Route and Activities Of Shodhyatra

Route and Schedule of Mini Shodhyatra (Aligarh)

Mini Shodhyatra will start from Madrak, Lodha Block on 29^th August 09 and will end at Badauli, Lodha Block on 30^th August09. In total 10 villages ( approximately 14 KM distance) will be covered in the shodhyatra’s two days program. Route with activities is explained below.

Shodhyatris from outside Aligarh and SRISTI team will reach Madrak on 28^th August 09 and will do a night stay.

Day 1 (29th august 09)

7:30 AM Madrak:- Shodhyatra will start from this place in the morning of 29th august09. Village meeting and various competitions at school level will be organized in this village. In the meeting farmers will get the knowledge about the organic farming and we will also look after other challenges faced by the problems and your innovation. Various competition among the children will be organized to make them aware about the correct use of nature for good.

9:30 AM Nagla Pooran :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

11:30 AM `Nhoti :- Village meeting and competions at school level among the childen.

Lunch after Nhoti

02:30 PM Keeeratpur :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

04:30PM Mainath :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

Night stay in Manoharpur.

Day 2 (30th August 09)

07:30 AM Manoharpur :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

09:30 AM Bhakraula :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

11:30 AM Dolra :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

Lunch after Dolra

02:30 PM Khadia :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

04:30 PM Badhauli :- Village meeting and Competition at the school level among the children.

At this place Shodhyatra will end.

Concept of Shodhyatra

Shodh yatra

"The next century will belong to India, which will become a unique intellectual and economic power to reckon with, recapturing all its glory, which it had in the millennia gone by." - Dr. R. A. Mashelkar

WHAT IS SHODH YATRA?

Shodh Yatra is a journey for the search of knowledge, creativity and innovations at grassroots. Shodh Yatra is an attempt on the part of SRISTI to reach out to the remotest part of the country with a firm belief that hardship and challenges of natural surroundings are the prime motivators of creativity and innovations. Shodh Yatra aims at unearthing such traditional knowledge and grassroots innovations that have not only simplified the lives of men, women and farm labourers but have also significantly contributed towards the conservation of bio-diversity. Shodh Yatra is a journey of mutual exchange and sharing of knowledge. Whatever knowledge and practices that we have pooled in, over the years are shared with the villagers during the Shodh Yatra. We also share the Honey Bee database with the villagers. Shodh Yatra is also a journey to spread green consciousness and we do it by involving women and children to display their ecological knowledge through various competitions. During Shodh Yatra, we also look after the problems faced by the people in those areas and try to solve their problems by mutual operations.

HOW IT ALL BEGAN?

On 7th and 8thMarch 1998, Jethabhai Gajera of Divrana, organized a meeting of Shodh Sankal at Vallabhbhai Sojitra's orchard at Titodi of Junaghad district of Gujarat. The farmer friends present felt that it was important and necessary to encourage organic farming. Moreover there were many honourable people from nearby villages who had found the solutions of their own problems through their inborn ability and presence of mind. There is no information in the society about such people and their activities. There is a need to contact such honourable people and spread their knowledge to other people through Shodh Yatra (a journey of exploration).
A workshop was held on 29thMarch1998 at Ahmedabad on the subject, "How to make interaction between experimenting farmers and Scientists?" under the project, 'Management of Natural Resources'. This workshop was also attended by the farmers of SRISTI, and Shodh Sankal Network. A farmer Gafarbhai Kureshi from Junaghad district, Talala Taluka's Village Ramdechi (Gir) gave invitation to start the Shodh Yatra from his place. For this purpose many farmers gave different suggestions about how to conduct Shodh Yatra and finally it was decided to start the Shodh Yatra on foot.

OBJECTIVES OF SHODH YATRA

Shodh Yatra, as a major scouting, networking and dissemination programme of SRISTI, is being carried out with the following objectives:
1. To learn about the experiences of the farmers engaged in organic farming and inform other farmers about the same.
2. To encourage the curiosity of the children about variety in organic farming and to discover the knowledge of bio and crop diversity among rural people.
3. To meet the people who solve their problems through their presence of mind and inborn ability, store their knowledge and felicitate them.
4. To compile and disseminate the knowledge, which is fast disappearing and establish a dialogue between the old generation and future generation

WHAT DO WE DO IN SHODH YATRA?

The Shodh Yatra is organized by SRISTI twice a year. Primarily, the Shodh Yatris, walk around a distance of roughly 250 k.m or so in a span of seven to eight days. The travel route that is chosen is usually bereft from any regular road or transport connectivity. This even makes the yatra more challenging. Shodh Yatris meet the villagers, farmers, artisans etc. individually and a report is prepared later collectively based upon each person's experience. The report is prepared both in Gujarati and English. The Yatris also look for the odd ball i.e. any body doing something differently and try to understand the logic behind it. During the Shodh Yatra, we also discover new methods of crop protection, cattle rearing and improved implements developed by the villagers. Quite often such people are felicitated by SRISTI during Shodh Yatra. Along with this, we also share the Honey Bee database with the villagers and ask for their feedback. The discussion generates quite a lot of useful links for SRISTI and Honey Bee Network. During the discussion, we also circulate copies of 'Lok Sharvani' to share the innovations and traditional knowledge of other parts of the country.

