Jhansi Catholic SEWA SAMAJ 2.59

a. Name of the Institution/Organization: Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj.
JCSS came into existence in the year 1985 and was registered in the same year under the Societies Registration Act XXI of 1860. It was at that time when the people of UP were facing severe drought. In such a situation, the prime task of the organization was to relieve the people of the havocs of drought and consequent hunger and thirst. Thus JCSS took the initiative to help people of the affected areas by undertaking various development projects related to agriculture and irrigation.

One of the main objectives of JCSS is empowering village women. We intervene in different ways such as health care program, preventive health care, Self Help Groups for women etc. to empower them. Through these programs, we aim at enhancing their self-confidence, power of decision-making, self-respect, self-reliance and ultimately uniting them together at the grass-root level to fight for their rights and dignity. When they are united, they will be able to help one another to fight for another’s cause. Thus they keep each step forward with inner strength and self-confidence. JCSS is functioning as the official relief and development agency of the Catholic Diocese of Jhansi, having its office at Bishop’s House, 64 Cantt, Jhansi. You can see the works of Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj in a nutshell in the following chart.

b: General Information about the Diocese:

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Jhansi lies in Bundelkhand. It is a geographical region of central India. It lies between the Indo-Gangetic plain to the north and the Vidhya Range to the south. It has got distinguished barren hilly terrain with sparse vegetation and highest elevation is not exceeding 600 meters. It comprises parts of both provinces of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. The seven districts in Uttar Pradesh viz. Jhansi, Lalitpur, Jalaun, Hamirpur, Mahoba, Banda and Chitrakoot come under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Jhansi and naturally the operation area of Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj. The shaded area points to the Bundelkhand region in the north central India.

Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj has been engaged in the pastoral activities of the diocese. Its main concentration is on the comprehensive development of the people of the operation area. Development work has been extended to the entire area of the diocese regardless of caste, colour, creed or religion. It is the unique attribute of the Seva Samaj that it is concerned about the welfare of all and works towards achieving this goal. Appendix: pastoral/strategic plan/development plan may be attached. Some of the current funding agencies are mentioned here below.

c: Financing Partners to date: We have a few of them.

With regard to the previous work, Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj has been working on evangelization among street children, rehabilitation of abandoned children, children engaged in rag-picking school dropouts to bring them to regular schooling, helping poor children of different locality by offering stationery, textbooks and teachers to assist them and caring for the handicapped children of the different areas especially by bringing them to the special school named ARUNODAYA and ST. DOMINIC SAVIO BOARDING at Lalitpur.

d: Jhansi Diocesan NGO:

As it is already stated above, Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj is the official non-governmental organization of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Jhansi with its own vision and mission statements.

Vision:
We envisage a just and self-reliant society based on the Gospel Values of Liberty, Love, Justice and Fraternity.

Mission:
Organize and empower the marginalized communities to take their rightful place in society and to promote and preserve life in all its diversities.

Objectives:
To empower the marginalized people economically.
To increase literacy rate and to improve quality education through innovative methods
To develop skills and capable human resource.
To promote leadership among the priority groups.
To organize the unorganized youth for mainstreaming them.
To facilitate holistic health care in rural areas.
To empower women to be agents of social change.
To strengthen community based organizations (CBOs).
To generate awareness among the people for the need for ecological balance.
To bring about reconciliation through dialogue for a peaceful society/to be promoters of peace through dialogue and reconciliation.
To strengthen GO-NGOs networking and collaboration.
To identify, rehabilitate and repatriate children at risk.

e: Description of the Project Setting:

Geographical: Bundelkhand region in the central plains in India lies between longitude 78°20’N and 81°4’N and latitude 23°20’E and 26°20’E and comprises of 13 districts covering 7.08 Million Hectares (Mha), out of which six districts comprising of 4.12 Mha are in Madhya Pradesh and seven districts comprising of 2.94 Mha are in Uttar Pradesh. Jhansi, Lalitpur, Jalaun, Hamirpur, Banda, Mahoba and Chitrakoot. The area bounded by Vindhya Plateau in south to river Yamuna in north, river Ken in East and rivers Betwa, Sindh and Pahuj in west.

Economic: The Bundelkhand region in Uttar Pradesh as well as Madya Pradesh experiences severe agricultural droughts. Even as the majority of population lives below poverty line and their livelihood dependant on agriculture and livestock rearing, severe scarcity of food and fodder hit the normal life of common man.

The economy of Uttar Pradesh is dominated by agriculture and allied activities. With less than 5% of the state’s population living here, this region is underdeveloped, most backward, frequent flood and draught ridden. Here people live mostly at the mercy of nature and climate.

Ecological: Bundelkhand region faces severe ecological and environmental concerns. Draught is quite frequent in this region. It leads to loss in sown area, productivity, failure of crops already grown, non-availability of forages, grass and fodder. This region is scare in water resources which leads to lower productivity of crops and even limited choices of crops. Due to these factors, this region has not been able to reap a good harvest of Green Revolution.

Socio-Political: Sociologically, this area is inhabited by people of various castes and tribes. Most of the poor people belong to scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. Their access to land, farming and cattle rearing is very limited.

Goal of human development is increasing human capacity, which can make life more useful. There is a great disparity. Women have no equal opportunities in education, health, economic welfare etc.

There are many political outfits in this region. Most of them are supported by the upper class milieu. Now the ruling party in UP Bundelkhand is headed by Other Backward Classes (OBCs).

Ethnic: Though there are diverse ethnic communities are there, most of them live in peace and harmony. Class dissentions and caste tensions are normal occurrences in the society. Economically poor class and lower caste people normally suffer various problems like land deprivation and caste hatred due to the dominance of upper castes.

Description of the Problem: We made a pilot study in 46 villages of Mehrauni and Madawara Blocks in Lalitpur district. We found that 40% of people do not complete basic/primary education. The percentage of rural dropout is very high. The present project is an initiative to harness this problem of less space for prayer and worship. This basic aim of this project is to motivate both the parents and children to lead them to God through prayer and meditation. So the project is really responding to a dire need for the Faithful.

Description of the Target Groups: The target group is people from the age of 4-70. According to the Constitution of India, Right to Religious Liberty is the birthright of every person of all the age. Though there are many Catholics, it is proper to have a place of worship and 85% of Catholics here are from the rural backward and are not able afford anything.

Below Poverty Line Beneficiaries: Below Poverty Line is an economic bench mark used by the Govt. of India to assess persons in need of assistance and aid. It is an income of less than $ 1.25 (INR 75.00) per day per head. By this estimate, about 32.7% Indian are below poverty line. It does not account for essential needs like health care and education other than basic food requirements.

Origin of the Project: The origin of this project came from the understanding of the mission of Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj inspired by the Catholic Social Teaching (CST) of the Church. This project is not absolutely new. As it could not be supported without funding from outside, we are planning to have recourse to you for financial aid.

This project is a part of the development plan of Jhansi Catholic Seva Samaj. We are working at the grassroots level. This project is a sign that we are working at a real development cause for the holistic development of people. Today we find people to take a lead to develop the talents of rural folk. The aim of our organization is to bring up the lowest strata of the society. This project is aimed at the overall development of the society.