“Life is for Giving”

At the Board Meeting held in February 2009, that is last year, when the Budget for the year 2009-10 was discussed, there was great concern about how we would succeed in raising the resources required in the context of the economic slowdown that the world was experiencing. I recall that I wrote to our directors as under in early March 2009.

We have a massive effort of collecting monies for the year and the business for collecting for the Corpus as well. This is a very difficult year due to the recession, but just as we need to fend for our businesses, jobs and our families we need to fend for these children for whom we have gladly and willingly taken responsibility. We have no regrets about this commitment. We need to find ways of finding money for the project.

“I can only speak for myself and each of us will need to resolve this issue for themselves. All of you know Chinni, my wife and me well. I am 73 years old and my wife is not young either. We are not rich and have not earned a penny over the last twelve years because we have sworn not to. We do not wish to be distracted. We have some savings in the bank (being sale proceeds of a flat that we sold at Bombay) and live off the interest. It has been meaning ’less and less’ as the time passes by. But our needs are few and we own a nice house in Purkal. We do not socialise or spend time and monies in many ways. Both of us are dedicated to the work of this society and we do contribute some money to the society apart from all our time and our skills to it. We are both happy and contented and thank the lord for this opportunity given to us. We have resolved to do our best to get the monies necessary and more importantly pray for it. We will also need   to sell all that Stree Shakti produces. We will need to make sure that there will be additional employment and income generation in this Division.   

Both of us wish to reach out to some people and make a difference to their lives. We understand that while monies are a means, personal involvement is the best possible gift that one can give. We are therefore giving what is most precious to us, our time and our life.

The experience that we enjoy is unique. The mask of false self is falling off and we are happy with living with our own self. We know that ultimately the only thing we will leave behind is the only thing that we will take with us, qualities that we have honed and engraved in our soul. We are attempting to leave behind a legacy of the spiritual kind, which we believe is more important than the one of the physical kind. Our fundamental goal is to give these over 150 children the childhood that we owe them and the several women the pride of Life..

But there are problems in the environment. We need to cope with it, we need to fight and we need to do it. I believe that this recession is an opportunity to reinvent. We shall in the process adhere to great business practices and good business culture. We shall learn the power of Faith.

Having said that, i know that what happens is according to the will of god and that he is all love and wisdom. There is a hidden meaning of mercy in all that he does. I therefore lift up my heart and pray to him. I shall wait for collective wisdom to permit this effort of mine. I do not wish to forget that I am a part, however miniscule of this collective. I appeal to all of you to give this matter serious thought.”    

Now there is another year and another budget and similar doubts. Will it all happen again this year? Are we wise in trusting the Divine purpose and not be sound with practical financial planning? Are we moving in the right direction? These are doubts that assail us yet again.

So, we revisit our ideas on Faith and Giving.

This Mission of Giving that we call PYDS has grown and survived over the years because of the dedication of several Friends of Purkal, all of whom have gained joy and peace from being a part of the effort. More are coming in since they see that there is something in this participation that satisfies. This group has blended into the large and happy Purkal family.

The biggest lesson that we have learnt is that the world is not degenerating but growing with a nucleus of many good people. Work on relationships grows this circle to include many likeminded. In the process, we become fully aware and many areas of our life get touched. Our minds get filled with fresh possibilities with Life expanding ideas. All this is brought about through faith in goodness and compassion.  We now know that we need to practice it more and better.

Looking at it in another light, we shall not amplify situations and facts by investing them with an overload of fears, worries and resistances.  We have need for security but it goes hand in hand with a need for adventure and for venturing into the unknown.

The Purkal family is now attempting to bring about changes in the Community that lives in Purkal through a model that attempts it by providing nutrition and excellence in mind stimulation processes. We call this practice ‘education’. These are being provided to the young so that they could become agents of change of the future.

The decision to take on this Project happened impulsively and the effort is growing and is being sustained with Grace. We have all been transformed into the soldiers who attempt this bold experiment. We are in it now and need to find the tools that will sustain the Mission. It is in the nature of things that Transformation comes first and the tools that make it happen come in later. Swami Tejomayananda has pointed out that Mahatma Gandhi was thrown out of the First Class compartment in South Africa and that event triggered the Indian Independence movement and transformed him into a freedom fighter. The tools for the independence movement were discovered later.

There must be a higher purpose that dictates this Mission that we are involved in. We cannot control it but only prepare for it, by transforming ourselves into better people through our five senses and the thinking and perceiving faculties.

