VISITING TUNG

Rusheel Nayak

Kapil Muni's Ashram (Renovations have
been made through the years)

This morning, instead of doing the normal Swadhaya, we went to Kapil Muni’s ashram.  Kapil Muni was a sage of tremendous power who founded one of schools of traditional Hindu philosophy.  There are many references to him in the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad Gita.   It was interesting to see this site because of all the myths and various interpretations that have arisen about the place over the years.  One such story says a sadhu (sage) with tremendous siddhi (power) lived in the area.  As a result of his siddhis, the local villagers began to refer to the area as Sidhbari (the name of the city where we stayed).

Tung's Mahila Mandal

After breakfast, we visited the village of Tung.  Tung is close to the CORD center, and as a result, the Mahila Mandal in this village has been functioning since 1991, which is only six years after the program started.  This visit reassured me because it proved CORD’s efforts are working!  The women easily discuss their problems with each other and bring up any village issues to the local government without qualms of repercussion.  Furthermore, the women stated that they have gained gender equality with the men of the village.  The women emphasize the importance of education to their children, are educating their children in private schools, and their children are more likely to attend college than those from other villages.  Also, the women are using the SRI technique to grow rice and corn and they have seen greater yields every year.  CORD’s mentality is to create a successful Mahila Mandal system in one village before moving to another village, and this village should be a role model for other villages!

Meera Parat

Today morning we took a little walk to the Kapil Munni Ashram. There, we heard a couple of different stories about how it came about; two stories were local stories that the villagers know, and the other was the Chinmaya Mission version. Later that day we went to the field, to a village called Tung. The Mahila Mandal in this village was established in 1991, so it had been going on for 20 years. We could tell that it was a well-run Mahila Mandal because they used their meetings for the proper purposes; for example, they discussed and solved small issues that the women had, and they used their bank correctly. Also, they were relatively very knowledgeable, and they were sending their kids to the best schools.  We weren't able to meet with the Yuvti Samuh today because they had gone to another village to compete in a sports competition and they would not be able to get back in time. After the Mahila Mandal, we went to visit KshamaJi's older sister and brother-in-law.


Sonali Nayak

Today, we went to the field again. This Mahila Mandal was clearly the most developed and informed group we had seen because they knew the value of education.  The women were educated. The secretary of the Mahila Mandal, Suman, was a college graduate, and she was able to speak to us in broken English. It was very encouraging because I was able to communicate to her without using a translator. Also, all of their kids attended English schools. After the meeting, we met Suman’s kids. Her two little boys were very cute. They also spoke English so we talked to them and tried to teach them about America. Krishna gave the boys an Introduction to Karate lesson which they enjoyed immensely.