Workshop on Pre-Marital Counseling

Three workshops on Pre-Marital Counseling were organized by BISWA at three different colleges of Sambalpur town. 1st work-shop of this series was organized at N.S.C.B. College, Sambalpur on 6th February 08. Sri Anthony Nag , Principal, N.S.C.B. College presided over the meeting. Chief Guest Dr. Chapala Mishra, Head Of the Department, Psychology, G.M.College, Sambalpur spoke on Domestic violence,its reason, consequences and legal implications, Sri Pawan Agrawal, Research Scholar of Deptt.of Anthropology, Sambalpur University delivered his speech on concept of marriage especially in the Indian context, Ms. Tilottama Khandapani, Research Officer, BISWA, spoke on Reproductive Health Education and Sri Bhawani Shankar Mishra, Manager, Health, BISWA on Biological and Psychological needs, High risk behavior and its impact, STD/HIV/AIDS. Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations delivered the welcome address and Ms.Sarita Mahapatra, Counselor, Family Counseling Centre, BISWA tendered the vote of thanks. 2nd workshop was organized at G.M.College (Autonomous),Sambalpur on 13th February 08. The meeting was chaired by Sri Sribatsa Das, Vice-Principal, G.M.College. Dr. Chapala Mishra, Head of the Department of Psychology gave her speech on mental health-identificationand treatment of mental illness and Psycho-Social skills. Sri Pawan Dalmia, Reasearch Scholar of Department of anthropology, Sambalpur university spoke on Concept of marriage especially in the Indian context, Ms. Tilottama Khandapani, Reasearch Officer, BISWA on Reproductive Health Education and Sri Bhawani Shankar Mishra, Manager, Health, BISWA on Biological and psychological needs high risk behavior and its impact STD/HIV/AIDS. Ms Rekha Devi, Head of the Department of Geography, also took a session regarding Pre-marital counseling.At last a question answer session was organized, which was conducted by Ms. Khandapani. Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations, welcomed the Guests and resources person at the outset and Ms. Sarita Mahapatra, Counselor, Family Counseling Centre, BISWA tendered the vote of thanks at the end. Similarly, the 3rd workshop was organized at Government Womens College, Sambalpur on 20th February 08. The meeting was chaired by Dr Shashank Shekhar Nanda, Principal of this college. Dr. Tulsi Acharya, Department of Anthropology took a session on Components of family functioning, Role, Communication, cohesion, adaptive pattern. Like this Dr.Chapala Mishra, Head of the Department of Psychology, G.M.College took her session her Common sources of stress and its impact, coping strategic mental health,social skills,Dr.Arpita Sabath, Head of the department of Education on Biological and psychological needs, Ms Smitisudha Tripathy, Department of Home Science took her session on Gender sensitization and power structure, Dr. Diptibala Pattanaik, Consultant, took her session on Reproductive Health Education High risk behaviour and its impact, STD/HIV/AIDS and Dr. Pravabati Guru, Department of Home Science took her session on Domestic Violence reasons, consequence and legal implication. Dr. Pattanaik welcomed the guests and resources person at the outset and Ms. Sarita Mahapatra, Counselor, Family Counseling Centre, BISWA tendered the vote of thanks at the end.

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Communicate Minds BISW A & AR TISAN DEVEL OPMENT BISWA ARTISAN DEVELOPMENT
16th February 2008 FORTNIGHTLY

Volume-78

Woman SHG Convention

ADVISORS
Khirod Ch. Malick

PRINTED MATTER

Pitabasa Sethi Ajoy Shroff Jogeswar Majhi Shiv Prasad Meher Aurobinda Mahapatra

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In this Issue...
Editorial Woman SHG Convention Other news of BISWA

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Chief Editor Debabrata Malick Editor Muralidhar Sethy
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Printed and Published by Debabrata Malick, Chief Editor. The Link, at BISWA Computer Section, Danipali, Budharaja, Sambalpur. PIN- 768004 Ph. No- 0663-2533597, email: thelink@biswa.org