We need to be happy and cease to be mentally agitated. We have learnt that if we rise above desire, the object of desire comes to us. We get what we deserve and we deserve through service and sacrifice. The sacrifice needs to be firm, unending and abiding.

This piece is being written since I am in need of this reminder now and because I think that this is the most important lesson in Life that we have all learnt. I am therefore proposing that we adopt this as our School’s motto. We shall read it as ‘Paropkaraya Jeevanam’

The desire for service must be raised, ennobled and purified. Its lower aspects needs to be controlled. Strong desire for realisation is aspiration and this is no fault since it is the mother of all virtues.

The essentials for practicing sacrifice and giving is to make it sacred. What we give has to be of value to us. We are all to be anonymous in this giving and do this without any expectation. The giving is to be done wholeheartedly. While we enjoy our possessions, we enjoy it better when others partake of them.

Giving is the religion of the soul and it emerges from a higher, nobler calling. We are happy giving away our tangibles such as money but we have examples of young people who give their youth, energy, space, comfort to nurture and keep this family called PYDS together and we feel humbled. We know that the hands that serve are holier than the lips that pray.

By sacrificing our limited identity, we have gained a collective identity that works for the welfare, peace, prosperity, progress and happiness of a larger group. We have thus dissolved and merged with the Divine. We have become fearless and happy with our sacrifice and to a degree attained God and we know that this is the road to peace.

May we now pass on this message to all those whom we serve by adopting this as our motto and may we all resolve that we will live by this dictum ‘Paropkaraya Jeevanam’ ourselves.

………..G.K Swamy

My wife Chinni, Myself and The PYDS.

My wife and I left Bombay about 14 years ago to live in the Himalayan foothills in retirement. We then, had no intentions of starting a Society or doing the type of work that we are currently engaged in.

The work related to the Society happened. It became the vehicle for a long journey to a higher self. I needed a destination. I needed to move from the state of just existence to a more meaningful life, where I would discover my higher self through an exercise in self-improvement. I needed a guide to follow this path and it turned out that the Divine himself offered his Grace for me to follow. I also understood that the only prescription for me to understand my guide was complete and absolute surrender to this power. The effort therefore is to perfect this surrender and faith in the Guide that I chose for my progress through Life.

I needed to transform my character which was naturally arrogant and self opinionated. I used to doubt the efficacy of prayer and instead trust my ability to think logically and rationally. I needed to change and learn to have unflagging faith in the Divine Grace and discipline myself and every part of my being into accepting His Will. I learnt that such total and unquestioned surrender alone had the ability to  transform my Self.

One of the lessons that I have learnt is that Life has an unseen driver, a guardian presence that carries us through the lanes and bye lanes of Life. The intention of this driver does not often co-relate with our desires or specific ambitions and ideas. More often than not, we are driven in opposite directions, and yet somewhere in the middle or at the end we find that we have been taken by the shortest route possible to the exact place that we wanted to go. Mental, vital and physical desires and expectations make it difficult to discern the guiding will and the only solution is to have faith that we will be led to the right destination and surrender consciously to the inner guide.(This paragraph is a copy of my notes from another source; cannot remember from where)

Both my wife and I were given this opportunity to help transform the lives of people living in this Community. This journey has helped us practice the virtue of Trust and has constantly helped us strengthen our belief that the Lord’s hand alone can guide and transform lives. That learning has become the sole personal purpose of my Mission with the Society.

My wife founded this Society along with me and we manage this as best as we can with the help of friends. There is challenge in living the simple life that I attempt. Often I am congratulated for the growth and record of the Society and knowing the fragility of its finances and plans and the extent of its dependence on continuing ‘Grace’, I often wonder about this record!

I recall a few lines from Sri Aurobindo in Savitri “ The world was not built with random bricks of Chance…….There is meaning in every curve and line…….In which the unseeing hands obey the unseen…..And of its Mater builder she is one”. It is not for me to question the plans so of this Master builder.

One also recalls the story from Mahabharata of Balaka, the hunter. Balaka had the uncanny skill of being able to aim accurately by mere sound. One day, hunting to feed his blind parents, he killed, by chance, a ferocious creature called ‘Andha’ and the gods showered flowers and celebration. Andha had become a monster because of a boon from Brahma- a menace since he had become almost indestructible. Balaka acted unintentionally but got the reward. He just happened to be at the right time and place. If the Society has moved forward and I happened to be there over the years it was just that I was used as the Instrument by the Lord for his work and I need to fully realise it and remain grateful for his having chosen me.

