About Awaken India
Dear Friends,
For the past five years or so, my colleague Jacquie Childers and I have used our little idea/project/website called Niya as our way of coping with war, hunger, disease, poverty, and other violence in the world. Our work is just a drop compared to the vast ocean of suffering, but it keeps us from despair. Awaken India is another one of our projects. It documents some of my adventures in India.
The whole world is talking about India and China, but Awaken India shines the spotlight on the people largely left out of her ‘progress.’ They live in the shadow of the glass-and-chrome urban jungles of Bangalore and Bombay. They live in far-flung villages. They aren’t famous, or rich, or powerful — exactly the opposite. In the course of my travels, I’ve come across interesting leaders, searching for solutions for India’s vexing social and environmental challenges. If these solutions happen to work in her diverse and complex society, we reckon they have legs to crawl their way elsewhere, as good ideas often do.
I aim to stay away from ivory-tower pontification (you know that stuff when your eyes begin to glaze over and you start thinking of chocolate ice cream). Instead an invitation to share in my Indian adventures. I go to places most ex-pats and tourists don’t usually visit so it should be fun. **We will issue posts only four times a year with the change of the seasons** but each set of posts will be meaty and diverse.Help me launch Awaken India by reading our first set of three articles - the “Summer 2008 edition”:
An Encounter With Minors at the Gandhi Ashram
I visited the Gandhi’s Ashram on the banks of the Sabarmati in Ahmedabad, Gujarat in January 2003. Now, five years later, it’s the carefree girls and the entrepreneurial shoe-shine child laborer I can’t forget.
“The Eye Camp Diaries: 532 Cataract Surgeries in 3 Days”
Dr. Lahane treks to remote villages to fix the eyes of the poor, surviving on one kidney. But he doesn’t travel alone. And in the Forest of Joy, it’s quite an emotional roller-coaster — from Baba Amte scolding important ministers to thousands of people waiting days and nights in heat, cold, or rain — just for a chance to get their sight restored.
SOFOSH: In Conversation with Mrs. Madhuri Abhyankar
As India rushes to dominate the global marketplace, will she take on her social challenges with comparable determination? For example, what will she do about her millions of orphan children? Mrs. Madhuri Abhyankar takes on this challenge in a her own simple and pragmatic way: one child at a time.
Tentative Topics for Set #2: Around Early August 2008 (Depending on Your Feedback to the First Set!):
- An Interview with Dr. Narendra Jadhav, Vice-Chancellor of Pune University (he’s really somethin’ else
- Attempting to Write the Gujarat Riot-Relief Report for AID-Austin: Five Years After My Visit (better late than never)
- Bilgaon: The Adivasi/Aborigine Village that Electrified Itself 56 Years After Independence (and inspired the Bollywood flick, Swades)
Thank you Jacquie for always believing in Niya and donating your incredible design skills. It’s been five years. You’re one generous soul.
Each blog has a comments box for your feedback. We hope you will help us make Awaken India better over time. Join the conversation!
My best,
Neesha Mirchandani