And the journey was..

Knowledge is a journey. And our journey in search of knowledge was not to libraries, labs, etc but to villages where scarcity and poverty lies.“Scarcity is the mother of invention” and "Poverty doesn't make a person uncreative" Our journey was following these principles.

Fourteen of us reached NIT Warangal on June 10^th and we had an orientation session with National Innovation Foundation, Honey network about the kind of work we would be doing in the villages by Brig. D Ganesham Sir (Honey network AP co-ordinator).We were shown videos of the many ideas incubated by villagers.

Want to have a look at the rural innovations- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_ho7xhgWV8

We were then divided into 5 groups and sent to 5 villages around Thorrur mandal namely Dubba Thanda , Hachu Thanda, Chityala, Chinna Vangara and Madipalli. We had to stay for 3 days in our respective villages exploring them.

P.S: Thanda is nothing but a community or a small hamlet.

Myself, Meraj and Pavan went to Dhubba Thanda and were received by a warm welcome by Mani, son of a librarian and got accommodated in the same library for 3 days.

The first day we were looked upon like foreigners in the village and everybody were staring at us. We went around the Thanda, enquired few details, came back, read the newspapers in the library and slept. With the help of Mani, we befriended several kids in the village. Mani, this boy has just completed 10^th standard but, you must get to know him to understand how mature and intelligent he is. He has got the brains which we seldom find even with a sane graduate. Regarding his communication skills, this chap can persuade and win even Anil Ambani in just 10 good minutes. We conducted a small biodiversity competition for the kids to collect different varieties of plant species and to narrate their uses.

Here is Mani,Pavan,kishore

We met Mani’s grandfather named Somaji who is well above 90 years. You can call him as the Nelson Mandela for this Thanda. He studied till 4th standard in those hard old days of Nizam’s rule. This person fought with the tyranny of the Nizam’s and distributed 300 acres of land to all the people in his community who rightly deserved the entitlement to the land. To this day, everyone in the Thanda praises his selflessness and shower utmost respect on him. We learnt from him and few other elders about the tradition and culture of Lambadi's.

This is Somaji and his Wife

It was eccentric to get to know that their marriages used to take place for 6 long months. And their marriage tradition is quite interesting and hysterical. It seems during the engagement the bridegroom is beaten by the bride’s brother four times at the same place. And the bridegroom has to stand till his father in law asks him to sit. Finally the bride is sent along with the groom after 6 long months,on a cow :). Girls what do you say???...Kaarsh...:P ...the tradition should have continued everywhere. Right?

13^th June, it was the last day in the Thanda and we were very much disappointed that we couldn’t gain substantial information, or find any viable innovations or herbal medicines. That afternoon we met a person named Vinay Kumar. This bloke is an all rounder. He is a teacher, businessman (real estate and hotel business), innovator, Ayurvedic Doctor and an expert at Yoga.We sat with him for 2 hours. And the whole conversation was rather more interesting than a movie,that our focus remained undiminished listening to him. Unfortunately we forgot to get a recorder the same day. I will narrate u the highlights of the conversation that took place:

It seems his grandfather learnt this cryptic art and dedicated his whole life and wealth trying to convert Copper to Gold. Finally he made it, but met an untimely death without revealing the alchemy he mastered. This person is now continuing the same job reading the books written by his grandfather trying to unravel the intriguing art. He said it took him 25 days to read one page. He also made it a point to mention centuries old ayurvedic treatments which included healing a person who has suffered cardiac arrest. It goes like this–

Ø A heart attack patient should be made to sit in blistering sun. Take two lemons and extract some juice and inject required quantity of mercury into it according the height of the person and place them in front him. He said the lemons would fly up to his chest and dance till the heart attack is cured.

It’s true that mercury becomes volatile in the hot sun hence, the lemons fly but the concept of curing heart attack this way was something we couldn’t understand and left us with lingering doubts.

Ø To a person who consumed poison, a small drop of ingalikam powder when kept on his tongue would throw up everything present in his stomach and make him fine.

And the list of primitive ways of finding the cure for every illness and health related complications is unending. He said all these ayurvedic plants, saints, etc are present in Srisailam forests. He also told about an interesting climber named thippudu thigalu (swirling creeper). It appears that once if our feet touch them, we will roam around the forest for 15 days without knowing ourselves. In between he said, “If you are interested to talk to a soul I can make it possible. Are you ready?” We didn’t have any answer. Suddenly we shivered for a while and it took a while for us to shed the fear. All this would seem as sheer superstition and we may find no good enough a reason to believe in it.

He said every person has an aura surrounding him which tells his nature and he also told pavan that if he took bath and did meditation for sometime he could tell pavan’ s future too. Poor Pavan, he said he didn’t want to know. He told us that there is some kajal (the same one which we see on the eyes of katikaparlu) when applied to the eyes we can scan everything i.e., the land, the past and future of a person, etc. Once he had unearthed the treasure which lied in the underground of a person’s house. And it was no surprise that he works for the archeology department. Finally, while leaving as we took his phone number in a book, he said that the book wouldn’t reach its final destination. We didn’t understand and went away bewildered. Then he called me back and asked if my defective eyesight was 6.5. I said its 8. He suggested me some herbal medicine. Of course, he poured out suggestions on how Meraj and Pavan should grow fat.

I don't know what's running in your minds now friends..But after the conversation, I was bit excited and felt like visiting Srisailem and the forests over there once.


Thus the whole conversation was like the narration of the telugu magnum opus, Pathala Bhairavi, the yester years sci-fi movie and we were in a confused state of mind about what to believe and what not to believe.

This is how it started......

A cliché that all you people have been repeatedly hearing-This is my first blog. I had been wishing to write one from long time. Finally, the day has beckoned...

I am doing B.Tech, 3^rd year in Bits-pilani. From my first year, I always aspired to do an enterprising internship that would match my career interests. So as intended, I applied to many prestigious institutes like IISc, E4SI, ISB, IIIT, IIM A and also a few start up companies. And a day arrived when I was left with much disappointment for I was deprived of a positive reply from everyone. But much to my amusement and surprise, I received 2 mails the same night, one from Anil Gupta Sir, (IIM A) blessing me with an opportunity to do a social internship in Andhra Pradesh villages with a motive to uplift the grass root innovators (www.sristi.org) and he said I can also include my friends in this great initiative. The other one was from a start up firm named Daily Dump which was ready to provide an internship with a stipend of Rs.6000 and the task was to market their products in the nearby villages.

Now I had to choose…

My friends and my mind said, “Teju, enough of social service till now. Concentrate on your career.” Whereas my heart said, “Teju com’n working in villages where the real and exotic India lies, uplifting grass root innovators sounds like a more exciting job than marketing some mundane products. And as Sir was willing to allow my friends to partner me in my social initiative, I sensed an amazing chance for our juniors to get well acquainted with the knowhow of the social conscience and this experience would help them in understanding the villagers and the way to go about dealing with them.

Akash(President, Nirmaan) and my friend, Bala Phani Chand appreciated my idea and encouraged me. Somehow I managed to convince 13 of my juniors and friends for the internship with the help of many. But the dismal thing was the fact that I was the only girl among them. As the project was conceived by me, I had to start even though my father was not interested to send. The day before I called my intermediate friend, Meraj and mentioned about the internship and she said she would love to join me. Thanks Meraj, this journey would not have been possible without your wonderful company :) Thus started the odyssey….