In my present life, while there is freedom to be what I want to be, I also need to deal with busy lives and complicated relationships since I am attempting to raise money and support for poor children and women who need care. My wife and I are attempting to give away our most precious possessions, namely our time and our life to those who need it. While we feel content and rich, feel compassion for those who need it; there is certain vulnerability while being open and sensitive to others. All that we are trying to do is to lead a simple life, rather than be moulded by consumerism and advertisement. We are yet to resolve this dilemma and we pray that we may conduct ourselves as worthy children of the Divine.

The Rationale behind the setting up of a school under the PYDS Banner

The Day Boarding School being set up by PYDS is addressed to meet the needs of the poor living in the rural area of this State of Uttarakhand. The experiment has been limited to a small number and embraces about 200 children at the present time.

 It is not intended to provide just ‘some’ education but excellence in education to these disadvantaged.

 The idea is to pick up children for the purpose of imparting comprehensive education from the pre primary stage to the higher secondary school stage and thereafter make them capable of competing with the more advantaged citizens of the country and seek intellectually challenging occupations. The hope is that in this manner, leaders capable of transforming this Community would be born from among the locals.

In the choice of the candidates for admission for these quality educational inputs, we are now careful to identify:

(a) Poverty, so that the scheme is not hijacked by the comparatively better endowed. (b) Academic potential, so that the resources garnered by the Society are not frittered away on children incapable of absorbing the range of expensive inputs that we seek to provide. The fact is that there are a very large number of such children awaiting attention

(c) an enlightened home in which the parents are keen to provide their all to make sure that their wards will excel through education.

This is an attempt at encouraging the best in the Society and helping the intellectually strong.  In that sense this is an elitist school.

In setting up this Institution we were convinced of its need, since Government schools in our area do not even aim at such excellence capable of stimulating the best in their outstanding wards. Alternate schools or private schooling is mostly driven by the profit motive and therefore target the wealthy and not necessarily the intellectually endowed. The poor and the marginalized are thus condemned to a second rate education in either government schools or poorly run private schools. Good schooling is expensive and the poor deserve it and this country needs it if we are to empower the rural community. Leaders of these communities will emerge if the best among them are chosen and nurtured through excellent schooling.

The curriculum is meant to include all elements necessary for the complete growth of the child. The Society encourages the child to live in their own home and carry the influence of the school into their home. The working hours of the school are long since it seeks to provide the child fun and games in addition to academics. Holidays are very limited and do not include the conventional breaks that all schools observe for winter and the summer. These additional periods of time are used to provide the Extra Academic inputs, which are considered as important as the academic.

This is therefore a model in which we as an NGO are attempting to garner private participation in the running of an excellent Institution for the poor, in a situation in which there is a vacuum needing to be filled. Our goal is not universalisation of education although we are not questioning that idea. Our challenge is to help rural parents who are incapable of affording an education that transforms personality, through child cantered pedagogy respectful of the child’s physical, mental, emotional and social needs.

This is a poverty alleviation programme but seeks to achieve the goal in the long term through leaders that the initiative will create. This is a model where private capital is sought to be used through an NGO that has good governance prescriptions. This is an alternate private school that is not low cost (no wasteful expenditure though), run for no-profit but seeking excellence by addressing the elite of the Community. Every member of its management is expected to provided their services and time not merely free but with a monetary contribution.

This school seeks to address the physical needs of the children through attention to their nutrition, their medical needs, and immunization, sports and yoga. Attention to their emotional needs is supported through music, arts, dance and drama. The mental health is addressed through a well equipped library, awareness of the environment and through access to values. The effort is to constantly improve our methods and evolve steadily towards excellence.

——-G.K Swamy

Narrow and Deep rather than Wide and Shalow

Over the years we have concentrated on a few students and not attempted to handle big numbers from the community that we serve. We have adopted this approach rather consciously. Our accent has been on potential of the children and their ability to absorb the investment of time and resources that the Society provides. The numbers that we mentor are small in relation to the student population of the Community but we believe that if we shape a few young minds well, they would in turn become change agents of the Society in times to come. We will invest narrow and deep and not make it broad and shallow.

