EDUCATION AND POVERTY PROGRAMS FAIL TO REACH RURAL THANE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 MUMBAI 000269 SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV PHUM ECON IN SUBJECT: EDUCATION AND POVERTY PROGRAMS FAIL TO REACH RURAL THANE REF: New Delhi 552 MUMBAI 00000269 001.2 OF 004 ¶1. (U) Summary: In rural Thane district, just thirty miles from the towering skyscrapers of Mumbai, Congenoff found a variety of common development challenges in three tribal villages, where government intervention is incomplete or non-existent. Here, some tribal communities struggle to maintain adequate shelter, earn livelihoods, and receive potable water and electricity. Several NGOs are active in and around these tribal villages, providing health and educational services, but their approach is piecemeal, and dependent on the goodwill of volunteers and donors. This cable describes the lives of several tribal communities who live mostly beyond the reach of the Indian economy, and where the lack of government services remain a continual development challenge. End Summary. THANE DISTRICT -- IN THE SHADOW OF MUMBAI -------------- -------------- ¶2. (U) Thane District, 21 miles from Mumbai's international airport, is considered part of the Greater Mumbai Metropolitan Area, a region that includes upwards of 17 million people. In the rural areas of Thane district, however, many state and central government development programs have only sporadically reached its residents. The district is 27 percent rural, with 18.12 percent listed as coming from Scheduled Tribes and 5.18 percent from Scheduled Castes (those traditionally disadvantaged and thus eligible for special government programs to lift them out of poverty). Nearly one in five Thane District residents is in the "below poverty line (BPL)" category, meaning they earn less than 356 rupees (7.44 USD) per month per person. For tribal people across Maharashtra, the figures are worse: 56.6 percent of tribal people live below the poverty line according to the central government's Planning Commission. Prem Seva Mahila Mandal -------------- ¶3. (U) Congenoff met with Stella Morais, director of the NGO Prem Seva Mahila Mandal (PSMM - Organization of Love and Service for Women) in Kalyan, a city two hours from the financial center of India, Mumbai. Morais, originally from Tamil Nadu, and her husband from Kerala have lived in Kalyan for over thirty years, where her husband owns a construction company. Founded eight years ago and in some ways a fledgling organization, dependent on the goodwill of volunteers, the Morais personally fund the activities of PSMM, which they run from their home. The organization has no singular focus, but rather tries to make a difference in the lives of women, children, construction workers, brick kiln workers, tribal villagers, orphans and prison inmates in Thane district. While district-wide the literacy rate is reportedly 81 percent, Morais reported that very few could read in many tribal villages. The tribals, all landless peasants in this area, have little if any economic means and suffer from malnutrition and lack of safe drinking water, she said. Children of migrant construction workers miss out on school -------------- -------------- ¶4. (U) The Mandal started its work with outreach to the children of migrant construction workers. As they have no regular home, the children have never attended formal education, according to Morais. India has a right to education law, and each child is entitled to attend school, but many of these nomadic families do not know their rights and the children are reluctant to enter a strange environment, Morais said. With Morais and two of her volunteers, Congenoff visited the camp in Kalyan where construction workers and their families live in small metal shacks, roughly 10 x 10 feet, with dirt floors, in the shadow of the construction projects where the parents work. Morais has a team of volunteers who work with the children four to five hours a day to teach them Hindi or Marathi, depending on their place of origin, and basic math and reading skills. She MUMBAI 00000269 002.2 OF 004 accepts that there is little they can accomplish given the transitory nature of these families, but her work aims to give them a foundation and basic survival skills. During Congenoff's brief visit to the site, the children were enthusiastic students in their make-shift classroom, a dirt floor with a roof over it, proudly demonstrating their ability to count, add, and sing songs. A seven-year-old girl displayed her betrothal necklace -- Morais explained that the child is already married, but will not join her husband until she matures, at approximately 13 years of age. Though child marriage is illegal, Morais noted that it occurs often in very impoverished areas. Tribal villages lack basic necessities -------------- -- ¶5. (U) Fifty kilometers beyond Kalyan, Congenoff visited three tribal hamlets, where social and living conditions became more rudimentary as the city receded. At the first, Shailothea Gaon, home to Katkari tribals, most of the homes had brick or cement walls and tiled roofs, but those further from the road were mud-and-stick constructions. The sturdier homes were built under an Indian government program years ago, according to Morais. There were few men in the community other than the very young and the elderly; others had left to find work on farms or in cities, according to Morais. This hamlet, with about 50 young children, had a one-room school for children up to the fourth grade, but the middle school was far way, so most quit school after fourth grade, she explained. The community had a water pump about 100 yards away, but no electricity, toilets or solid waste services and the paths between the huts were littered with trash, mostly food packaging and other plastics that do not decompose. Health conditions were poor; being close a major road the villagers can get to a primary care clinic in town, but they often do not know they need a doctor until it is too late, Morais lamented. Morais brought clean bandages for a man with leprosy. Though the disease is treatable, the tribals do not know about modern medical care and there are few outreach services, she said. ¶6. (U) Further from Kalyan, in a small hamlet called Madliwadi, the Ma-thakui tribe lives in mud-and-stick homes and the few men left in the village, all elderly, were busy thatching the roofs to prepare for the upcoming monsoon season. The huts generally had two rooms, more spacious than many of the slum dwellings in Mumbai, but there was no electricity, no water, and no sanitation or solid waste disposal. The river where villagers would normally draw water was dry and the women had a long walk to a distant pond to draw water. PSMM is trying to get a well dug for