Kasipadu - An Illustration of Virtual Leadership

Dr Mani Paturi, 59, is a pediatrician who migrated to USA almost 30 years ago. Her husband was an active member of Telugu Literary Cultural Association in Queens, New York. He was also interested in social service both in US and at his native village in India. He came from a village in West Godavari District, in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh, India. The village, like most of its counterparts in the country, does not have access to good quality healthcare and education. The Paturis used to visit the village once or twice a year and organize medical camps with the help of local relatives and friends. After her husband passed away in 2005, the family was looking for a way to continue the services and planned to create a permanent health center in the village in his memory. When I explained the concept of Virtual leadership to Dr Paturi in 2006, she expressed a keen interest and wanted to know if it can assist her in her mission.

Though her village did not have internet, there was Kasipadu, one of its neighboring villages which had the connectivity, thanks to the Project ASHWINI implemented by Byrraju Foundation. Project ASHWINI provides broad band connectivity to 50 villages with a combination of terrestrial and wireless networks and hence has created a high quality video conference platform on which services related to health, education, livelihood etc are being delivered.

On one fine weekend, Dr Paturi started interacting with Village Kasipadu, a village almost 5000 km away, right from her home environs. The medium used was the most popular video chat on the internet. The village was very glad to interact with her and the local leadership including the elected representative (the Panchayat Sarpanch) extended their co-operation to her. Dr Paturi consulted the infants and the young mothers in the villages for about two hours every week. The Foundation’s health worker in the village and a few volunteers help to spread the message and organize the young mothers and the infants to consult their “US Doctor” every week at the appointed hour. Within a few months, the dedicated Doctor had counseled young mothers in over 12 villages, without moving from her home. This is a small beginning no doubt, but it has given Dr Paturi tremendous professional and personal satisfaction and she hopes to realize her dream of building a health center in her village soon.

Technology today provides various cost-effective channels for real-time interaction (like chat, videoconferencing, Voiceover IP, e-mail, and instant messaging). The key then is to evolve suitable structures and processes so that the diaspora is able to assume a larger role without sacrificing their professional careers and interests and with minimum investment of their time. There is a strong belief that real-time interaction of the diaspora community with the projects/communities/villages in India would have a beneficial impact. The services that could flow through the system include educating school children, primary health care, computer literacy and skills-imparting especially for women. However, the issue of leadership is an unsettled debate with ambiguous views from the diaspora and the nonprofits.

An innovative vehicle of diaspora philanthropy that emphasizes this two-way exchange and, if effectively harnessed, has the potential to solve many issues on the ground in the rural India is Virtual Leadership. Virtual Leadership is defined as assuming full lifecycle responsibility -from concept to implementation- for an initiative or a project addressing specific deliverables in the social sector with modern information technology being used as a tool. Virtual Leadership – the term combines two different but situationally connected concepts; The Leadership, with focus on making things happen and Virtuality, necessitated by the geographical distance and enabled by technology.

Tail piece :

Diaspora philanthropy is but one component of a broader concept of ‘Social remittances’ that includes the transfer of values, attitudes and practices. In the coming days, it is expected that Diaspora giving will switch from material giving – money or financial contributions – to intellectual or in-kind giving, such as research, advice, and teaching. A majority of the Indian diaspora consists of professionals and knowledge workers who could utilize their core competencies for social causes. However, the diaspora’s influence on the implementation of social projects (the weakest link of the chain) is minimal, considering the distance, time and effort required, and the hitherto prohibitive technological costs.

The concept of Virtual Leadership combines three key components: The potential of the Indian diaspora, the power of ICT and a new mechanism which can foster a Southern version of Philanthropy as ‘Doing Good together’ as opposed to the Northern version of Philanthropy as ‘Doing Good to others’. It can be praxis for poor, as it reflects the broad principles behind the public-private partnership (PPP), which is courted by almost every Government across the world. In a way, it becomes a ‘Micro PPP’ –much more effective in its impact because of the factors behind it – the individual commitment, technology and managing for impact.

The above piece is an extract from my work ‘Virtual Leadership – The next wave of Diaspora Philanthropy’ done at CUNY in 2006. But when I read it again recently, it occurred to me that if you replace the term “Diaspora” with “Urban Indian professionals”, it would still ring true and open up a lot of possibilities!

Sempatti - ICT for Quality ?

