It may need years of stay in a village for a visitor to understand rural challenges, but even a brief trip can make an indelible impression. This college student from Greater Noida gets a firsthand experience.
Nestled amid fields known for producing golden wheat and yellow mustard flowers lies the village of Jewar Khader. As I entered the village, located in Jewar tehsil of Gautam Buddha Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh, vignettes of ordinary life unfolded before me like chapters from a forgotten tale. The visit was part of a day-long rural immersion programme organised by Birla Institute of Management Technology (BIMTECH) in partnership with Village Square for first-year students of Post Graduate Diploma in Management.
As part of the exercise, about 320 students from the institute visited 10 villages near Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh for a daylong trip on November 7 to interact with the villages and take away lessons in rural development, sustainability and social responsibility.
The villagers welcomed our group into their mud-brick houses. They graciously shared stories of their families, livelihood and the close-knit community. It was apparent that the green fields are nurtured with hard work and resilience.
My first conversation unfolded with Sangpyari as sat on the terrace of her house. The talk veered towards sanitation and hygiene issues, a topic often overshadowed by the ambience of rural life. Acknowledging the challenges, Sangpyari spoke of the need for better sanitation facilities and awareness programmes for the residents of her village. The lack of a clean and healthy environment emerged as a shared concern among the villagers. They also spoke about family ties being tested by migration.
Another major problem that the villagers spoke in unison about was water supply. Many households rely on traditional wells and hand pumps and during the summer months, water scarcity becomes a pressing concern. The community is collectively looking for assistance to implement sustainable solutions for getting a steady water supply throughout the year.
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In Jewar Khader, I also discovered the transformative power of self-help groups (SHG). Women here make food items such as papads and pickles and also craft other goods. The group is not just a way for them to get financial income but also works as a place where they share their concerns and ideas. The village has 22 such SHGs, with each group consisting of 10 women. While the women are happy about the work they do, marketing their products remains a big challenge. All of them expressed the need for an outlet that can connect their products to a broader customer base, providing them with a regular source of income.
Through these conversations, I gained a deeper understanding of the challenges that shadow the open landscape. We walked through the lanes of the village and saw many old, rundown houses too, showing the economic difficulties that people face in rural life.
We also visited a local school and engaged with the students and the teachers. The excitement in the children’s eyes showed that they were keen to learn and excel despite the lack of enough study material in the school.
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The rural immersion exercise not only opened my eyes to the challenges faced in rural life but also ignited a sense of shared responsibility to contribute to the betterment of the community.
The lead image at the top shows a group of students with some women from the village. (Photo from Anshika Kesarwani)
Anshika Kesarwani is a first-year student of Post Graduate Diploma in Management at Birla Institute of Management Technology (BIMTECH), Greater Noida.
