Note From President Shernaz Vakil
SEEING IS BELIEVING
It was 2 am. Chinchutara chinchutara kept spinning in my head!
I could hardly contain the anticipation of actually visiting the communities we had agreed to support a mere five months back.
Could the project have been completed so quickly and could we have really made that difference we were hoping for?
As we roller-coastered across the Sahyadri hills towards Vaitarna, the waterbody that feeds our city of Mumbai, we understood how the poor, surrounding villages were banned from directly using the water.
How they were made to climb down several kilometres, from their villages on top, to repeatedly fill their pots during
the day.
How, in their abysmal lives, they were denied the basic necessities of water and light.
And then we saw the actual difference we had made…. Huge solar panels had been set up close to the water source from where pumps were inserted in the water to pull up and fill the large tracks of pipelines that traversed miles to
reach the tanks set up in the village.
Houds were built and filled, and the villagers could fill their pots just outside their homes.
Chinchutara, then Dandwal and Nilmati, forgotten villages in Mokhada – we visited each and saw the massive solar panels, pumps, tanks and houds and were convinced that the project was well conceived and completed.
RCB’S INTEGRATED RURAL DEVELOPMENT PROJECT NINE VILLAGES. 4055 PEOPLE. 745 HOMES.
But it was not until we met and heard the stories of the villagers, the farmers and the ladies who now had water and light from the solar power we had generated, that we were convinced we had made an impact!
An impact so great that their lives were transformed; they could now make a livelihood from farming different
remunerative crops, their wives did not have to spend all day fetching water and their children had classrooms powered by solar lamps and even a television!
And, as the children performed for us joyfully, delighted when Ramesh pulled out his bag of goodies, we Rotarians felt the happiness that can only come from having made that difference to over 2000 people! We met them all, drank hot cups of tea from the filtered water that came out of Skyjuice ultrafiltration units and witnessed the happiness that RCB had brought to these communities through the collaboration of many partners.
The vision that started with Ramesh was transformed by Chirag (and their technical and design support Nimbus, support on ground Diganta,) whilst being fuelled by Sumitomo Chemical through the organisational support of RCB.
However, it was also the Shraamdaan made by the villagers themselves and their voluntary contributions in labour, land, and effort that makes this project sustainable for the future.
Today, we will go on to witness the other villages that were supported through PP Preeti Mehta and IPP Framroze Mehta and see the difference we have made over these past three years.
We have seen the impact and felt the blessings of a grateful community.
— President Shernaz Vakil