Sempatti visit was refreshing in many ways. It is the first time I had a chance to interpret the word Agriculture in the context of vegetables, fruits, flowers etc. The local farmers in this village, about 25 km from Dindigul, are more of the middle class households who bet on roses, jasmine, drumstick, brinjal etc. The excellent work done by the team at M S Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) center at Sempatti in aggregating the whole piece is certainly an example to be emulated. Every question of the farmer is recorded and responded within a definite time period (I noticed that there are more outgoing calls from the center than the incoming ones). They have gathered knowledge about the entire supply chain, market dynamics, and more importantly they know all the Krishi Vigyan Kendra scientists,government officials, traders on a personal basis, outside their official relationships. They have earned the trust of the farmers in the villages around Sempatti over a period of almost 5 years , which is evident when they share their trade secrets which they will not divulge to an “Agri Dept” personnel.

A few years ago , Agri prices went ‘online’ for the first time from Ottanchattiram , the nearby wholesale market. The commodities were listed for both their quantities traded and the last price , modeled on the stock exchanges. When I made some enquiries on the current status of that project, there were no satisfactory replies, but the center has excellent contacts with the large buyers/sellers at the market that they still get their “ real-time price updates” on telephone from the market to be disseminated to the farmers.

Information and Communication technologies (ICT) has been acknowledged as a major element in development-the UN General Assembly recently approved the Tunis agenda and the commitment of the World Summit on the Information Society. Many of the ICT initiatives started with disseminating information, but the impact was not very high as there were no avenues to make use of the information. The kiosk models then attempted transactions and tried for a cost recovery, which was largely unsuccessful. Most of the diagnosed reasons for failure were linked to connectivity and statements like “…if only we had better connectivity…” etc were quite common, even among the experts. But if one observes the success stories of the online world, even in commercial marketplace – Amazon, FaceBook, Twitter etc, it did not require a sophisticated high bandwidth connection at the users’ end. The reasons are therefore primarily linked to the mismatched price-value relationship. Today, broadband is a reality in many villages, but the service offerings have not marched alongside the quality of connectivity.

Low-cost access to information infrastructure is a necessary prerequisite for the successful use of ICT by the poor, but it is not sufficient. The implementation of ICT projects needs to be performed by organizations and individuals who have the appropriate incentives to work with marginalized groups. Furthermore, grassroots intermediaries and the involvement of the community are identified as the main factors that foster local ownership and the availability of content and services that respond to the most pressing needs of the poor. There have been only a few successes in the entire country so far with Healthcare and Education leading the way, but the key lesson has always been to deliver high quality services and then worry about cost recovery. Further, the returns have been excellent whenever the online capability is complemented by the offline relationships. Initiatives like Narayana Hridalaya and HMRI have established path breaking models.

Another critical factor here is the spread of ICT to rural India and there are positive signs on the near horizon. Government of India is currently implementing an ambitious project called the Common Services Centers (CSC) initiative to reach the entire rural India, with each CSC covering 5-6 surrounding villages in a honey-comb structure. The encouraging aspect of Indian ICT experience is that the market forces are also not behind in reaching out to rural India. In fact, India is the fastest-growing wireless market in the world and its growth potential is impressive. The dynamic leader behind the ICT initiatives at MSSRF, Senthil Kumaran recently explained the “Green SIM” card initiative launched in collaboration with one of the leading service providers, which provides five free messages/advices/alerts to farmers on a daily basis tailored to their local cultivational needs.

Tail piece :

Here are two anecdotal pieces which might explain the complexity in ‘designing’ programs and modeling the behavioural pattern of rural customers/people:

1. At Ottanchattiram, one can see another ingenuity at work in grabbing the farm produce from the poor : there are intermediaries who pose themselves as farmers at the marketplace and when the small farmers arrive, they offer a price a little higher than the local prices stating that they would not be able to get a better price for their ‘unmarketable lot size’. The farmers return home satisfied with a marginal profit, but the intermediaries then aggregate several transactions like this to convert them to a ‘marketable lot’ and sell in the real market at a higher price and pocket the difference !

2. In Sempatti, many families prefer to work in cotton textile mills, which are atleast 50-75 km away, even for a wage of about Rs.50 per day. The reason : They are picked up from their homes and dropped back at their doorstep on “modern buses on par with the best – shaded glass, cushion seats, attractive colours, sleek design”. Which owner would do this sir ? they ask. Surely the mill owners know a thing or two about their wards. It is also common to borrow and spend without savings, and when time comes for repayment the male members of the family head towards Tiruppur and slog for a few weeks without nightcap and rest and return with some surplus cash to solve cashflow problems.

