30 October 2009
It is a bizarre sight, but the villagers of Tinginaput are now used to seeing Meenakshi Dewan above their roofs. In her red and gold salwar kameez, she shimmies up street lighting poles, checking the wiring to the solar-powered lamps at the top. Meenakshi is a slight and soft-spoken 20-year-old, making her mark in poor, rural Indian society where most women are illiterate and their lives are spent largely in the shadow of the men's. Here she tells how DFID and the state government of Orissa helped her become a solar power engineer:
“We women used to be scared when outsiders came here. We’d shut the doors on the NGO people who wanted to talk to us. But things changed, and eventually we formed this self-help group. We decided one of the village’s big problems was lack of electricity. So it was agreed that four of us would go to Hyderabad to be trained in solar engineering.
“The other women had never left this place: it was hard and it was difficult for all of us. I was scared to ask anything, but I ended up helping teach the other women from the village, because they speak only the local dialect. But that is another reason why the solar lighting we’ve got now in the village is so important – it means the children can study after dark.
Big changes
“So much has changed. Now the women in the village ask things, they speak up. They help each other. They can watch TV, so they know a bit more about the world, and they realise there’s all sorts of new things they can do. We’ve got to convince people girls must go to school too. And, yes, maybe they look at me and see a good example.
“The men? Well, they think I’m a bit strange. They feel uncomfortable if women tell them things. But some of them are beginning to understand, and now we’re training volunteers so they can help other villages get solar-powered electricity. Everyone sees it’s a good thing. You save money on kerosene for lamps and solar doesn’t cause fires.
“My father died while I was training in the city. I didn’t know because we don’t have telephones. He had really encouraged me. Now, with him gone, my mother would be very sad if I didn’t get married. But I would definitely continue with this work. I want to learn more about application of solar energy, I want to train more people, get more systems up and running in this district. And then I’d like to look at other applications for solar power.
Helping farmers
“While training in the city, I saw a solar-powered cooker. That would be a very good thing to have here, where people use wood from the hills to cook. There are few trees left. We’ve heard that the weather is changing – it’s certainly got much hotter here since I was a child - and we know we have to save the trees to preserve the water. That’s the other good thing about this project: it’s helped people learn about harvesting the rain water, which has really helped the farmers.
“Now our group – the Orissa Tribal Women’s Barefoot Solar Engineers Association – has got a contract to build 3,000 solar-powered lanterns for schools and other institutions. We’ll make 50 rupees (60 pence) for each one, and we’re also getting an allowance for training other people from other villages. That is making us very happy.”
Facts and stats
- Meenakshi received her solar engineering training through the Orissa Tribal Empowerment and Livelihoods Programme (OTELP).
- OTELP is being funded by DFID (£8,669,021 from 2004-10) and run with the state government of Orissa. It will sustainably improve livelihoods and food security for 75,000 poor tribal households.
- Over 40% of people in India do not have access to an electricity supply.