In this quest, there have been two very important developments related to our Programme in the recent past:

(a)  We are consciously moving towards establishing our Day Boarding Programme and moving away from the SPRY idea. This is for two reasons: We do believe that the children are unable to cope effectively with the very long hours that the SPRY Programme demands The second reason is that we believe that we should be able to more effectively build creativity and completeness in the learning, if the children are with us the whole day and save the time travelling to school. We will in this programme be able to give better attention to nutrition, health care and the Mental and Emotional Health of the child. We expect also to be able to give better attention to the Social Health of the child in the context of the longer hours that they will spend with us. One notices that in spite of the longer hours with us the children will enjoy more leisure and spend quality time with their parents under this new arrangement.

(b)The second very important idea is that we shall concentrate on developing outstanding candidates who will become leaders and change agents in due time. These wards of ours will be chosen from among the disadvantaged in the community. They need not necessarily be the poorest possible, although these could also qualify.

      Without realising that we were following Mr. Amratya Sen’s Human Capability approach, we have been attempting it. Dr. Sen talks of Instrumental, Intrinsic and Positional value of Education. This follows on from Sen’s ideas of Freedoms.

Instrumental values represent the extent to which education secures jobs and promotes individual political and social participation. Our original and primary objective was to help our children secure jobs in this growing economy full of opportunities. The objective is a little more advanced beyond what Dr. Sen envisages, since we are attempting to secure for our wards not just jobs but those that that are well paying and capable of making a paradigm change in their living styles. Emphasis on the Social health of the students is meant to enable their wider social participation and the teaching of their rights and possibilities under the RTI      (Right to Information Act) are meant to promote their political emancipation.

Intrinsic values means the benefits that accrues to an individual beyond the instrumental factors – increased enjoyment of literature, music or improved self-confidence in interaction with others.  Our spending money on the teaching of music, dance, arts and crafts apart from yoga and games and our conscious efforts to help these students travel and meet with people across a wide spectrum  are steps in that direction. Efforts are also made to cultivate soft skills which enhance the personality of the student and increase their self-confidence.

Positional values refer to how education has benefitted the individual in relation to others who have the same level of education but possibly from a different background. Certain types of Institutions are able to help measurements made by job givers and others overlook inequalities in which people have grown up. We wish to address both these aspects so that our students will be able to measure up to the prescriptions of job givers and also fill the gaps arising out of their upbringing and environment. Our hope is that our Institution will be able to deliver these advantages to those under our care

Social Opportunities are being promoted by us by our encouraging our students the freedom to pursue a higher education. We consciously prepare them for this possibility, through appropriate career counselling and assistance to a limited extent at the post twelfth class stage, rather than seeking employment after school. Steps are taken to build pride in the self and the Community identity, their cultures and their history.

To implement these ideas there have been two very important developments related to our Programme:

(a) We are consciously moving towards establishing our Day Boarding Programme and moving away from the SPRY idea. This is for two reasons: We do believe that the children are unable to cope effectively with the very long hours that the SPRY Programme demands The second reason is that we believe that we should be able to more effectively build creativity and completeness in the learning, if the children are with us the whole day and save the time travelling to school. We will in this programme be able to give better attention to nutrition, health care and the Mental and Emotional Health of the child. We expect also to be able to give better attention to the Social Health of the child in the context of the longer hours that they will spend with us. You will notice that in spite of the longer hours with us the children will enjoy more leisure and spend quality time with their parents under this new arrangement.

(b) The second very important idea is that we shall concentrate on developing outstanding candidates who will become leaders and change agents in due time. These wards of ours will be chosen from among the disadvantaged in the community. They need not necessarily be the poorest possible, although these could also qualify.

We realise that to achieve these goals we will need to improve our ideas on access and enrolment. Also address the quality of ‘Learning’ as opposed to the quality of ‘Teaching’. We are moving away from ‘Teaching to ‘Learning’. We also need to improve learning conditions. We are therefore investing in better text books, equipment, and teacher training. We are hoping to improve teacher and student motivation.

We are also aware that investment in Health, hygiene, sanitation and immunization apart from nutrition need to be part of the education Programme, since there can be no quality education without good health and the prospect of normal growth. Improving living conditions is essential – so it is that we took up the question of helping the women of the community earn. 

You will thus see that we have addressed the following areas:

(a)  Pre-school education Programmes and in-school health and nutrition Programme. Those following us are aware that we are soon to commence our Early Child Leaning Centre.

(b)  Curriculum and syllabi that are focussed on ’Core skill’ at the Primary level and emphasis on ‘trainability‘ at the higher levels

(c)  In-service training for teachers linked directly to class room practice. Our contract with idiscoveri, Gurgaon is a step meant to promote this goal.

