself
that we are students not government people & we
explained our purpose to visit her village. She was
very happy by hearing that we were came for learning
from her and villagers. She explained her story also
explained her traditional knowledge about the
medicine plants, Farm practice etc., from here our
objective was started. We documented all the
information she had given to us.
After that one young person came there; it was
surprise pacakage for us because he was speaking
little bit in English. He ensured us that he will
guide us in this journey. First we went to forest
which is heavily dense and filled with rich
biodiversity. While walking towards forest we saw
those lots of people are engaged in working under
National Rural Employment Guaranty Scheme. They all
were happy while working. Then we all with our
village friend went deep in forest while going there
we faced with very drastic situation actually one
villager came there and he actually stopped us from
going into the forest. He strongly told us that you
should not shoot the forest rout. He was thinking
that we are going to show this all route to urban
people & that could be dangerous to them. But our
village friend solved our problem at that stage.
Then we moved to deep forest where our village
friend showed us different medicinal plant. He
showed us one Plant which is useful over fever. He
also showed us the root of plant which is useful for
paralysis, diabetes, headache etc., Then our journey
of forest & we moved towards the village with more
satisfaction, & fulfillment. Then we met the
President of village Hanumayya. Then he marathon for
us because everybody sharing their knowledge very
enthusiastically. We documented all the information
which they had shared with us. We provoked them to
talk about innovation & secrets, traditions, culture
etc., then we informed to all villagers that we are
going take recipe competition at evening. They
prepared lunch for us. They brought rice for us
which is very costly for them and they generally
used this rice for their guest & festival times. The
lunch was very delicious & tasty and it was served
very in very hot. He assured us that he will again
take us to forest to find out biodiversity. Naga &
Amol had lunch there. Then we moved towards the
school in search of young talent.
Talent Hunt at
School:
After lunch we moved to School to observe talents
present among students and also awarded them. Head
master of the school helped us in all possible way.
At 3 pm School children were gathered at their
school play ground, nagababji addressed the
gathering in the local language and successfully
convinced our purpose of Gyan Shodh. Then children
were allowed to show their talents. We were
surprised by discovering diverse talent in the field
of dance, singing song, drawing, crafts made by
paper (boats, birds, pistol, camera, aeroplane, and
cap) among the children. One boy called Rabindra
Nayak who studies in class seven had developed an
innovation. It was a paper fan works with walk man
motor and battery. Though the idea was not a new but
it was developed by rural boy who has not much
exposure of technology but the approach was quite
impressive. To encourage him we gave him a special
prize. Three boys were selected for 1st 2nd and 3rd
prizes for dance, singing a song and drawing
respectively. All the participants were also
awarded. They also played Kho-Kho and Kabbadi.
School teachers and all students participated open
heartedly and supported us completely.
Scouting and
Documentation :
Small raining was there then we moved towards the
president house. He was very passionate to take us
to forest. He showed us different medicinal plant
which they are using for there disease treatment. He
showed plant which is used for hunting the animal.
Actually they feed that plant root to the pet dog
after eating that plant, dog can catch the animal in
the area of 2 kms. If big animal is in the area of 2
kms then it makes different sounds so that people in
the village will be elert from that big animal. He
showed us some plant which we are describing below:
No name of Plant uses:
1. Dadir leaf Fever
2. Pulla Putraku – Eye pain/Remedy
3. Chitramullam – Back pain
4. Nallamu – Fever
5. Pedapurudu Drying of lips & Polio
6. Diala chattu To build apatite
7. Galarlu sanpalleru To feeding dog for helping in
hunting
8. Not available No sweet taste plant
Then we moved towards the village. We taken sign of
president on PIC from because he is only knowledge
person who had given information. Then we conducted
recipe competition & we selected two recipes & we
awarded to the female who has prepared that. We also
falicitated old male & female of Chintala Village by
offering shawls behalf of HONEYBEE network.