Madliwadi, but Morais complained she has not been able to get government assistance. Though there was trash lying about the village, there was far less packaging material, evidencing the remoteness from urban centers. Morais reported that the village had a health worker with a seventh grade education who would check on the people and encourage those who needed care to go to the primary health center, but the clinic was far away. There was no school in the village and Morais reported that few children made the almost 2 mile trek to the nearest elementary school. The people subsist primarily on rice and dal, according to Morais, as there are no stores nearby and the villagers have little income to purchase food. Chickens and baby goats roamed amongst the huts, but the villagers said they were for eggs and milk to sell, not a source of protein in their diets. In addition to selling eggs, the villagers made money selling fire wood. There was a large stockpile of fire wood, approximately 150 by 20 feet, at the entrance to the village. Now little forest cover remains; the villagers cut so many trees they permanently damaged the soil's ability to retain water from the monsoon season, Morais noted. She said they also cut precious teakwood trees for fire wood, not recognizing the value of the timber. ¶7. (U) At the third hamlet, Thakipatar, up a hill and even farther from a water source, the men must walk two hours each way to fetch water at night; when Congenoff arrived, the women were just returning with water in the heat of the afternoon. Morais said the water pots were often half full of mud. There was no local food source and the villagers subsist on rice alone, Morais said. Education facilities were also lacking; there was a building designated as a pre-school center, but no MUMBAI 00000269 003.2 OF 004 primary school was within walking distance for the children. ¶8. (U) A nurse from the local government hospital, who was visiting the village at the time, said that the nearest health service for these people was 21 miles away and the villagers had no transportation to get there. She brings medications when she can get transportation to visit, but she said her efforts are often in vain as the people do not take the medication or follow medical advice. Many of the villagers are severely malnourished and have blood iron levels as low as seven, where 12 is considered normal, the nurse reported. When she can get them, Morais brings the villagers protein packets from AmeriCares, an international relief organization with offices in Mumbai. This hamlet had a tiny doctor's office, but Morais said the doctor is rarely ever in. Although the medical building had an informal electrical connection (a hook and bare wire hung over a power line),there was no electronic medical equipment inside, only a fan and a light. None of the huts had electricity. There were pipes for a water delivery system, but no storage tank at the top to complete the system. After supporting the Shiv Sena Member of Parliament in five consecutive elections, the villagers reportedly voted for the Congress candidate this time in hope that water would finally be brought to the hamlet. No Rural Employment Guarantee Program for Thane villages -------------- -------------- ¶9. (U) The National Rural Employment Guarantee program (NREGA), was established to guarantee 100 days of employment at the prevailing minimum wage to any rural household across the country. (See reftel) However, according to the Government of India's website for the Ministry of Rural Development, the people in rural Thane and many other areas have not participated in the program. The GOI reports that 164,449 tribal households in Thane have been issued job cards under the program, but as of May 2009, none were provided employment. (Note: Seventeen other districts in the state similarly report no benefits have been provided under the scheme. Whether this is due to the tribal's lack of knowledge of their rights, or that the program has not been fully implemented in this area - or that the Rural Development Ministry has yet to update its website -- is unclear. End Note.) Though none of the people in the villages we visited reportedly participated in the NREGA, one sign of progress was that each hamlet had a single-lane paved road leading to it; the villagers, however, have no vehicles to use on such roads. HIV/AIDS reaches remote villages -------------- ¶10. (U) PSMM also attempts to coordinate medical care for some of the villagers, arranging transportation to clinics or hospitals, or for private doctors to see patients on a volunteer basis. PSMM also works with an orphanage on the Mumbai-Nasik highway, Mukta Jaivan, which houses and cares for 115 HIV-positive children. A second orphanage along the same stretch of road, Naya Jaivan (New Life),reportedly houses 400 children of lepers and 100 HIV-positive children. Morais readily acknowledges she is not a medical expert and cannot diagnose the medical conditions of the people. She was unaware that the spread of HIV from mother to child is preventable. ¶11. (U) Kripa Foundation, another NGO working in Thane District, runs a clinic and hospice center for people affected with AIDS. Since the clinic opened its doors in October 2002, in the town of Vasai, it has cared for over 1500 patients, according to Jimmy Amor, a caseworker at clinic. Amor said that some of their patients come from small villages 20 to 25 miles away. They come to the clinic only when they are in the final stages of the disease when there is nothing doctors can do for them, he lamented. The disease makes its way from Mumbai to these remote hamlets, often carried by men who traveled to the city looking for work and contracted the disease, Amor explained. MUMBAI 00000269 004.2 OF 004 ¶12. (U) Comment. Although India has made great effort to raise the conditions of those in poverty, the breadth and depth of the problem is profound. Government programs for rural areas such as the farm-debt waiver program have no impact on tribals who are landless peasants; other programs, such as NREGA, have not yet been fully implemented in Thane and elsewhere. In Maharashtra, there are huge governance gaps which continue point to discrepancies between what is promised and claimed, and what is actually delivered. As elsewhere, India's dynamic civil society and volunteer organizations have stepped in to plug some of the gaps left by the government's inattention. However, staffed by well-meaning citizens, these efforts are not coordinated or planned, and their impact is piecemeal and often unsustainable. While corporations and civil society groups will continue to play a role in development, India's mammoth development challenges can only be met by a committed, efficient, and accountable government. End Comment. FOLMSBEE