(d)  Lengthening the school day and the school year to provide more ‘Learning time. We now run a ten hour a day school and have no conventional holidays for summer and the winter. Children spend their time at our premises learning many things beyond the school curriculum.

(e)  Investment in instructional material and infrastructure. This is a continuous process limited only by our rather thin resources.

The other aspect that interests us is the one related to evaluation and assessments. We are comprehending the idea of ‘Evaluating what’ and the ‘How’.

All these initiatives we hope will help us to train an young ward and make him/her a complete person capable of becoming Community leaders and eventually significant change agents. If we succeed we would not have invested all this effort in vain.

My thoughts on how to build PYDS over time

All those connected with the Society are aware that we are taking responsibility for each of the children in our care for many years (at least 15 for each of them) and investing in them. It was only 6/7 years until recently but will now become longer with our having commenced the Primary School Programme. We believe that she/he that we take responsibility for will become a leader from the Community in her/his own right and become change Agents influencing several others over time and so slowly change the Community in many ways.

I see that many have dedicated some of their time and energy to furthering the lives of others and are involved with us in several ways. I am writing this Blog so that you can help me think further on the lines that I have indicated. Perhaps you have other new and different thoughts. We are a fledgling operation and need to go a very long way but we shall strive towards excellence and my present purpose is to ask you to help me think better. Thinking and planning is the basis of all progress and I know that I am asking for your time, the most difficult of resources but I shall deeply appreciate your help.

I am beginning to believe that all that it takes to succeed in a venture of the type that I have undertaken is to make sure of a few essentials. Most important of it all is the sense of Mission and its goals and the conviction that the vision will succeed. We need to be focussed on these goals and define for ourselves about what we need to do and what we shall not do, the latter being as important as the former since we need to remain focussed. We then need to marry the Mission with the activities that we undertake.

We will need to realise that there will be vision changes with the changing world. New themes and dimensions will get added to the issue. As far as we are concerned the most important idea is inclusive growth and opportunity.

Faith in the fact that we are the Agents of the Lord designated to accomplish this purpose is important. There should be no feeling of ownership or arrogance of accomplishment. All of this belongs to Him and ours is to merely perform to the best of our abilities and we shall do so as long as He wills that we do. This attitude calls for total dedication to the purpose, and the surrender of all other pursuits at the altar of this goal.

 Entrepreneurship is part of the skill that needs to be brought into the plan. The essence of this quality is faith in the ultimate success of the purpose and the Mission. Innovation is all about being able to garner money and other resources so that we build a very useful and adequate infrastructure. We need to possess the skills to develop designs needed to accomplish excellent education or whatever we produce at Stree Shakti (Quilts is our Product at the present time). We need to access technology to help build systems for efficiency and ongoing understanding of the outcomes of our endeavours.  This implies that we will have clearly defined Measures and outcomes and drills for evaluating the progress as we go along.

Since I need to accomplish the purpose set out with the resources garnered from others there is need for great transparency and honesty in matters of accounts, each voucher generated. The Annual Report needs to become elaborate and be available to all the stake holders. We may define these stake holders as ourselves to begin with, the donors, the beneficiaries, the employees of the Society and the members of the Board. We perhaps also need to include the customers of Stree Shakti who may be buying to support a cause. There could be other important people in Government and elsewhere whose support for the progress of the enterprise is important. All of this adds up to a very large number. Fortunately, we now have the Web to broadcast the Annual Report and plenty of money can be saved in the process.

Once transparency is established we should be building public awareness and so improve the chances of our survival and progress.

The rules by which the activities of the Society are governed also need to be laid down and be common knowledge. These need to be codified for HR (Hiring, wages, Confirmation Promotion etc.) for Purchasing, Assets Management, Accounting Rules, Qualification, conduct and Membership of the Board. There could be other things as well. We need to think about all this, codify and then to begin practicing them.

As for the purpose of this Mission, the approach could be either narrow and deep or broad and shallow. Larger numbers can benefit through the latter method but each initiative needs to determine its own road. We have chosen to make it narrow and deep and so do not expect to benefit very large numbers. We shall concentrate on the small numbers and attempt to bring about profound changes through them.

—– G.K Swamy

The Purkal Youth Development Society

 

We request all our “Friends of Purkal” to comment on our work. 

You can learn more about our Society from our website www.purkal.org