At last it was time to close our journey from
village Chintala which is rich in culture,
traditions, knowledge, hospitality etc.,
CONCLUSION OF GYAN
SHODH:
The singular conviction that stands above all else
after the yatra and the immense energy, talent,
creativity, tolerance that was evident with the
people, is about the ability, resourcefulness of the
people of this land, their enduring capacity and the
power of people force. The idea that people have it
in them to be innovative and creative to be able to
solve their problems and run their lives. Like any
institution, community, society, this land is not
without her problems and shortcomings, but the value
systems and the unspoken, unwritten laws of society
that are her own very well able to also take care of
the problems that will crop up, and restore order.
What has happened is that people have lost the
confidence that they are been given new value
systems to replace their own, which does not work
for them, and we have in our hands a fractured
society. A group of women in Chintala were talking
to some of us about their life, problems, and
society.One of the women Nagamma spoke a long while
about her life, daily routine,a ll the work that her
friends and she have to do; her day as other
women’s’, starts very early and ends very late,
since she has to finish her morning chores at home
like cleaning and cooking, then go to the fields of
the work, come back and again take care of cooking
and cleaning. They also have to seasonally take care
of crushing grains. She does not get much support
from her husband for all this work that she does. In
the midst of all this, she has managed to save
enough money to send her daughter to a boarding
school in town. And so life continues. After telling
all that, she added in the same breath, that we (shodh
yatris) have come here to meet them, we only have to
teach them things since they don’t know anything,
“we women from the villages are no good, we don’t
even have the time to keep ourselves beautiful, we
work the whole day and by the end of many a day have
neither the time nor the energy to bother about our
appearance.” When she said that she did not realize
that they have spruced up the place and themselves
for us, the guests! All that people need is for
their confidence and faith in themselves to be
restored, their collective force will conquer the
world.it is of course another matter that it is not
in their spirit to want to conquer the world, as it
is meant today. They would build their own brand of
globalization, that of endurance, an empathetic
understanding of the world and how it works and
happiness. Anything else that we think they might
need is secondary.
The Shodha Yatra aims at unearthing and honoring
traditional knowledge and grassroots innovations
that have not only enriched the lives of men, women
and farm labours but have also significantly
contributed towards the conservation of
biodiversity. HoneyBEe database is shared with
farmers in their local language through Mobile
Phone, video camera and print publications, posters
and some time thorugh street plays. A mobile
exhibition on medicinal plants, posters artifacts,
working models of innovations, etc. is used for
making the presentation more relevant to the local
context. During the Gyan Shodh, following major
activities are generally taken up:
The Honey bee multimedia database as taught us a
great deal about demystification of information
technology and its use for empowering local
communities and within the the creative women and
men. We are convince d that this technology if
applied properly with the right kind of sensitivity
to local cultural and ecological diversity, can
transform the capacity for imagination and
experimentation. A great deal of discussion today on
sustainable development is is top down,one way, and
often based on information and alternatives produced
by the formal sector. The HoneyBee database has
demonstrated that by building upon the knowledge of
the poor people, we can not only enrich local
repertoire of ideas but also trigger initiatives
some of which may transform into innovations.
Whether institutional capacity to respond to these
innovations will be simultaneously increase could
depend upon the emergence of horizontal knowledge
networks managed by local communities and individual
innovators, aided by the volunteer scientists, IT
experts, media planners and educationists.
The Honeybee metaphor can indeed make a difference
if it can permeate our vision for promoting learning
& Grass root community. We found that language is
very major problem to scouting & documenting rural
invention. In our group only one member is familiar
with the local language and he can only
Understanding the crux of rural people living,
method of their living. As there is only one person
form us knowing local language it is constraint of
our group & due to that we didn’t asked to much
questions to rural people about their living.
One great thing we found that these Chintala rural
people have lot of Traditional knowledge. They know
about forest trees which are useful for treatment
for various diseases, but problems is that these
people are not willing to tell us about their
knowledge with us. Even he don’t want to show the
routs of forest. His perception that if this routs
are shoot then all urban area people come to know
about their secrets & routs of Forest which could be
dangerous for them & due to that it could be problem
for their daily bread.