A convention of Woman Self Help Groups (SHGs) was organized by BISWA on 29th January 2008 at its Environment Friendly Waste Plastic Recycle Unit, Danipali. The meeting was presided over by Sri K.C.Malick, Chairman, BISWA. Sri Kapurbhai Chandaria, Chairman, ANaRDe Foundation was the Chief Guest of the occasion. Other Guests on the dais were Sri Jitendra Rautroy, Dr.Alam & Sri Rajen Dhulia of ANaRDe Foudation and Sri Ashutosh Mishra of Reliance Money. Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations gave the welcome address at the outset. While addressing to the audience, the guests opined that they would work with BISWA to eradicate poverty from Orissa. Sri Malick spoke out that BISWA is going to work with ANaRDe Foundation and Reliance money to eradicate poverty from Orissa and render more profit to the SHGs. He

added poverty could be wiped out only by empowering the SHG members. How SHG members would get more interest by investing their saving money in share market, how the SHG members and their family would be covered in health, life & asset insurances, how they would conserve water and use it in business purpose, how could they cut the health expenses by facilitating safe drinking water and latrine etc were also discussed there. Dr. Jharana Mishra, Manager, Research, Documentation & Consultantacy and Sri Sisir Sahu, Chief Executive, BISWA Network also spoke on this occasion. About ten thousand women from Jujumura, Rengali, Maneswar blocks and Burla & Hirakud NAC areas attended the convention. Some of the SHG members shared their experiences in the interactive session.

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Women empowerment
Women empowerment is found always relevant not only in India but also all over the world. Even though India is no more a backward country, rather presently identified as a developing one, the need of women empowerment is still found relevant here. Some how the society grew as a male dominated one from time immemorial. Thus it kept itself handicapped by depriving power to half of its population. It is as good as an axle having to uneven wheels at its both ends. Obviously it cannot lodge progress in the desired direction with such handicap. Any way the society has realized its folly, even though after much delay. Several attempts were made in these years to remove this handicap, which is coined as women empowerment. The latest adoption in this series is Self Help Group (SHG) module and BISWA is following this module. It cannot be termed as a new experiment, as the strength of unity is utilized, which is a time tested realization. In recent years a new trend is being evolved to empower women with following SHG module in almost all walks of life. But BISWA is following the module for altogether a different purpose, i.e. for upliftment of the deprived section of the society. Obviously the stake holders are women here. Formation of groups, empowering them with realization of strength of unity, teaching them to follow the democratic way to organize themselves and last but not the least providing them economic power in the shape of loan(micro credit) with their linkage to bank, could be described as some of its activities in the said direction. The activities are then furthered to building their capacity in micro entrepreneurship development with forward and backward support.

E ditorial

PARTICIPATIONS OF BISWA
An Adolescent Life Skill Training Programme was organized by Neheru Yuba Kendra Sangathan at Kasturaba Gandhi Matruniketan, Mahulpali. Its valedictory function held. on 12th January 2008. The meeting was chaired by Sri Raghunath Mishra. Sri Sarat Sahu,Chairman, Jujumura block joined as Chief Guest on this occasion. Among others Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations, BISWA, Sri Paramanda Pradhan, Sarapancha, Birasinghgarh Gram Panchayat, Sri Satya Pattnaik, Regional Coordinator, Neheru Yuba Kendra Sangathan, Sambalpur were present as Guests of Honour. Earlier 42 t r a i n e e participants of Life Skill Tr a i n i n g programme, paid an exposure visit to BISWA Head Office on 19 th December 2007. An informal welcome meeting was held at BISWA Training Institute. Sri Jogeswar Majhi, Manager, BISWA Training Institute and Sri Muralidhar Sethy, Assistant Manager, Public Relations welcomed the visitors alongwith trainees and some of their parents. Sri Raghunath Mishra & Dr. Diptibala Pattnaik, DART member of Neheru Yuba Kendra, Sambalpur were present there. Sri Pranaya Kumar Purohit, District Project Officer, Sri Baladev Purohit, Counselor, Sri Pradip Kumar Biswal, APV, Ms. Smita Maharana, APV, Sri Kailash Chandra Mahanty, Accountant accompanied the team. Dr Ashok Kumar Singhal took a session on Human Psychology and Human Reproductive System where as Dr.Pattnaik took a session on unsafe sex and HIV/AIDS. Then Sri Majhi told the visitors about the aims and objectives of BISWA and its different activities. A consultation workshop on Role of Volunteers in Disaster Management was organized by OSDMA and UNDP/UNV at Conference hall of Collectorate , Sambalpur on 4th January 2008. Sri Laxmi Narayan Nayak, District Magistrate & Collector, Sri Hemanta Kumar Das, Joint Relief Commissioner, OSDMA, Sri Nirmal Chandra Satpathy, ADM, Ms Kalika Mahapatra, Senior Programme Associate & Key Resource Person, UNDP and Sri Gyana Das were on the dais. Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations, BISWA took part in this meeting and gave a presentation on Institutional setup for involving volunteers.

