Melghat Mitra is a group of volunteers, which came together in the monsoon of 1997 to save the tribal children in Melghat who were dying because of malnutrition. In the 3 monsoon months of 1997, Melghat Mitra ran an emergency program where nearly 250 volunteers from Maharashtra and elsewhere lived with the people in 6 villages over a period of 10 days. Besides helping the local government health machinery to deliver their services, they tried to understand the problems and lives of the Korku tribals in Melghat.
All funds required to run this program were raised through public appeal at the time, and every single individual who worked as Melghat Mitra during this period worked as a volunteer, without any monetary compensation. In fact, all of us spent from our own pockets for our individual expenses and the funds raised were utilized entirely for the program in Melghat.
This program gave us an insight into the complex and multi-faceted problem of malnutrition and helped us to look at the problem from different perspectives of the multi-disciplinary volunteer force that worked there. We believe that malnutrition needs to be addressed at its roots, and for doing so; we would have to basically ensure the sustainable livelihood mechanisms for the Koru families. In addition, access to basic health and education services will also have to be ensured.
Since then, we have continued working in these 6 villages and have in fact spread the area of operations to 6 other villages as well. We have developed good and trusting relationships with the villagers there, thanks to two of our volunteers who have camped out in one of the villages for nearly ten years now. Our work continues to focus on the three aspects that we identified, namely health, primary education and sustainable livelihoods.
Our four volunteers in Chilati have succeeded in gaining the confidence of the people in the Hatru area. In the last ten years, they have helped the people to get the benefit of the different government schemes. People from Chilati and the neighboring villages come to us for guidance and consultations.
Apart from helping the people in their own work, we run Study Classes in 20 villages. The educated youth from the village conduct these classes. These classes are for children in the primary school and all children in the village in the corresponding age group take the benefit of these classes. With the help of Dr. Abhay Bang, we had completed a 2-year survey of child mortality in the area. The survey has been conducted with the help of villagers, who have contributed their time for the same. The result of this survey has been published in January 2001.
Our strategy is to develop the capacities of the people to solve their own problems rather than make them dependent on us. Therefore, we do not burden the people with our programs but help people in their own initiatives.
We continue to raise our funds through the public, strongly believing that such an activity should run entirely through public support, not only in order to ensure accountability and transparency, but also to ensure that the problem of malnutrition in India is understood and owned by the people of our country. We believe that it is only with collective efforts of the common man and of every single citizen that we can address the deep-rooted poverty of our Korku friends and others in similar situation.
