Ganesh Patel is a young boy of 25 years from the village of Karawara, Kherwara in Udaipur. He has done his schooling from Karawara and has graduated in arts from MLSU, Udaipur.Currently; he is pursuing his Masters in Social Work from Rajasthan Vidyapeeth, Udaipur. He has been into the social sector for the last 3-4 years. Presently, he is the treasurer of Sanjha Manch, a youth research centre of ALFA Educational Society.

Ganesh says that Sanjha Manch is doing a very excellent job in educating and infusing the feeling of oneness among the generation next. He says that generally the youths living in the remote villages remain aloof of the happenings of the outside world and as a result of this; they lag behind the youths of the urban areas. In the villages, neither do they receive quality education nor do they get proper exposure. He says that a majority of the youths from his village go to Kuwait after their 10th or 12th in search of job. It is in this regard that Sanjha Manch is doing a commendable job by arranging for tuition classes and exposure trips for the children and youths of the villages. Exposure trips give the local youths a chance to come out of their nutshells and experience the outside world and hence, widen their own world view in the very process.

On the personal side, Ganesh feels that being a part of the Sanjha Manch family has brought some positive changes within him. He admits that earlier he used to be too prudish and shy in speaking in public but slowly and gradually, after interacting with different international and national interns coming to Sanjha Manch for internships and sharing one’s own thoughts with them, he has become quite eloquent and has opened up a lot. He feels that now, he can get down well with people from different backgrounds.

Ganesh also adds that working on such issues require a lot of funding and infrastructure which presently the organization lacks. Some kind of professionalism and discipline is also required for running an organization. He says that once the organization starts receiving funds, the organizations working can be structured well and it can be run in a more efficient way. He thinks that the big corporate houses must come forward to help such very few organizations that work at the grassroot level.

After completing his MSW, Ganesh looks forward to giving his best to the organization and is quite confident that the organization will very earnestly work for achieving its objective.

Interviewed and written by Rohit Singh,a SMILE intern from PRAVAH(Dec,2011)

Hello everybody!! I am Rohit Singh. I belong to Ghazipur in the eastern part of Uttar Pradesh but born and brought up in the beautiful city of Guwahati (Assam).I passed my engineering (Electrical & Electronics) from Ghaziabad (U.P) in the year 2011.Before sharing my experience, I would like to make a few points clear that would justify my motto behind coming for this wonderful rural internship programme:

1) Right from my childhood, I have been very proud of my India. Its vast diversity seduced me a lot and I always cherished a desire to explore its diversity. I always desired of identifying myself with each and every Indian irrespective of his/her caste, sex, religion, region etc and the very internship played a very short but very vital role in this regard.

2) I want to give back something to the society, to the country. I want to bring about a change in the society either by joining the civil services or through constructive and good politics. But before doing so, I feel it’s very necessary to understand the ground realities and experience the problems/issues at the grassroot level of the society and the country as a whole.

3) To widen my world view and understand issues from different perspectives

As a part of the SMILE internship programme of Pravah, I was placed at ALFA Educational Society in the beautiful village of Karawara, Kherwara, Udaipur, Rajasthan. For me, the internship was an awesome one which gave me a wonderful feeling which is inexplicable. The exposure gave me a golden opportunity to explore myself and to come out of my comfort zone.

ALFA Educational Society basically works in the areas of child education and communalism. It is doing a very commendable work and that too, on self support basis. During my stay there, my job was basically confined to documenting, interviewing people and teaching English grammar to the youths and the children of the villages. The overall internship was a perfect blend of work, fun and adventure. The youths and the people of the locality were very warm and friendly which made the internship a memorable one. The place was like a second home to me. The outskirt of the village was a scenic beauty with hilly forests and ponds that acted as a symbol of serenity. I interacted a lot with the youths of the villages and we also shared one’s thoughts with each other. Those interactions and discussions helped me in knowing the ground realities of the villages and understanding the issues through their eyes. I made many new friends and relationships in those few

days. Interacting with people like Pathan (an electrical mechanic) and Kantibhai (a tea stall owner) was full of fun.

I am very grateful to my mentor Mr.Lokesh Kalal who tried his best to make me feel comfortable and guided me throughout the internship. He was very supportive of my work and always kept on encouraging me like an elder brother. It is often said that every human being is selfish by nature but when I looked forward to Lokesh, I was forced to give that saying a second thought. His organization has no external funding yet; he is working on an issue as sensitive as communalism which many well established NGOs refrain from laying their hands on. Although, I found that ALFA lacked some professionalism and the working there was not structured but I am quite hopeful that once it starts receiving funds, it would function in a more professional and better way. Last but not the least, I wish ALFA huge success in every endeavor of theirs.

ALL THE BEST!!

Rohit Singh, a SMILE intern from Pravah (December, 2011 Batch)

I am Maneesh singh . I am 20 years old and belong to Uttar Pradesh.Iam pursuing my graduation in Science steram from University of Delhi.I worked with Alfa educational society from 14Dec to 31st Dec.I came here as an intern under Pravah a NGO in new delhi.I taughtmahtematics, science and computer science . It was a great experience to devwelop my teaching skills as a well as communication skills. I was appriciated by students and they also co-operated me. I always tried to put my 100%^ efforts.I also taught tribal children near Kherwara village.. They were very excited about the way I taught them.They were intelligent and obedient. I taught them matematics , english and moral education. My hard work was resulted in a good change in theintelluctual level of students.I want say about Pathan Bhai . he was very much willing to learn English.at this stage.By the i footed in kherwara village. the people herewere very helpful.I did not feel like I am away from home. I have learnt about communism as well as iI tried to understand people mentality of all communities here.I would like to thanks to Mr. LokeshKalal CEO of Alfa Education Society.He always encouraging. I got a lot knowledge about society and issue .He provided me good accomodation,food and other facilities. I would like to thanks to Mr.

Kaishbarg, Vasim, Tushar,Malng,Pandit,Moin Khan,Sultan, Mehul .they all made my work entertaining and easy for me.

Special thanks to,All villagers and Fulla ji.I will miss u all.

from,Maneesh SinghHansRaj CollegeUniversity of Delhi