We are now 10 years into ASER, and real sense of momentum is building within me. I want to thank all the partner organisations and supporters in Bihar who have helped to make ASER a reality.
Stories can inspire action and there are two such stories I want to share with all of you. One story made me very happy and hopeful while the other made me feel sad but, at the same time, taught me to accept some realities of working in the social sector.
Story 1 : A journey from inspiration to action
In 2006, I met Balram Prasad Ji at a ‘Voluntary Forum for Education Networking’ meet. It was a forum for local capacity-building of NGOs in Bihar. Balram Prasad Ji was an active member of this forum. After interacting with the members of Voluntary Education Forum, some volunteered to partner with Pratham to conduct the ASER survey in their home districts. Balram Prasad Ji was one of them. He hailed from Nalanda district and was committed to solving many of the district’s pressing issues. His life was dedicated to taking up social issues and engaging with communities to better their social and economic conditions.
As the General Secretary of his NGO, Gramin Manav Seva Mandir, he took the responsibility of conducting the survey in 30 villages of his district. Through this first ASER exercise in 2006, he became aware of the grim education situation in the villages of his district. He was very alarmed and wanted to do something about it and decided to raise awareness on education in his area. He went on to become a mukhya (chief) of his village and organised meetings to bring about awareness and talked about ways to improve the status quo. He used every platform to discuss the ASER findings and went on to become one of our long-standing committed partners.
In 2011, he visited the Pratham office in Patna to hand over the survey formats and collect his cheque. When we tried contacting him after that day, we were told that he had disappeared. I was shocked! Did he get lost? Did he pass away due to an illness? Was he kidnapped?
To this day, no one knows where he went or what happened to him. We reached out to the police, his family and his colleagues from organisations he was associated with and they too have no clue about his whereabouts. He went missing. I wish I could have done something to help. I often wonder what could have had happened. How could someone go missing like that, quietly leaving his family and friends?
Balram Prasad Ji was an extremely passionate and inspirational man. He had that ability to create hope, purpose and motivation. His work, achievements, attitude, commitment and values continue to inspire me every day.
Story 2: A filmy incident
Patori Veena Seva Sansthan (PVSS) is an NGO based in Katihar district of Bihar. Katihar is situated in the north-eastern part and is among the least developed districts of the state. Finding a partner organisation in Katihar has always remained a challenge for us. The events I am about to narrate took place in 2011.
We approached PVSS through a trusted reference and the General Secretary agreed to partner with us to do the ASER survey. Within a few days of our agreement, some members of PVSS began to rebel against this partnership. They began to demand full payment for their services even before completing the survey in their villages.
At ASER, we follow a very basic principle – we pay half the amount to the partner organisation at the beginning to help them cover their training and travel costs and the remaining amount is only paid once they have submitted the survey formats.
For some reason, this rebel camp did not trust us or their General Secretary. When we refused to pay the full amount to them upfront before the survey began, they did not want to continue working with us. My team continued to follow up with those volunteers a little more persistently. We pushed them a lot to get them to complete the work they had signed up for. Eventually they did complete the survey in their villages and followed the protocol required, but this required a lot of follow-ups on our part.
However, the story does not end here. They decided to spice it up a little by making it harder for us yet entertaining for them.
When the time came for the survey formats to be submitted at the Pratham district headquarters. they refused to comply. Instead, they asked us to meet them at places like ‘nadi ke kinare’ (by the banks of the river) or ‘mandir ke bagal’ (next to the temple). We got a little doubtful and were not very sure if it was a good idea to meet them at the landmarks they wanted us to come to. We approached the General Secretary, but the volunteers refused to listen to him as well. Since we had to collect the survey formats, we decided to prepare ourselves by familiarising ourselves with the area first. We were also a little worried about our personal safety. Finally, we did go to meet them to collect our survey formats and pay them the remaining amount for completing the survey in their villages.
Learning
The Katihar story was an interesting experience – definitely very different from our experience in Nalanda. This experience helped us to understand how to deal with people who have different intents and purposes when they join an ASER-like survey. I have also grown to be more patient when working with my own people.
As a social worker, I have also realised that I cannot impose on the partner organisations to do as I say, or expect them to look at the positive effects of what I am telling them. Ultimately, they are the ones who have to choose whether they want to be part of the change. We cannot force anyone to change their ways.
Building meaningful partnerships is not an easy task. Some partners will be like Balram Prasad Ji for whom change began from inside and, like him, will have the burning desire to strive for such a change within their communities. There will also be others who consider the partnership as purely transactional.
If we have to bring about social change, we have to start somewhere and learn, and patiently keep working towards our mission.
(Sanjay Kumar Singh was an essential part of the 2004 dipstick in Bihar and the first ASER survey in 2005 in Bihar. He is now the Pratham state head of Bihar)