Adampur Gram Vikas Agency

ADAMPUR Gram Vikas Agency

1. Executive Summary:  

           GVA: Gram Vikas Agency or GVA is a non-profit organisation that works with rural and tribal communities. It partners with rural-communities to address their critical needs in a manner that is sustainable, socially inclusive, gender equitable and empowering. Like in the case GVA, acting like a micro finance institute, forms village level institution like Mandalis for the betterment of village people.  The GVA had, as of June 1989, provided 14,000 man-days of wage-paid employment to the members of the Mandali in its plantation project in the village which was started in 1986.  As of June 1989, the GVA had invested over Rs. 2.65 lakhs in its plantation project covering an area of 312 ha of degraded forest and revenue lands in Adimpur and two other neighbouring villages. The GVA also provided managerial subsidy of Rs. 100 per month to the Mandali to meet part of the salary of the secretary. GVA ,as organisation, is headed by 3 key people land they are Shiva Raman, Programme Coordinator, Bhimbhai Amin, Programme Organiser (Watershed Development) and G Krishnaswamy, Programme Organiser (People’s Organisation). The GVA believed that the village-level institutions such as the Mandali should be the main forum for taking up income-generating community-oriented activities and for ensuring their sustainability and an equitable distribution of their benefits. The GVA wanted its role to be that of a facilitator or an enabler rather than that of an actor. GVA headquarter is in Nilang. As of July 1989, the Mandali had a total membership of 176.

     Mandali: Adimpur Gram Vikas Sahakari Mandali was a rural people’s organization registered under the Co-operative Societies Act. It was based in a tribal village, Adimpur, of Gurjar state and was sponsored by a voluntary agency, GVA. The total number of households in the village was only 165. Adimpur is a tribal village with a total population of 1147 of which 1089 (95 %) belongs to Vasara tribe with 46 (4 %) Chaudhary tribe and 12 (1%) Kotwalia, who are Harijans.

 It had started functioning in June 1986 but was formally registered only in September 1988. Its main objective was to promote all-round development of Adimpur village by financially and technically helping its members to take up income generating activities, both individually as well as on a community basis. Membership in the Mandali was voluntary. Any resident of the village above 18 years of age could become a member by paying an entrance fee of Re.1 and buying at least one share at Rs. 10. The Mandali had persuaded its members to regularly save a portion of the wages paid to them for works sponsored and financed by the GVA. The Mandali had also created a common fund by pooling the amount that it received an account of commission on the supply of agricultural inputs to it members and marketing of their produce, and the interest earned from the advance of loans to its members. In addition, earnings from the operation of a seed bank in earlier years and from the sale of grass from the plantation area were also added to the common fund. 

         An Executive Committee was responsible for policy decisions and administration of various activities of the Mandali. The eleven members of the Committee were elected by the members of the Mandali in its annual general body meeting; they in turn elected from amongst themselves on Pramukh. Mahipatsinh, who was a young man in his early thirties currently holding the post of pramukh. The Mandali had only one paid employee, the Secretary. Former secretary of Mandali was Deepsinh.

Now a petition was filed by 19 members of the Mandali to withdraw their contribution from the Mandali’s pool of its members’ savings. Some of them alleged Manadali for not giving loans and hence threatened to quit Mndali. So a meeting was organised by GVA regading this issue but ended with no fruitful decision.

Here we have to put ourselves in Shiva Raman’s colleagues’ shoes and have to empathetic to discuss the case. 

1. Situation analysis :

1. Mismatch of expectation of community and GVA board: As per the case In May 1989, some of the dissidents of Deepsinh started visiting the GVA office in Nilang and making representations to Shiva Raman that they be allowed to withdraw their contributions from the Mandali. In June, Shiva Raman received a written petition signed by 19 members of the Mandali asking him to intervene in the matter and help the signatories get back their contributions to the Mandali. Now some of them asked Mandali for loan but as per the Pramukh those were not profitable.

The members were arguing based upon a promise given by the chief executive of GVA, which was counter-argued that for such cases, the financial condition of Mandali should be strong.  Mandali issued loans for productive as well as non-productive uses in the past. So here was a communication mismatch between two existing role players. Mandali should take decision rigidly on what basis loan would be disbursed in future and should provide a proper guidelines regarding it.

1. Conflicting Situation: Mandali dissolved into a conflicting situation as 19 members has threatened to leave Manadali which could lead to a financial crisis. It might lead to a unity crisis in Mandali as well diminishing the strength among people.
2. Operation of Mandali: The operation and activities of the Mandali seems to be in tandem with the cooperative principles, which is evident from the case facts. From the behaviour of the dissidents and and the involvement of the employees of GVA, we can arrive at the conclusion that GVA holds good reputation in the village and has a role in determining the activities/running of the Mandali. The attention of the Mandali in marketing members’ produce shows that the strategy adopted by GVA/Mandali is a multi-pronged approach to ensure sustainability of the Mandali as well as its members. By this activity the Mandali was able to generate some money to its common fund and also helping its members to realise more profits.
3. Supply of Agricultural Inputs: The Mandali was providing essential agricultural inputs supply to its members. GVA enjoyed the power to sell grass from the plantation project area that gave the Mandali some good earnings to its common funds.
4. LOAN: Mandali provided loan assistance to members with the help of common fund and savings fund. The Mandali also arranged a joint collateral so that members can take loan from the bank through the Mandali. Members can avail up to 75% amount of their savings as loan @ 18% interest rate. Mandali can avail loan at a rate of 12% from bank. Also, productive loans are provided in terms of kind only, which is also another way of ensuring better profit for Mandali where it will be entitled for 2 % commission also.
5. The number of family member in village is 165 but member of Mandali is 176. So there can be three situations – 1) multiple member from one house, 2) not all family became member of Mandali and 3) there may be repetitive member from one family.
6. Deepsinh or Pramukh might have formed a small dissident group of 20-25 members within the Mandali and started looking for opportunities to dissociate the group from the Mandali. It really raised a question mark to community’s unity and may put the community in verge of collapse.

                                       COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS