Saloni Meghani

The M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation, with support from the Tata Group, is helping rural residents around Pondicherry discover the marvels of technology

Veerampattinam, a fishing village near Pondicherry, would lose seven to eight people every year to the whims of the waves. But since 1998 not a single life has been lost at sea. The fishermen now know in advance when it is dangerous to go fishing.

At Embalam, Vijaya recently lost her husband. She could easily have been reduced to a picture of helplessness as other widows in her situation often are. Instead, she is raising her two children with an income from a cow bought on a government loan, a widow's pension and a ration card. She has made the most of the government entitlements due to her.

Such and other sunshine stories are increasingly a commonplace phenomenon in the countryside of Pondicherry as villagers no longer lag behind because of ignorance. "Information empowerment is the first requirement of a democratic society," says Professor M. S. Swaminathan, who has sought to bring the knowledge revolution out of the theory in textbooks.

For communities that hang on to life by a slender thread, information is not just power; it is survival. The M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) is keenly aware of this. With help from the Tatas, it has set up the Virtual Academy for Food Security and Rural Prosperity (VARP). The project aims at bringing the knowledge revolution to the doorstep of people living on the periphery.

Under VARP the Foundation has set up knowledge centres at 10 villages around Pondicherry using information and communication technologies. There is a hybrid wired and wireless network comprising PCs, telephones, VHF, duplex radio devices, spread spectrum, email connectivity, VSAT and a public address system. Not only are electronic media like the Internet, cable television, ham radio and loudspeakers used, but traditional methods like print — yellow pages and community pamphlets — and the good old notice board also ensure that the information reaches the intended audience.

"The project uses a hub-and-spokes model, with the state-level hub linking to the block-level hub, which in this case is located at Villianur. This centre serves a cluster of villages," says S. Senthilkumaran, who is involved with the project.

But it is not the hardware that changes the lives of the technological have-nots. What brings them to the knowledge centre in droves is the data that is relevant to their lives. MSSRF focuses on helping them convert this know-how into do-how.

At Veerampattinam the fisher folk earlier used meteorological reports provided by the state's Fisheries Department. But these sometimes came a tad too late. Now the Foundation downloads the wave height and wind direction from the US Navy website. It sends an online message in the local language from the main hub to the village centre. The village centre then makes announcements throughout the day on the public address system set up in the village.

Residents of Embalam, among other villages, receive not just weather reports and lucid information on government schemes, but also the availability of agricultural inputs, market potential and prices for their produce. They also access local databases, health-related updates and job opportunities assimilated from various sources and published in a fortnightly. This publication uses the local language and is distributed free of cost.

To gather the appropriate information the Foundation has linked up with varied sources, national and international. These range from government departments (meteorology, rural development, fisheries, etc) and financial institutions to self-help groups and farmers' associations. VARP has networked with academic and research institutions like the India Space Research Organisation and the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University and field stations like the National Remote Sensing Agency. Most importantly, the Foundation has developed local databases and local web pages. For instance, the yellow pages that have been compiled for the region include a database on animal husbandry and the addresses of doctors.

The project focuses on keeping the content relevant to the demands of the audience. As most of the people are occupied with agriculture, weather management is a crucial requirement. Locale-specific information on the price of agricultural inputs like seeds, fertilisers and pesticides, on the one hand, and the price at which farmers can sell their produce and the markets, on the other, also help. Farmers know which market to take their produce to and what price to sell it at — and they don't rely on middlemen. Their other needs include health updates and clear information on the array of programmes provided by the government.

The project works according to the guidelines for sustainable development issued at the 2002 World Summit at Johannesburg. It concentrates on climate management, water, energy, health, agriculture, and on biodiversity and the ecosystem.

While immediate prosperity is an overt indication of knowledge empowerment, there are many less-obvious obstacles that have been bridged by the centres. Students in rural areas, for instance, are unable to match the resources of their urban counterparts even when they make it to a certain level. But in Pondicherry they are able to download sample question papers from the Internet and prepare for examinations. They can gear up for public entrance exams and courses and check results online. They also get information on colleges and hostels that suit their needs. Teachers in the area are also able to use animation and educational CDs for imparting more effective education to students. Most importantly, because of the free computer education facility, children gain familiarity with technology at a very young age. Additionally, the centres impart training for software development and how to use software such as MS Office, Page Maker and Photoshop.

