In a unique initiative in Jhalawar district of Rajastha, 2014 batch IAS officer Bharti Dixit is educating NREGA women workers at their work sites for an hour daily. They called it ‘NREGA Pathshala’, which is aimed at providing women labourer with basic literacy.
Pilot project in Manoharthana block is going on and have a teaching module of 45 days in three phases of 15 days each. The NREGA mates are teaching women in the middle of working hours to ensure the presence of all labourers at work sites of this block. Mates have been already given basic training on teaching. Indian Masterminds interacted with Jhalawar District Collector, Bharti Dixit to learn about this initiative.
NREGA PATHSHALA
NREGA Pathshala’s module is designed for the women labourers aged between 21 and 70 years. The women labourers will be taught the basics of maths, Hindi, English, health and hygiene.
Speaking with Indian Masterminds, Ms Bharti said, “The main concept behind this initiative is women empowerment. Most of the labour workforce in NREGA is women. I would say that almost 90 per cent of them are women. And they aggregate everyday for almost 6 hours. Any community work lasts for 2 to 3 fortnights. A fortnight is of 15 days. In this way, these people gather for one and a half to two months. So, we thought that it would be better for them if they take half an hour in between the work and work for their basic literacy. That is why we started this initiative.”
“Most NREGS labourers are women and that they spend 6-7 hours during the terms of work that last for 15 days each. That is why we worked on a module of 45 days. It can run to a few months, but the idea is that imparting 30 minutes of education daily can help them learn,” said Ms Dixit.
LITERACY
She further said, “The mates who are in NREGA are 8th pass. So first of all we are trying to assign female mates, because women are more comfortable in talking to another woman. That is why we are trying to appoint women mates and then, they teach to other women. Every day, for half an hour, they teach women about basic literacy like alphabets, reading and writing etc. So if women literacy increased here, it would be great for everyone as Jhalawar is very backward district in terms of literacy. For women, literacy rate is just 47 percent. And if you see Narega women, then it might go to the extent of 80 to 90 percent, because most of the women working there are belonging to the low socio-economic background.”
“We started it with Manohar Thana block in district. We have total 8 blocks in district. After assessing the outcome of this project, we are planning to scale it up to the entire district.”
WHO ARE MATES
Talking about mates, she said, “Narega Mates are the persons at every work sites, who keeps record of attendance and everything related to work. They also do the analysation and estimation of the work at sites. They also do work division in labours work. You can say that they are the main incharge. The basic qualification for them is 8th pass out. Generally, you will see that male mates are appointed at maximum sites. But, we are trying to appoint women mates instead of men. Secondly, if a woman teaches to women then there will be more comfortable atmosphere. They will be more comfortable to talking each other.”