Male are dominant in family as compare to female in
Chintala. They are doing all the form work as well
as they do hunting in forest in remaining time.One
key observation is that these rural people don’t
know about invention & innovation but actually they
all are doing something innovative& our work was to
observe & document these invention. They are very
curious about guests, as we visited Chintala they
really have taken our care. People now getting money
& food & work under the National Rural Employment
Guarantee Act, government scheme and now all people
are very happy. They are working there, and living
their life happily. Some people are already got the
House under the Government scheme.
Literacy is the major problem of this village & We
found that only 3-5 people can only read the
language. But the good thing is that next generation
of these people learning well in local school. Some
people’s children studying in Hyderabad school &
because of that these people happy for that. Local
school is well established & about 300students
studying there. Lodging and boarding are available
in that school. Students are very innovative &
energetic. Every & each student has talent in
different activity. One bad thing we observed that a
lot of people are badly addicted by alcohol. Even
they are drinking alcohol in day & just sleeping
whole day. As male are dominant in family female
can’t do anything to solve this problem. Otherwise
all people are innocent & they are living their life
happily. We have mentioned some events we recognized
at Chintala Village, we also mentioned the purpose
of these event.
Recipe Competition:
The recipe competitions are organized for the women
in the village. The women who prepare the most
interesting recipes using the minor millets, lesser
known crops or crops with medicinal values are given
awards and participants are given certificates. The
whole objective is to make the people aware about
the unique nutritional value of the indigenous crops
and their importance in maintaining the ecological
diversity.
Village meetings:
The objective of the meetings during the Gyan Shodh
is to initiate a dialogue on innovations,
traditional knowledge and creativity, so that people
with understanding creative potential can come
forward to share their innovations and knowledge,.
Mutual exchange of knowledge will not only encourage
the innovator and the traditional knowledge holder
to think more creatively and critically but also
would help him/her to know about other experimenters
in different parts of the country.
Walking through the village:
The most important event during the Sodh Yatra is to
walk through villages, urban areas if these fall on
the way, forests, deserts, mountains, valleys,
sea-shores etc.,. with an objective to discover,
learn and share. The Shodh Yatris meet many people
on the way and interact with them. Very often the
casual interaction turns out to be an interesting
source of information about some creative
experiments. During the walk, the mutual knowledge
sharing among the Shodh Yatri is an interesting
experience.
Challenging to scouting rural inventions:
1. Language is major barrier to scouting and
documentation of rural invention.
2. The rural people have very bad experience of
government people and they are thinking us we are
government servants so due to that they were not
willing to share with us. Also they do not willing
to share forest roads, they just shown us forest
externally they might thinking that if they will
disclose their invention then it could be harmful
for their future livelihood.
3. They did not know about invention & related term
until they know what they are doing something new
there is no issue of document it.
4. Illiteracy among the rural community also one of
the challenge for indentify the rural innovation
because they are not aware of outside world.
5. Most of the Rural people are not aware about the
technology which they are using, which might be
innovating in market point of view.
6. the major challenge for an innovation is
establishing the connect with the market. Most of
the innovators at grass root work in isolation and
consequently the marketability of end result remain
doubtful. The most important aspect is to enable
knowledge sharing between market and suppliers. This
connect can definitely bridge the gap between the
market player and enable suppliers to leverage on
information for gaining extra returns for their
produce.;
7. They always thought us that we are from
Government & always demanded money.
8. local school also not paying attention to village
so that people remained illiterate.
SUGGESTION FOR GYAN SHODH:
1. I saw that all people are not happy to sharing
their knowledge, we would like to suggest that
please conduct meeting of all people before visiting
village.
2. first make aware all people about what rural
people are actually doing which is different from
others & which is valuable.
3. Visiting period is very less so try to increase
it.
4. Instead of living to resort; it is better to live
in one of the village where we are going for
scouting;
REFERENCE:
http://www.nif.org.in
http://knownetgrin.honeybee.org/honebee.htm
http://www.sristi.org/cms/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/chenchu
Photos : Implements:
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