Bhoomi Kendram WASSAN

Minutes of the meeting with CFs

on 19.12.2007, CWS Conference Hall Hyderabad

I.  Introduction and Purpose of the Meeting

Ø  Chief Functionaries of all partners attended the meeting except Ms. Bhanuja of REDS. Yellappa represented her.

Ø  Prashanthi ,APMSS also participated in the meeting along with the three DPCs of Karimnagar, Nalgonda and Warangal

Ø  Ravi started with explaining the purpose of the meeting at 10am. This meeting was conducted to review the progress in the lst three months, plan to full fill the gaps at project and partner level

II. Review of previous action plan

Organization wise CFs and DPCs explained the status of the activities planned earlier.

REDS / Facilitated formation of
·  8 groups with 40 members in Veerepallypeta village and also formed a labour committee with 11 members
·  3 groups with 40 members in Yetigadda thanda and formed labour committee.
·  3 groups in Patnam village
·  3 groups in Rachuvaripalli
and formed labour committees in all these villages
1)  Yetigadda thanda villagers were asking for Sprinklers, REDS is trying to facilitate linkages for provide the same
Nalgonda-APMSS / 1)  Completed PLA in 4 villages
2)  Has to consolidate the EGS-website downloaded data
Warangal-APMSS / 1)  Fulfilling the gaps in Baseline information
2)  Facilitated application of job cards in Kasulapadu
3)  Planning to conduct Grama Sabha for works identification in Pedicilla
Karimnagar-APMSS / 1)  Completed the baseline in all villages
2)  In Chandranayak thanda no body has the job card, trying to apply for job cards
ARTS / 1)  By end of the December PLA will be completed in all the villages
2)  Communication campaigns completed
3)  Enrollment process is going on
EFFORT / 1)  Baseline and PRA completed in all villages
2)  Need to review the selection of villages for this project specifically on Mirjapeta village

III. Discussion on basic elements of the project

After the sharing of organization wise status, Ravi started the discussion to evolve the essential elements of the project to be completed from the partners, The basic elements evolved are

  1. Communication
  2. Information
  3. Assessment
  4. Enrollment
  5. Formation of Committees (REDS)
  6. Coordination with EGS officials(ARTS)
  7. Identification of issues
  8. Evolving Research based issues

It was agreed that by mid January all the organizations complete the basic level of achievement of all the above elements

For all the commitments from the individual organizations.

ARTS- Except formation of committees other works will be completed by end of December

EFFORT- Except formation of committees other works will be completed by end of December

Warangal-APMSS – By 15th January will complete first 7 points

Karimnagar-APMSS – By 15th January will complete first 7 points

Nalgonda-APMSS – By 15th January will complete first 7 points

PILUPU- Enrollment and Formation of committees will be completed by Jan.15th and others will be finished by the end of December

REDS-Assessment will be completed by end of December and all the tasks by January 15th

After evolving individual commitments, roles and responsibilities of Village activists were discussed. Village activist’s has to involve basically in two types of tasks.

1) Ensure EGS entitlements at village level

Ø  Organize wage labour

Ø  Conduct regular meetings

Ø  Provide information to the wage seekers

Ø  Support wage labour in identification of works, execution and payments

Ø  Ensure EGS entitlements like application for the job card and get the receipt, work site facilities, timely payment, muster maintenance etc.

2) Project related tasks.

Ø  Assist the field coordinator

Ø  Day –to –day feed back to FC

Ø  Identification of issues

IV. MOU with G.O.AP for working in selected Mandals

Ravi shared the information regarding MOU with Mr. Raju, Principal Secretary, RD, arrived by some of the members of UHHAC. Both are planning to work together for better implementation of EGS. The main objective of this proposal is to secure 100 days wage employment to at least 2000 families by the end of March 2008 in the selected mandals. There will be a Mandal volunteer and an activist for every 500 workers. Some of the committee members did not under this MOU. CEC is playing the anchoring role. By explaining this he invited the opinions of all partners.

ARTS-Sanyasi rao expressed that, they can associate with this project without any financial assistance from the government project, but cannot effectively raise issues with the government.

Prashanthi-APMSS expressed that empowerment approach and the proposed project focus is different, so we can not work the way proposed in the MOU. One can put additional efforts in additional villages simultaneously working with our regular project out of MOU. Others also expressed similar opinions. So, it was agreed that the group will continue its efforts in the present form and explore the opportunities to get administrative support in the selected villages, but not in the purview of the MOU between CEC lead initiative and GO.A.P

Other issues discussed:

During the implementation process we have to find the impact of EGS on small & marginal farmers and large formers. Mohan rao- EFFORT opined that, large farmers are complaining about differing in wages, and they are proposing that agriculture woks can be proposed under EGS then it is easy to get labor. Ravi said that according to EGS act we can not work for individual benefit so can solve this problem in other way.

Janardhan Pilupu gave the example of ACCORD in Mulkalpally village. Small & marginal farmers are not cultivated the paddy this year, because they have to invest money and can not expect good crop, so preferred to go EGS works. And in some cases they have invested this money in next harvest.

Sanyasi Rao –ARTS shared in Srikakulam farmers have shifted to Social forestry (near to this area, paper mills are located, the management of the mills are assuring that they will take the product after five years) and are going for EGS works.

EFFORT Mohan rao shared, in some villages of Prakasam similar situations were observed where farmers are shifting to social forestry rather than regular Agricultural works.

After this discussion Ravi reminded all the partners about the proposal of publishing a book let with case studies linked to mis-utilisation of EGS which has to be identified in respective project villages while getting involved with the implementation cycle. This was proposed and agreed by all the partners on 2nd September during inception meeting. But no progress was seen till date. Everyone accepted the delay and committed to get engaged in work from Jan 1st onwards.

V. Action Plan Dec-Jan

Activities / Base line, PLA with consolidated report / Involving with implementation cycle / Identification of issues/case studies
Org. Name / ARTS / By end of December / started / From last week of this month
EFFORT / Consolidated report end of this months / From end of this month / From last week of this month
APMSS-Nalgonda / By 15th January / From end of this month / From last week of this month
APMSS-Karimnagar / By 15th January / Starts from end of this month / From last week of this month
APMSS-Warangal / By 15th January / started / From last week of this month
REDS / End of December / started / In process
PILUPU / 15th January / started / From last week of this month

*Minutes by Kalpana