Some Missionaries of Charity nuns in Bilaspur, a city in the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, are on a different mission these days. Once every month, they travel to the Parsahi mission of Raipur archdiocese, 45 km away, to encourage marginalized villagers to develop themselves through self-help groups. The work is focused at Bhaisthara village, some 5 km from the mission, where they distribute free food grains to some hundred needy villagers. Instead of merely doling out free food grains, the Catholic mission insists that the villagers use the charity to develop by forming self-help group.
As reported by mattersindia.com, Chedilal Ratnakar, an animator, said that “To develop them the parish social animator visits them on tenth of every month. The villagers have formed 26 self-help groups for women and some men regularly participate. In the beginning they were suspicious and scared to come for the meeting. But now they are very particular on the fixed date.” Since most villagers are illiterates, an animator proposed appointing a tutor help them read and write. But the villagers said that they felt shy to learn at this age. But a few of them have started to learn to write their names from their school-going children, said Kaushilya, a group member. “Lots of changes are taking place among them from the time we had gone to visit them,” says the superior of the nuns.
Some 300 odd villagers of Bhaisthara say they do not know when and why they had come here. Some say their ancestors had migrated from neighboring Andhra Pradesh state. The migrants consider themselves Gond tribals; but the local people call them Sabariya, or those who toil with sabar (crowbar).
Source: www.mattersindia.com