Awareness-cum- Scholarship Distribution Meeting

Orientation-cum-training programme on Renewable energy and its application

Mr. Giridhari Munda, Senior Assistant Manager, NRM & IRB department of BISWA attended the orientation cum training programme for two days on Renewable Energy and its application, at Bhubaneswar on 5th and 6th February 2008. The programme was organized by Center for Environmental Education (CEE) and Orissa Renewable Energy Development Agency (OREDA), the two pioneers in the Renewal Energy sector. The programme covered important topics like Village Energy Plan and integration of Renewal energy programmes. Under energy plan, village electrification for rural areas through alternate energy was discussed. This was a crucial learning in view of BISWAs proposed intervention through LED based household and street lighting in the tribal as well as interior villages of Orissa. In supplement to the discussions, there was an exposure visit to a village in Nayagarh where the renewable energy programme is being implemented. The sessions also covered Carbon trading in context to the global climatic changes. BISWA is working towards a Biomass Based Energy project, of which the first phase on Feasibility Study is over. It is assumed that BISWA can build a replicable model so that the reduction in energy emission becomes an economically beneficial activity for the developing countries to follow. At the end of two days, the participants from various social development organizations across Orissa exchanged their views on the implementation of renewal energy projects in their operational areas. BISWA seeks to learn from the experience of this workshop, both in theory and the practicalities for further conceptions on the Energy front.

An Insurance Awareness-cum-Scholarship Distribution meeting was organized in village Kusang of Bolangir District on the 16th of January 2007. The venue was the premises of the famous Maa Durga Temple in Kusang. Around 100 members of the Self Help Groups attended the meeting. From BISWA Head Office, Mr. Ajoy Kumar Shroff, ManagerInsurance; Mr. M. P. Rayguru, Asst. Manager- Assets Insurance and Mr. M.D. Sahu, Asst. Manager- LIC were present. Mr. Jamil Ahmed, Development Officer, Oriental Insurance Company Ltd. also attended the meeting. At the outset, Mr. Puspadhanu Jena, Area Coordinator and DC-In charge, Bolangir introduced the guests and spoke about the aim of the meeting. Some of the office bearers of the SHGs introduced themselves also. Then the visiting officials on the dais introduced themselves. Mr. Rayguru explained in detail about the importance of assets Insurance whereas, Mr.Ahmed detailed about the new Oriental Health Insurance. Mr. Ajoy Shroff spoke about the Micro Insurance programme of BISWA and explained them the importance of the various Insurance Schemes.The interactive session was quite lively. The members asked several questions pertaining to ICICI-Lombard, scholarship under JBY, claim settlement procedures, etc. These were clarified by the officials present in the meeting. Mr. M. D. Sahu distributed scholarship to the 21 children of the members covered under JBY. The total scholarship amount was Rs.12, 600/. The meeting ended with the vote of thanks by Mr.Jena.

2 nd Kafe Khusi Opened

A food kiosk named Kafe Khusi, was opened at Kachery Road, Sambalpur on first day of February. Kafe Khusi is a part of BISWA initiative to create e c o n o m i c livelihoods of SHG members of urban areas. It is sponsored by ITC Limited, one of Indias top ten corporates. This is

Women Power

Thousands of women gathered in SHG convention

the 2nd Kafe Khusi kiosk in Sambalpur town. The formal inauguration of the kiosk took place in the presence of Sri K.C.Malick, Chairman, BISWA and Sri Julius Lakra, Project Director, District Rural Development Agency. Sri Shiv Prasad Meher, Manager, Public Relations, Sri Krupasindhu Guru, Project Coordinator and Sri Subhash Mishra, Supervisor were also present there.