We are done with the first leg of our travel around India. At the Yatra, this is known as “THE STORMING”. This is where the yatris interact with their groups, cohorts, other yatris, the ex yatris and the role models from Mumbai to Chennai.
The feedback so far is very encouraging and extremely heartening; the energy, upbeat; the focus, unchanged; the learning, ongoing; the emotion, exacerbating!!
This year too, the yatris are focused, energetic, vocal, compassionate, and extremely confident of their abilities. They seem to be accustomed to the routine on the train and a system has been put in place, rather by default. No discussion. No questions!! The morning wake up calls, the session planning, the role model visits, getting ready every morning before breakfast. It is as if they have been doing this for years.
Mumbai was the start of the journey in more ways than one. Our first role model, our first station for waiting (among many) our first train session, and our first meeting with 400 yatris and the core group from the Tata Jagriti Yatra team!
Manish Tripathi was energetic and provided the right fuel for the yatris to start thinking in terms of entrepreneurship! And he was loved by all. No exception!! His story is quite real and very doable unlike some stories which may be beyond the reach of the general audience we had in the auditorium that day.
That was probably the last vestiges of a proper air conditioned environment that would be felt for some time to come. Since then it has been rather interactive with the real India – the wind, the nature, the people, the dust, the uncertainties of rain, and the variation in food provided on board, and at the various locations so far have ascertained that this is in fact what real India is all about. The reality of Middle India!!
Our second session was at Trivandrum a good 2 days away from Mumbai. And although we were about 5 hours delayed due to unforeseeable circumstances, we still made it in time to Kochuvelli station, where we had our first fire drill. Our visit to Paul Tenberken and Sabriye Kronenberg of Braille Without Borders was very touching and very enlightening about social taboo against blind and how wrong we could be about the grit and determination that blind people have about being independent or for that matter, as co-dependent as we are with others in our society. But most definitely not being a burden without cause or direction! We were introduced to Mr. G. Vijayraghavan, CEO and Founder Technopark. He indulged us with details about what he went through trying VERY hard to fight against all odds in order to make his dream of setting up an IT park in Kerala. And he succeeded rather well, in fact being a record setter of sorts now being one of the larger organizations in India.
Kanyakumari was a breather of sorts, with the first half of the day introducing the yatris to Vivekanand Rock Memorial. A picnic of sorts! A lot of introspection time was given and it proved useful since our first CNBC Panel Discussion involved introspection especially on the part of the women yatris. The topic of discussion was Women and Enterprises: Success stories and Role Models. Historically entrepreneurship has been a male-dominated pursuit, but many of today’s most inspirational entrepreneurs are women. While women’s entrepreneurship has been recognised during the last decade as an untapped source of economic growth, why is their participation low? Why is it neglected at large? How can women be incorporated in the enterprise-led development? What are the success stories out there? And these questions were cleared out by leading women entrepreneurs in their own right, Madhura Chatrapathy, Chetan Gala-Sinha and Shaheen Mistri.
From Kanyakumari we moved to Madurai, the temple city of India, where the yatris were exposed the best example of systematic and operational brilliance in the form of Aravind Eye Care System. And the best part of this role model is it provides the best model for entrepreneurs to create a system whereby all sections of the society are catered to with equal attention and yet be fitting to each person’s necessity and earning capacity. At Madurai, as a surprise, we also introduced the yatris to the Aparajitha Foundation. Their excellence in value and service was discovered first hand by the yatris through an excellent exercise conducted on how they teach values through visual aids.
Kuthambakkam village, outside Chennai was the next location to talk to the yatris and the host was Mr. R. Elango, visionary and rural development genius in the south of India. The village of Kuthambakkam is in Tamil Nadu (India), with a population of 5000. A few years ago, the village was fraught with poverty, inflicted with violence against lower castes (dalit) and women, had 35% of its population involved in illicit liquor brewing and lacked infrastructure. Today, the village is transformed, has good basic infrastructure in place, and the villagers are now busy building an environment-friendly local economy based on a cooperative model, producing their basic necessities (like food and clothing) within their own village. The panel discussion in the village covered Enabling Rural India to prosperity. Multiple questions were addressed by Mr. Chaukar of Tata, and Mr. R. Elango. Some were: How do we spur inclusive growth in rural India? How do we enable farmers with efficiencies in various spheres of agriculture, power and water along with supply chain management of produce? How do we promote education and promote access to innovations?
By now the yatris are comfortable with each other and the next leg starting Bangalore and the New Year will be the time that yatris need to use to form their judgements, their thoughts, their beliefs, and their network, growing their capabilities to attack the problems that plague their vision, or may be an obstacle to their success. This is what we call NORMING. Welcome to the Yatra! Yaaron Chalo…
For Bouquets and Brickbats, please email me at partha@parthasrinivasan.com
Partha Srinivasan, Publicity Consultant
