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Dalit women sanghams have been formed in 4 village in Medak namely Chennapur, Avancha, Nallavalli andPeddagottimukula and work initiated in 4 villages in Chittoor. .The women have come together primarily asthey are keen to work on ecological farmingand ways to better manage their livestock, towards overallbetterment of their livelihood. Anthra has been working with the local activists providing inputs on differentaspects related to their agriculture and livestock.

I. Institutional Building-In August, Anthra had a review of its work where the major focus of discussions was on roles andresponsibilities between local peoples forums sanghams and organizations such as Anthra. A majoroutcome of this intense discussion was that the teams working with Dalit groups had a chance to elaboratetheir concerns and strategies regarding their work with Dalit communities. They articulated the strong needto work in an integrated fashion on the range of Dalit issues focusing on

Fighting caste discrimination To counter violence against women To create awareness on rights To build their livelihood rights To build livelihood and food security

The local team members chalked out their strategy to work with the communities, and the support they seekfrom Anthra, is in facilitating training and technical inputs, linkages to other groups and resource groups/individuals and building the capacities of the team members in various ways. In Chittoor and Medak theteams intend to work with Dalit women across 10 and 8 villages respectively, mobilizing, organizing andproviding inputs on different aspects.In September the activists widely discussed the need for having exclusive Dalit sanghams which woulddiscuss the range of issues listed above, the need for having leaders.

II. Capacity build ing of activistsApri l 2007: Perspective bui lding for act iv istsVolunteers attended a seven days training program ondifferent aspects related to Poverty- Resources-

Agriculture-Livestock. The caste-class-gender dynamics

of this were discussed in depth. The activists were alsointroduced to certain practical techniques for enhancingsoil-fertility (effective micro-organism, Herbal tea)and bio-intensive gardening, which is a useful strategy for eachhousehold to grow vegetables the year-round.

May 2007: Poultry Management and VaccinationActivists were trained to vaccinate animals (cattle,sheep/goat) and subsequently were able to use this newskill to vaccinate animals in villages. The activists were trained in Care and Management of Poultry. Thesetwo practical inputs were extremely useful for the Dalit women.June 2007: Ecological agriculture:An intensive training on ecological agriculture- principals, practices,

skills conducted by Mr Nammalvar in June, was an intensive and extremely important training. The inputs(see list of inputs described in Adivasi Livelihoods), helped the teams to start applying practices in their ownfields/ farms and demonstrate the techniques to farmers.

August 2007: Organisational development From August 27th-31st2007, the team participated in anintensive training on sanghams and were introduced to the different types / forms of organizations.Different resource persons came and spoke to the group including Mr Madhusudhan (Yakshi), Mr AjayKumar (Andhra Pradesh Vyavsaya Vruthidharla Union), Ms Indira, independent Consultant. The groups wasintroduced to the fundamental aspects of any organization such as the need to have clear objectives, a

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workplan and strategy of work, a structure, decision making processes, finance plan. They listened to thepros / cons of being legally registered and the different legal entities such as society, trust, cooperatives,unions, company etc.

The training provided the team with better insight on their own work with communities in their village to helpthem develop and flesh out their own ideas with their sanghams.

September 2007: In Chittoor training and awareness programs at village and Madnal levels were carriedout in 4 villages on Dalit problems, history of Dalit struggles, development programs available for Dalits,Constituional laws that protect Dalit rights.

III. Livelihood intervention

Medak : Ecological / Organic farming and Livestock/Poultry interventions

Chennapur village: 20 Dalit women have been actively involved in working on ecological agriculturepractices. All the women have been using vermi-compost techniques to prepare compost, which they areusing on their fields. They are also using various herbal soil-fertility enhancing methods, and pesticides on

their crops. While all the women have begun the process of converting their lands from chemical to non-chemical agriculture in a gradual fashion, 2 women farmers (Pochamma and Suseela) cultivated their entireRabi vegetable crop (onions and tomatoes etc) planted in 2006 completely organically. Anthra team hasstarted purchasing these organic products directly from the women. We are exploring ways in which theycan market their organic produce.

Nallavalli and Peddagottimukula: Dalit women, members of the sangham were trained in ecologicalagriculture practices.

