Snehavardhini - A Stream of Love

Mission 2017 – A visit from the Kathkari Tribals to Holy Cross Parish, Kurla

During this time, last year, on 22^nd October 2017 – Mission Sunday, Holy Cross Parish had guests visiting for two days, traveling all the way from Roha, Raigad. Roha is 130 Km from Mumbai, lies between the Sahyadri range of the Western Ghats and the north Konkan region of Maharashtra. Our guests comprised of six Kathkari tribal ladies along with two social workers and three sisters from the congregation of Handmaids of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, led by Sr. Bridget. Their visit was aimed at spreading awareness about their ‘mission’ which has been close to their hearts since nearly three decades now – a mission that aims at empowering the tribals to have dignity to living through education.

The Invitation

Inviting them to our Parish was a novel idea of Fr. Norbert and the participation of the SCCs along with parish associations, gave it the direction, which paid forward and gave the Parishioners a unique experience to directly meet and interact with them.

Snehavardhini - A Stream of Love

It was their first time in Mumbai city, their coming and putting up a stall of home-made products for us depicted their success story – it gave a living testimony to the decades of toil and hard work done by the congregation in bringing them out of the jungles and into the main stream of civilized life.

Traveling by road for nearly 5-6 hours (each of them comes from remotely different interiors of Raigad) from their Center, Snehavardhini at Roha, they reached Holy Cross Parish in the evening at about 4.30pm on 21^st October (Saturday). A stream of love between Roha and Mumbai had been initiated by the Sisters’ congregation!

The Participation

On reaching, they were welcomed by a small team of volunteers; the volunteers had done the planning and arrangement of their stay by closely networking with the different associations of the Parish (such as the SCC (Small Christian Communities); Women’s Cell; and Lady Sodality).

The Ladies along with the social workers were put up comfortably in the class rooms of the middle school building. Their needs were well taken care of in a well-coordinated manner, among the various SCCs of the Parish.

The Stall

The tribal ladies had brought along with them, variety of products which they had painstakingly prepared back at their center, under clean and hygienic environment monitored by the Sisters. Their Stall was put up next to the stall of Lady Sodality both working towards generating funds for the Mission. The Stall was all set and ready to sell, within minutes of their arrival! Everything was laid in systematic and a neat array of stacks. The volunteering team members were present to support them in every way and in putting up the list of products and their rates, impressively Up on a chalk board!! The stall generated interest among the Parishioners coming to church and they patronized the stall willingly. Few of the products became out-of-stock on Day 1 itself!

About our Guests

Katkaris are a tribe of catechu (Katha)makers. They make catechu from Khair trees. They speak Kathodi, a language currently listed as endangered. Alcoholism, child marriages are the social evil prevalent in their culture. The kathkari tribe depends a lot on the forest for their livelihood. They collect the woods and sell it (only the dried ones- they never cut a good tree), they cultivate nachni and Vari in the forest land which is given to them for cultivation, they have seasonal fruits, flowers and vegetables that they grow in the forest and in the fields. They are largely daily wage earners- who work for a daily wage of Rs.250/- per day. They work as landless laborers. Due to the uncertainties of the employment, 70% tribals migrate to the bricklins, or construction sites to the nearby states like Gujrat and Karnataka thus hampering permanently the education of their children. They are still the victims of caste system and are directly or indirectly treated as untouchables, giving a leeway to the rich and upper caste to oppress and exploit these tribals.

We found that the ladies were fond of dancing, they created their own music and sang in Kathodi language weaving through the day-to-day events in their songs like a story – we were privileged to shake our legs to their tune and rhythm.

Visit to the Mall

When guests visit your city for the first time would you not like to take them around the city as a refreshing break? On similar lines, the day that they were supposed to leave, right after they winded up their stall, they had a little time left before they had their lunch and left for their Wada (villages as they call), the Women’s Cell members volunteered to take tribal ladies to Phoenix Market City to give them an experience of visiting a city Mall. It was a totally different and a new experience for them, they had a nice time seeing around, going up and down the elevator – an experience they are going to always remember and cherish.

The Experience

It was great interacting with them! Initially observant, they opened to us soon. They are simple people with basic needs. The center plays a very important role in their lives, be it health; be it educating their children; and be it leading an independent life of self-employment, they say they owe it all to the ‘center’ and all its initiatives. “Earlier we did not have guidance, had become lazy, things have changed after the center came, we have now become self-reliant” one of them confessed. They also shared how the Sisters helped them understand the importance of their Jal (Water) and Jungle(Forest) resources – how they being the owners of it could now produce goods to support their livelihood.

I got a chance to interact with the social workers, it turned out to be an interesting conversation. Ms. Ashwini Ashok Pawle, is a social worker, working with the center for last 28 years. She confided that initially when she had started to work at the center, the VHP, would time and again warn her that the Sisters are here to convert their faith – an accusation found to hold no truth; instead she found a clear distinction between the values propagated by VHP and that of the Sisters and decided to stay back and work with them. She shared some interesting initiatives of the Sisters for the people.

-        Gavki Meeting (local self-governance):  The village representatives (includes the men, women, youth and children) address the local issues that are taken to the Gram Panchayat; Panchayat Samiti; and Zilla Parishad. They have ample support of the police; Patils; and Sarpanch

-        Bachat Gaath (Self Help Groups): Through the 26 SHG groups they accompany women in nearly 24 villages and help them organize themselves to help each other and oneself; they also have began the Income generation programs through making and marketing the herbal medicines and food products of Nachni etc . Alcoholism, is a problem faced by both the gender but the ladies meet once a month and a certain amount is saved regularly and based on these savings the community issues or needs are resolved by lending money to them via Bachat Gaath – this saves them from going to money lenders and getting exploited.

-        Education for girls: Girls drop-out was on an increase but due to center’s efforts the scene is now changing, with the first generation of their children now finishing their education and graduating, their lives have certainly taken a turn for better.

-        Child Marriages: With children being married off early, especially girls at very tender age, child mortality rate during child labor was ever increasing, now with awareness program frequently run by the center, four villages have taken a vow (Shapat) to educate their girls and get them married at the age of 18years.

-        Self-employment: Center promoted the idea of Jal and Jangal to the villagers who now have understood the value of resources available to them and have recently started small self-businesses of manufacturing products (the ones sold at their stall).

-        Supplementary classes: They have supplementary classes in 15 villages that accompany the students in their formal education, 20 Balsansads- the dynamic children’s groups through which they encourage the leadership and talents of the students, and help them grow in the mutual growth and responsibilities towards each other and to their own society.

-        Health: the centre trains the village health workers in herbal medicines, enforce cleanliness in the villages and supplementary classes and accompany the patients of TB, Leprosy and malnourishment. Special cares are taken for the expecting mothers (victims of child marriage)  in order to bring down the mortality rate at birth

The sisters accompany them in their life and needs through their empowering and developmental activities throughout the year

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The Farewell

The missions do not end in a day; they continue to become a journey! Though our guests have gone back, they went back with confidence – confidence that tells them to continue their journey of self-empowerment; of good will and trust; of being welcomed – something they never expected to the extent of which our Parishioners have extended their generosity and hospitality towards them! They take it all with them with an invite for us to visit them soon. A small team of volunteers did visit them on 11^th November 2017, to participate in their Balmelawa thus lending support to the vision and mission of the congregation Sisters.  Snehavardhini, a small stream of love has entered our hearts and plans to grow into a river!