The Village that Works Together

The Rama family — Samjana, Vedkumari and Ratankumar — poses in front of a wedding archway on the day before Samjana's wedding ceremony. Photo: Roger Burks/Mercy Corps

Souden Gaon, India — Today, the Rana household might be the busiest place in the whole Darjeeling district. One of Ratankumar and Vedkumari Rama's daughters is getting married tomorrow.

It seems like the whole village is pitching in. Young men are pounding rice flour in mortars using heavy wooden pestles. The older men, including Ratankumar, are putting the finishing touches on the traditional wedding arch, made from leaves and branches woven together. Vedkumari and other village women are hauling water up the steep hill from a spring far below.

Even the bride-to-be, Samjana, is busy putting the finishing touches on the small house where she and her husband will spend their first night together as a married couple.

Right now, Samjana isn't just the daughter of Ratankumar and Vedkumari Rama — she belongs to the whole village. They all celebrate and take pride in this step she's taking.

The people of Souden Gaon are a closely-knit group; they work together, and it shows.

Recently, they formed a community task force to address the village's lingering problems — serious issues like illiteracy, sanitation, clean water and unemployment. Everyone is pitching in, lending their voices and resources to solve these problems together.

Mercy Corps is pitching in right beside them. Through its Community Health and Advancement Initiative (CHAI) Project, funded by Oregon-based Tazo Tea Company and implemented through local partner DEG, the agency is providing the people of Souden Gaon with timely advice, technical assistance and financial resources to improve the lives of local families.

A collective effort

The strength of CHAI, like so many of Mercy Corps' programs around the world, lies in the people the project serves. In Souden Gaon and 23 other communities in Darjeeling's Himalayan foothills, the CHAI Project organizes village committees called Community Initiative Groups (CIG) to discuss pressing needs and explore creative solutions.

Both Ratankumar and Vedkumari serve on Souden Gaon's CIG.

After weeks of careful deliberation and several meetings with CHAI Project staff, the Souden Gaon CIG identified santitation as its biggest problem. Before the project started here, the village had only eight latrines for its 40 households. Several people live in each household, and so those latrines were quickly filling up, increasing the risk of contamination and disease in the densely populated village.

With help from Mercy Corps and DEG, the men of Souden Gaon have already completed 32 new latrines and intend to build several more. Every family will have its own latrine and the old ones will be sealed off, reducing the likelihood of preventable illness.

The availability of clean water is also a major concern in the village. A huge government hydroelectric project is emptying the wells around Souden Gaon, forcing villagers to walk longer distances — up and down steep mountain foothills — to reach springs and other water sources.

"During a wedding like this, we really feel the pinch for water," Vedkumari says. "We've been carrying water up from a source for over a week now to prepare for the wedding."

Souden Gaon's CIG identified the lack of water as another critical need, and is working with the CHAI Project to address the issue. A CHAI Project engineer has indentified a water source not far from the village, and is now calculating the best way to pipe water into the village. This new system will certainly help Souden Gaon's farmers in their work — and will also make life much easier for hard-working women like Vedkumari.

Youth serves

Young people also form a critical component of each village's CIG. The CHAI Project encourages the formation of youth councils, which identify the unique needs of young people in the area, determine how they can contribute to village initiatives and work with the CIG to propose solutions.

The village's youth council has identified starting a local hotel, which would cater to tourists who are trekking through the Himalayan foothills, as its entrepreneurship goal. Young women, including bride-to-be Samjana, are leading this initiative.

The youth council has also identified adult illiteracy as a major challenge in Souden Gaon. Most of the older generations never attended school. Today the village's youth, who have had the opportunity to go to local schools, are spending time with their elders and teaching them to read and write.

Before beginning another trip down the hill for water, Vedkumari pauses and thinks about how life in Souden Gaon is improving.

""I've seen a lot of change," she says. "When I was my daughter's age, I couldn't go to school. I am happy to have been able to send my daughter to school, and that she has a lot of opportunities and say in her decisions and life."

Ratankumar agrees. "I feel that there aren't many leaders here in Souden Gaon, not many people who know how to begin to change things for the better. CHAI has instilled confidence in us and empowered us to bring about the change we need."

With that, the Rama family returns to their busy wedding preparations. Over 300 invitations have been sent to households in Souden Gaon and surrounding villages, and they expect that more than 600 people will attend the festivities.

When tomorrow comes and families arrive from around the district for Samjana's wedding, they'll certainly be amazed at the careful preparations made for this special day. Behind the scenes, everything has been made possible by the power of people working together.