Keeping pace with the electronic age has helped many entrepreneurs come up with innovative ways to earn some money. Some of them design wedding cards for the rest of the village. Others have discovered routes to sell tender coconuts or vegetables to resorts and hotels in the area.

Connectivity also leads to direct opportunities for livelihood for prospective employees. For instance, seven people from a village secured jobs with local fire stations because of timely updates on vacancies. Some cottage industrialists use the technology at their disposal to streamline their activity and submit yearly reports or even type letters.

By focusing on the most marginalised groups even among the rural population, the knowledge centres have done yeomen's service to women. The centres train them in tailoring or making jute bags, incense sticks and shell decor. At the fishing village Sengalunir, for instance, the women have organised themselves into a self-help group to see their families through the lean season when men are not allowed to fish. The fact that more than half the volunteers at the centres are women ensures that the project makes a positive impact on their lives. Being able to answer queries from the males can go a long way to improve the status perception of women.

This also aids the community involvement that VARP aims to achieve. It sets up the centres while the villages arrange for the premises and pay for the electricity. By taking contributions towards the expenses from the beneficiaries, the Foundation ensures the sustainability of the knowledge centre and a sense of ownership among the villagers. At Embalam, an annexe of the village temple is being used as the common space for the centre, while Theerukanchipeth uses the room set up for television viewing during the daytime.

At this Dalit village, it is also heartening to see the self-respect in the eyes of the 130 families living on less than Rs 50 a day. They have tasted the power of getting organised. Until recently they had no transport to get them to the nearest amenities. Even children had to walk many tedious miles every day to get to school. But now, because of the knowledge centre, women have been trained to ply the zero-emission passenger vehicle almost eight times a day. Some women have downloaded information off the Net and started organic farming for more prosperity.

This is not the only example of how keeping pace with the world fuels action. A businessman holidaying at the beach accidentally met some villagers and casually asked them about the feasibility of a jellyfish preserve unit. Typically, out of sight would have meant out of mind and this idea would have sunk to the bottom of the ocean after the visitor left. But the e-smart villagers kept in touch with this businessman. The business unit born of this interaction today employs 150 people.

Again, under the project, volunteers have been trained to check the population for defects in vision. The data collected is sent to an eye hospital by email for diagnosis. The patients who require ophthalmologic attention are taken to the urban areas for treatment.

Sometimes the villagers make specific queries that the staff at the Centre are hard put to answer. For instance, while satellite images of patches of abundant fish catch tell the fishermen where to head, they don't provide information on the kind of fish available. The fishermen now look to find the colour of the surface water, because they can tell the species by this information.

In this way the project keeps a careful grip on the entire loop for an efficient and effective flow of information. While one of the aims is to collate and adapt data from scientific and other data generating institutions, the virtual academy also aspires to tap into and preserve the traditional wisdom of the rural and tribal communities. On the one hand, this information is pooled together by a consortium of scientists and disseminated to users. On the other hand, the knowledge is shared among the villagers and conserved at the knowledge laboratory.

For instance, the Open Knowledge Network, started in partnership with the One World International, is creating a network to connect the rural poor of the world. In a pilot project in March 2003, three villages were used to feed relevant local news and suggestions to produce a daily newssheet for a fourth village. This daily can be uploaded on WorldSpace and used through the Internet or WorldSpace radio within an hour.

To put the tools into the hands of those who need them, VARP has followed an unusual path. It has selected scholars from amongst the villagers themselves to be torchbearers of the movement. B. Kasthuri, a former housewife, now mobilises members for saving groups and D. Usharani organises health campaigns and eye-camps. Similarly, K. David, a physically challenged advocate, helps spread computer literacy.

MSSRF has thus proved that rural people, whether literate or not, can master new technologies as long as the medium of teaching is the local one and the method is learning-by-doing.

If you see an adolescent surfing up updates on his favourite WWE star or women downloading recipes from international cookery websites, no more might you want to presume that you are in an urban area.

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Uploaded on August 9, 2004