Sittanavasal – Neglected, but magnificient

An overwhelming number of popular tourist places in the state of Tamil Nadu have Hindu origin (Think of Madurai, Rameswaram, Tiruchi, Mylapore etc). Almost all the literary works have always had Tamils as Hindu characters (though three of the ‘Aimperunkappiams’ (Five Great Epics) have a great deal of philosophies and characters from Buddhism and Jainism). Very little authoritative studies have reached the general public regarding the innumerable and inevitable clashes amongst various religions in their early days. In fact, one would not be faulted if he/she thinks that this part of the world always had Hinduism at its helm, given the absence of contrarian claims. Among the other major religions, Buddhism seems to have somehow taken an aerial route to SriLanka directly from Andhra Pradesh. Christianity claims are more prevalent in the west coast of India then the East coast. Jainism, however, seems to have a strong relationship with Tamil Nadu for almost 1000 years starting first century B.C. There is a school of thought that claim that the Thirukkural- the primordial work of Tamilians had Jainist origins and some refute this notion , instead categorizing it as a Shaivaite work. Though the great writer Sujatha has written about the debate in ‘Kanaiyazhi’ almost thirty years ago, interested readers can visit the blog of the writer Jeyamohan on this subject (http://www.jeyamohan.in/) for recent views. The jury is still out on that one, but if you would like to visit a place reminiscent of non-Hindu period in Tamil Nadu, you can easily pick the rocks at Sitthannavasal. Abode of Siddhas (Jain monks) is the meaning of the name .

It is a tribute to our attitude towards our history that the sole employee appointed by the Archeological Survey of India as a caretaker of this monument was not even at the ticket counter at 11 am in the morning. He was watching our vehicle from a distance and only after confirming that we actually wanted to visit the place did he amble towards us. You cannot fault him because the rock surface is just by the side of the Pudukkotati-Annavasal main road and one will give it a miss if not watchful, as there are no large signboards worthy of a historic site. There is a hillock which leads to ‘Ezhadippattam’ – the cavern where the Jain monks practiced their meditation and led their ascetic lives. I noticed a ‘No Photography’ sign and asked the caretaker how the stone structure could possibly be damaged by photography. Instead of trying for a reason, he took the easier route : “ You can take your camera , Sir” clearly expecting some ‘Gandhian favour’ in return. We declined the offer and prodded along till we reached the cave which has a very low ceiling, but well lit and spacious. There are a series of stone beds – 3’X10’ slots carved out on the stone floor with an elevated head rest on one side to be used as ‘pillow’, and there are about 17 of them. There is a Brahmi script inscription as well explaining the purpose. But even before the Government could act to protect the monument, one can notice the inevitable love messages left by our romeos and examination numbers inscribed by our pious students all over the structure.

Adjacent to the Stone Bed is the better known cave temple known as Arivar-koil, which houses the unparalleled Sittannavasal paintings (http://www.poetryinstone.in/lang/en). The painting and the remnants of the structure are worth the visit and deserve to be promoted even more. The celebration of life seen through the vivid colours and the comity of different living beings like elephants, buffaloes, men and women, lilies and lotuses certainly makes you yearn for those days. Said to be of the same age as their famous Ajanta cousins, this ceiling work encapsulates the skill, mastery of those faceless artisans. You can also see the carvings of Thirthankaras affirming the Jain origins. In addition, the sanctum sanctorum has been designed to echo the primordial sound, Om….which when uttered reverberates in all directions, but not the normal conversations.

Notwithstanding the advice given by the Government on the photography, if you want to see the pictures of these two places, pl visit
http://www.pudukkottai.org/places/sittannavasal/03sittannavasal.html#the%20Sittannavasal%20Paintings and
www.saigan.com/heritage/.../Sittannavasal%20-%20a%20booklet.pdf

P.S. In writer Sujatha, we probably had the best link between common people and science, a rare combination. Though one of the prolific writers covering a wide range of subjects with intellectual authority, he was rejected by the literary world because of his identification with popular media like magazines and movies. When he passed away this year, the media recalled him more for being a classmate of APJ and for being part of the EVM design team than for his work as a pioneer author. A versatile creative genius, he was clearly a couple of generations ahead. For example, in 1960s, he started writing a column which would appear on the last page of the leading literary monthly magazine Kanaiyazhi, which continued for almost thirty years or so (long before Bajaj Auto did the famous deal with India Today for the last cover page ad). It was a one pager written in his inimitable style of self deprecating humour, where the topics would range from Purananuru to Haiku , Robots to Book reviews and so on . It became very popular and brought in a lot of readers to the otherwise serious magazine. Clearly, the forerunner of today’s blogs ! He, of course, opined that blogs are superficial and an endless ego trip. Many said the same things about his columns in Kanaiyazhi too.