SRISHTI

Boxma village, P.O.Kuchinda-768222, Sambalpur – Orissa – India

Annual Report for the year 2007

SRISHTI (Sanatan Rishikul Ashram Seva Trust) is a Public Charitable Trust registered under the Orissa Public Charitable Trust Act. Sri Swami Om is the founder President & Managing Trustee of the organization. The organization was set up on April 20, 1990 at Boxma village in Sambalpur district of Orissa state. SRISHTI is affiliated to Orissa State Voluntary Organization under the Rural Development Program.

Aims and Objectives of the Organization: To initiate program for the over all development on Education, Health and Agricultural activities. Also to infuse Income Generating activities and Self Help Groups so as to uplift the community from economic backwardness.

SRISHTI initially started a Vocational Training Centre in Tailoring and an Orphanage consisting of twenty five tribal children in Boxma village. A training program for Mushroom cultivation was imparted to tribal women as part of the Income Generating program with the support of Sir Dorabji Tata Trust, Mumbai. Under Sambalpur District Rural Development Project we installed three thousand smokeless choolas in more than fifty villages whereby we could protect the forest from deforestation.

SRISHTI organized Community Based Rehabilitation for the Visually Impaired persons in rural area. We identified 559 Visually Impaired persons, out of which 82 were children. As part of our rehab work we provided Disabled Pension from state government and conducted mobility training program for all identified Visually Impaired persons.

SRISHTI is the first organization in the state to organize Women Co operative Dairy Society as part of our Income Generating activities. We formed Srishti Women Co operative Dairy Society in Boxma village in October 1995. Today there are thirty five Women Co operative Dairy Societies in Kuchinda sub division employing more than a hundred women in these societies. Also we have installed a Bulk Milk Chilling Plant with a total collection of 3500 liters of milk per day collection. SRISHTI s motivation in Women Co operative Dairy movement is one of the successful and model Income Generating program of the state. Along with these program we have initiated Self Help Groups, Women Literacy Program and Women and Child Health Program.

SRISHTI has a village high school in Boxma village organized by the panchayath with around one hundred and fifty student studying every year. We do provide free hostel facilities for the needy students who comes from the far off villages and girl students are given free education as a special case in order to promote women literacy in our society. We also provide free mid day meal for our school children as most of the children come from the below poverty line cadre and also this takes care of the daily attendance in the classes.

This year in February we took our high school children to attend the Science on Wheel exhibition at Rourkela railway station. It was an innovative trip to Rourkela for our children as most of them were venturing out of the village for the first time and also most of the children has not seen a railway train in their life. The science exhibition was very informative for all the children and it created a big pact in the mind of most of these children about science and technology.

Like every year we do organized Rural Inter School Athletic meet at Boxma high school play ground for two days. We invited more than six schools from the nearby villages for the Athletic meet providing trophies and certificates for the participants. We invited the Sub Collector as our chief guest to distribute certificates and trophies for the winners.

Also we do organized this year Independence Day and Republic Day in our high school. As part of this function there were debate, drawing and song competition and winners were provided certificates and all children were provided sweets, biscuits and drinks after the function. Our school do organized Saraswati Pooja, Ganesh Pooja and Shivaratri Pooja as part of our village community service and after the pooja Prasad were distributed among students and parents.

ASHA for EDUCATION, Cleveland Chapter, USA is presently supporting SRISHTI for its educational project. Hence, we are thankful to ASHA for EDUCATION in our Boxma High School activities and hope they will continue to support us for the coming years ahead. Mr.Bharadwaj project coordinator for ASHA for EDUCATION visited our high school and spend some time with our high school children and staff members.

SRISHTI wanted to set up a Science Laboratory in our Boxma High School for the coming academic year on an experimental manner. We hope to find suitable materials and financial help from the like minded donors so that our rural children have a scientific outlook in their life. We have already started a Computer classes for our high school children and hope the coming academic year will create an interest in our high school children. We are indeed thankful to Asha for Education, Cleveland chapter in supporting our educational project and guiding us in our future activities so as to uplift our tribal children into the mainstream.

This year we constructed a toilet for our high school children with the financial help of the state government under the Rural Sanitation Program. Also we are renovating our school main building as the building is getting weak due to heavy rain and wind. We received a financial grant of Rs.Two lakhs from the state government through the village panchayath for the renovation of the school building.

SRISHTI organized rural health program this year on De worming and Vision Screening in more than thirty schools nearby. All the children were screened their vision testing and free tablets were given for worms among the children along with spectacles for the low vision children.

Further we have taken the initiative for evolving a sustainable social culture by periodically organizing Enviornmental Awareness Program for the rural masses about the environmental factors and persuading them not to cut trees in our reserve forest area and not to kill wild animals which will lead to extinction of wild life.