Activity Update February 2017: Tadoba

Highlights:

Katwal - Our Conservation Officer Prameek Kannan
guides village children on nature trail

Katwal - Our field assistant Kishor Dudhbarai
points out birds to children on nature trail 

 Vishank Bhoskar with his new SUV. Trained by us as a driver,
he now earns 25,000 rupees a month.

 Kutwanda - Ravindra Kannake, trained as driver through us,
stands next to jeep that he drives in the Tiger Reserve 

Mudholi - Dayanand Jambule, trained as driver through us,
poses next to truck that he has bought to transport goods

Katwal - Youths and school children clear plastic litter from village 

Katwal - Volunteers who participated in cleanliness
and anti-plastic programme

Udiya Tola - Our Conservation Officer Prameek Kannan
addresses villagers on conservation and local issues

Dewada - Village youths attend programme organised by us
to discuss livelihood options

THE FULL REPORT

Team:

Conservation Officer – Prameek Kannan

Field Assistant – Kishor Dudhbarai

Highlights

·      3 cleanliness drives in Katwal with 89 participants

·      1 ‘Gaon ki mann ki baat’ meeting in UdiyaTola with 30 participants

·      3 education programmes were conducted with 125 participants in Kondegaon and Katwal, including nature, trails, bird watching and classroom lectures

·      2 skill development training awareness sessions were conducted with 22 participants in UdiyaTola and Dewada

·      6 youths placed as gypsy drivers, temporary driver, and tourist taxi driver after going through our 4-wheeler driver’s training programme

·      Our mobile health unit treated 499 patients in Moharli, Bhamdeli, Sitarampeth, Kondegaon, Katwal, Khutwanda

Conservation

A meeting was held in UdiyaTola on the 8^th of February to discuss livelihood and conservation issues in the village and was attended by 30 villagers. The villagers said that there was a serious livelihood problem here and they would like help on the same.

After several meetings organised by us, an arrangement has been made that on every Monday, there will be a garbage collection drive in Katwal, which started this month.

As a part of this initiative, 3 cleanliness drives were held in Katwal on the 13^th, 20^th and 28^th of February, with 89 participants. Efforts are underway to implement similar initiatives in the other villages as well.

Education

On February 10^th, Kishor and Prameek took 26 students from Katwal ZP School on a bird-watching excursion around Katwal Lake near Katwal village. Many species of water and forest birds were spotted on this excursion, such as black drongos, red-vented bulbuls, 3 species of egrets (cattle, large, little), grey herons, flocks of migratory ducks such as pintail, red-crested pochard, and most exciting of all 4 pied kingfishers hovering and diving into the water to catch fish, a spectacular sight that really captivated the young students. Most of the birds were new to the students, and reciting their names in Marathi and English was a great, fun way to initiate interactive learning and appreciation for the wild denizens that live around their village. In addition, tracks and scat of wild boar and nilgai were also seen by the lakeshore. They had apparently come down to drink the previous night.

Mobile Health Unit

Employment

Placements for month of February 2017:

Our 4-wheeler driver’s training programme undertaken during the months of November and December 2016 was extremely well received with 40 villagers signing up for the program. This program empowered 6 villagers to take up employment, 2 of whom even took loans to buy their own vehicles.

Vishant Bhoskar was one of these two, as he has taken a loan to purchase a brand new Mahindra Xylo for 13 lakh rupees and is now earning 25,000 rupees a month as a tourist taxi driver. He is thankful for the driver’s training programme and is excited about his future prospects, and is spreading awareness amongst his friends and neighbors on how such skill development programs can result in big financial gains for the local communities, as it has for him.

Dayanand Jambule is an enthusiastic resident of Mudholi village, who is thankful that the training program has empowered him to take a loan to purchase a Tempo Traveller, which he uses to transport goods, fetching him 25,000 rupees a month. Jambule also spreads awareness amongst members of his community on the benefits of such skill development programs, and how they can help obtain lucrative opportunities away from forest dependency.

Three more youths, trained in our driver’s training programme, have started driving tourist vehicles (Maruti Suzuki Gypsys) at Khutwanda and Moharli gates. Two of these 3 are from Khutwanda, a village that is 15km from Moharli, the tourist hub village of the Tadoba buffer. Mr. Nagpure and Kannake are thankful for the opportunity that our programme has provided them, and they are excited at the future prospects burgeoning around Khutwanda gate. He says that more locals of Khutwanda and nearby villages are now trying to becoming gypsy drivers to provide service to new resorts and home stays coming up around Khutwanda gate, which is 18 km from the tourist hub Moharli. Such initiates are helping spread the benefits of wildlife tourism further across the buffer area villages. 

After the locals of UdiyaTola and Dewada brought up the issue of livelihoods in their villages, Prameek brought Parimal Gangrediwar from RSETI Chandrapur to conduct awareness sessions on free training programmes for skill development provided by them. The locals here are quite under-qualified and local cottage industries such as tailoring, and making bamboo artefacts would really improve their livelihood options, something which RSETI can help with. RSETI – Rural Self-Employment Training Institute – is run by Bank of India in Chandrapur.