During the Shodh Yatra, following activities are taken up on usual basis:

1. Night Meets: The meetings are usually held with the villagers in the night. The villagers are introduced to the activities of the Honey Bee Network and the objectives of the Shodh Yatra. The meeting basically acts as a forum for mutual sharing of creativity and innovations that the villagers have developed over a period of time. The night meets act as a great source of discovering the creative grassroots genius. But in Aligarh Shodha Yatra meetings will be organized in the day time.

2. Bio-diversity Competition: Competitions on bio-diversity are held regularly among the students and young people of the villages. In the competition, the participants are asked to identify and stick the samples of vegetation found in their village on a cardboard and list down their various usage. Each participant is orally tested regarding the samples they had brought along and the students making the best impact are given certificates. Many villagers also join in the programme.

3. Recipe Competition: The recipe competitions are organized for the women in the villages. The person who cooked the most nutritious variety from the local ingredients was encouraged by giving a prize and a certificate. The whole objective is to make the people aware about the unique nutritional value of the indigenous crops and their importance in maintaining the ecological diversity.

4. Felicitation of Creative Villagers: During the Shodh Yatra the farmers active in organic farming, those who had developed new methods through their creative abilities and ingenuity, the villagers who had helped in publicity of the aims and objectives of the Shodh Yatra and the oldest person of the village are felicitated and presented with a set of the volumes of 'Madhubindu'; "Samvad thi Sanshodhan Sudhi" and various issues of 'Loksarvani'.
JOIN THE JOURNEY OF EXPLORATION
Shodh Yatra is open to all. However, the Shodh Yatris have to take care of their own lodging and boarding expenses. For more information and registration, write at shodhyatra@sristi.org
For more information about the earlier Shodh Yatra’s, please visit www.sristi.org

Meeting with Mr. Commissioner for support in organizing a Shodhytra.......

I got leave from college to attend a meeting with commissioner of Aligarh Zone. The meeting was related to the agriculture department and all other related to agriculture in all four districts coming under Aligarh Zone. I was invited to attend the meeting by Deputy Director Agriculture of Aligarh who heads the whole agriculture department in Aligarh District. Meeting was scheduled to start at 2:30 PM, so I reached at commissioner’s office at 2: 15 PM. After few minute official from different departments in different districts walked into the conference room. Suddenly Deputy Director Agriculture, Aligarh Dr. Omveer Singh came and we entered the conference room together. Officials from agriculture, horticulture, Gramin Bank, irrigation etc departments were there to face Mr. Commissioner, who is the administrator for all four districts in Aligarh zone. All these officers were having some files with them; they were reading their files and all. There was nervousness on every face except few farmers; those officers were worried about the questions from Mr. Commissioner.
I was invited to discuss about my work in the region and next steps. Few days back I discussed with Deputy Director about my planning about organizing a Shodhyatra in the District. I also asked him for help and I am also concerned about the help from few other departments e.g. Gram Panchayat, Education dept. etc. I went to attend the meeting to raise the support of Mr. Commissioner, so I can get the support of all departments in the region.
At around 3:30 PM, Mr. Commissioner entered the room and everybody present in the room gave him respect by standing up on own place. Finally meeting started with irrigational problems faced by the farmers in all four districts. One by one representatives from all departments in all four districts gave their report about the growth and targets; somehow any of these departments had not completed its target for one reason or the other.
After a hectic season of targets and achievements, a scientist from Tata Chemicals addressed the conference. He shared about the launch of some crop focused chemical fertilizers, he discussed about the benefits of these fertilizers but he didn’t address about the harms which can be caused by these chemicals to the soil and environment as those fertilizers are chemical ones.
He was just to sit after his lecture, I asked him about the kind of harms caused by the chemical fertilizers and also about the expected harms will be caused by new crop focused fertilizers. He said, “If any farmer uses beyond the standards, chemical fertilizers are very harmful for soil and environment”. Scientist from Tata chemicals suggested about the standards of using chemicals on field, some others from few other chemical companies also favored him. But if a farmer is cultivating any crop on his fields, he has to increase the amount of chemical fertilizer for same results. Every year farmers increase the amount of fertilizer used in agriculture, if they don’t they don’t get proper outcome. So, how can we go with the standards, if farmers follow standards they will not get good results. In any case they have to cross the standards. Farmers present in the conference room agreed with my argument. I asked those representatives of chemical companies, “Is it the policy or strategy of your companies to produce such products by which your sales can be raised”? This time this scientist or representative of one chemical company was beating around the bush because he didn’t have any favorable answer. This debate ended by the interruption of Deputy Director Agriculture, Aligarh.
Now it was my turn to discuss my work and my purpose of being there. I introduced myself and my organization SRISTI and its ideology. I introduced the concept of Shodhyatra, and also discussed about activities which we do in the Shodhyatra. I shared my planning about organizing a Shodhyatra, I asked Mr. Commissioner for his support for my operations in the region. With few questions, finally He got convinced with the concept and agreed to provide support. His agreement was like an order to all departments present in the conference room. Meeting ended after few other discussions related to agriculture at around 5:30 PM.
After meeting, I was surrounded by some people, some officers from other districts asked me about my further planning to enter their districts. Some farmers also came to me and discussed some of their problems caused by chemicals and asked for the solution.