Avancha v il lage: 16 Dalit women who are members of the sangham, and who also were recipients of thepassing on the gift goats, were trained in ecological agriculture practices in May 2007. Training wasconducted at Chennpur and practical demonstrations were done on Pochammas land. In Avancha 16

women were given 15 kgs of jowar seeds, 16kgs of red gram, 14 kgs of green gram, 10 kg finger millet, and5 kg of cowpea. They planted these in their lands in mixed cropping system, and have been using theecological practices for this.

A breeding buck was purchased and given to the group, who discussed that they would collectively takecare of the buck by paying one of the woman, Rs 5 / month. The breeding buck was purchased for Rs2500/- from Bikyathanda on 12thApri 2007l. Digambar organized a meeting with all women in sangham anddiscussed about the modality of keeping buck. They have decided to pay Rs 5/- of each to the person whomanage this buck. Kondi.pentamma expressed interest to rear the buck.

The women were trained once again in goat care and management (feeding, grazing and health care , useof herbal medicines) in April. Narsimlu, Sulthana and Ellesh conducted the training program with dalit

women on goat care and management on 18th

of April. They taught them about feeding and breedingmechanism and use of herbal medicines. Ellesh has been monitoring the health status of the goats. Thewomen are regularly using the herbal medicines to treat simple conditions such as wounds, foot rot, maggotwounds, bloat, fever etc.

3 goats unfortunately died due to management reasons. 2 due to sudden acute toxic bloat as a result ofoverfeeding under stall-fed conditions, and one due to being attacked by a dog, which mauled it to death.Till the onset of the monsoons and the agriculture work, the women were taking the goats out to graze. Assoon as their agriculture labour work began, they began to collect fodder and stall-feed the goats

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exclusively. As a result 2 goats experienced sudden bloat due to overfeeding and lack of exercise and died.Anthra veterinary doctor conducted a post-mortem, and found that there were no pathological changes, andthe only cause was bloat due to overfeeding. The goats had also been fed left-over rice, which could haveresulted in acidosis and death. Soon after this incident, the women were again explained the importance ofnot exclusively stall-feeding and overfeeding the animals, but to ensure that they were taken out to graze.Secondly they were once again told to avoid feeding rice and other fermented left-over food items. It was

interesting that the shortage of labour at the household level, and women having to go for agriculture labour,had this impact on the goats, which were overfeeding, as they were stall-fed exclusively.

The third goat was attacked by a dog at night and badly mawled. The injury inflicted was severe and theanimal, while administered first aid and rushed to the local veterinary hospital, could not survive. This is the6thcase of dog-bite in Avancha village, and villagers report a sudden increase in the dog population eversince poultry farms started springing up in and around their village. The easy access to poultry birds, hasemboldened the dogs which now attack animals at will. The women were advised to house their animalsinside their homes/ compound, to minimize chances of dog attacks.

One of the goats kidded in August, and the rest are all pregnant. One goat aborted in September. Theremaining are doing well. The women were trained in kid management by an expert goatherd named

Beeresh and the Anthra Veterinary Doctor.

Chittoor: The activists initiated work with the Dalit community through carrying out a survey to understandkey issues and concerns confronting Dalit women. Some of the major issues which emerged included Castediscrimination against women in villages, violence against women in households, lack of capacity to pursuefurther studies, limited decision making powers. Based on this they have decided to initiate work Dalitwomen in 4-5 villages.

Sheep and goats owned by Dalit families in all the 4 villages were dewormed, and animals suffering fromvarious diseases treated with herbal and homeopathic medicines. Herbal medicines to be used as first aid(Diarrhoea, Cough And Cold, Fever, Wounds) were distributed to the Dalit households. Dalit farmersinterested to grow fodder trees, were given fodder trees grown in the nursery.

Policy Issues: Mr Pandu Dora, Convenor of the Adivasi Aikya Vedika, spent 3 intensive days with theteam visiting villages and talking about the forest rights act.There are a large number of SC and STfamilies in these villages who have been cultivating lands in the forests since hundreds of years, and whohave forest cases slapped on them, for cultivating in forests. These cases date back to the 1980s. Theseprovide sufficient evidence for them to stake their claims to get rights to these lands under the newlyenacted Forest Rights Act, 2005, as they have both documented and oral testimonies/evidence that theyhave been living and cultivating in these forests for over 3-4 generations. Mr Pandu spoke about the act asalso carried out detailed discussions with elders and visited the sites, to help people understand thepotential for the act to be used to secure their rights, once the rules get notified.