The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Bharat Vikas Yatra chapter launched

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Wednesday, Dec 12, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Bharat Vikas Yatra chapter launched

Staff Reporter

To unite people for the nation’s progress

KULITHALAI: The Confederation of NGOs Rural India (CNRI) has launched the Tamil Nadu chapter of its Bharat Vikas Yatra at Kulithalai on Tuesday.

Describing the yatra as unique in the annals of non-governmental organisation movement in the country, co-chairman of CNRI L.V. Saptarishi said that the aim of the “development journey” was to broadbase the utilisation of the fruits of science and technology with special focus on women.

The CNRI was co-opting with Department of Science and Technology, Life Insurance Corporation of India, National Insurance Company of India and Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) in setting up NGO-linked knowledge centres nationwide.

While the aim was to establish over 600 such centres, work on 300 knowledge centres has already begun, Mr. Saptarishi, a former bureaucrat, said.

The significance of the yatra is to unite people for the progress of the nation, surmounting social and economical barriers.

The Bharat Vikas Yatra was nationally launched in New Delhi on November 25 with the blessings of President Pratibha Patil while State chapters of the yatra were being launched in the past few days in various regions.

The yatra was launched in Guwahati and Nagpur on Monday while in Hyderabad the movement was launched on Sunday, Mr. Saptarishi added.

Coinciding with the yatra, the CNRI also launched a Jan Seva Manch aimed at networking the beneficiaries of the NGO movement.

Mr. Saptarishi said that the main pillars of the Manch would be sector-specific people such as farmers, women and self-help groups, rural youth, self-employed entrepreneurs and artisans, dispossessed classes of society as also the aged and experienced personnel whose services should not be ignored.

If these people could synergise their work, then they would be able to address their needs properly.

The ultimate aim was to gradually help the beneficiaries create their own corpus to meet the development needs, he added.

Towards that end, a new concept “self-help NGOs” (as different from government-dependent organisations) was being ushered in, he added.

Mr. Saptarishi lauded the role of NGOs, observing that the State was setting a good example in the NGO movement and especially in the affairs of the CNRI.

He also chaired discussions related to violence against women in which speakers including Gramium Director P. Narayanan and office-bearers from various NGOs from across the State participated.

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