The Nishtha Project

Asia » India » Himachal Pradesh » Dharamsala
December 8th 2006

Published: March 14th 2007

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Geoff n Lexa

Dr Barbara

Nishtha Project

In all we spent 6 weeks in Rakkar a small village just southeast of Dharamsala, in the rather chilly northern state of Himachal Pradesh, volunteering at Nishtha - a rural health, education and environment centre

Check out www.nishtha-hp.org

It was set up some 20 years ago by Dr.Barbara Nath-Wiser, now Nishtha's manager, a general practitioner from Vienna, Austria who has been living in the area since 1984. The health centre is dedicated to the memory of her late husband Krishan Nath Baba, who was a respected spiritual personality in the area and was very concerned about the well-being of the local people.

Their primary aim is to provide a health clinic for some ten thousand people, this is free to the poor, of minimum cost to the 'middle-class' and plays a central role in improving the standard of living for many locals. The clinic is supported by a whole range of other cultural and educational projects that Nishtha runs, such as stitching classes, computer courses, self-defence, children's club, environmental education and a youth club.

To redress the problem of illness and malnutrition Nishtha has installed a filtered water system for the village and runs

Carrots all round

Morning snack for the kids before school starts

a feeding program that provides school children with fruit/veg for breakfast and a free lunch, ensuring that they get at least one good meal a day.

Particular emphasis is given to supporting women and girls, with society strongly favouring the boy child and the birth of a girl still considered a misfortune by many. The few girls that do receive a decent education are still usually confined to a life of manual work in the home and fields, living in the shadow of the males in their family.

By living within the community we learnt a lot about rural life in India and were invited to many weddings. Whilst this was very welcoming and sociable, it also highlighted the problems that traditional marriage customs can bring, where girls are married away from their families, sometimes placing them in a vulnerable position within the husband’s family. When sick some are not encouraged to seek medical help due to cost and this is exactly where the Nishtha clinic offers affordable and appropriate care.

Seeing the lack of respect that women are given, has really had a profound effect on me as I feel very privileged to have the life

Feeding frenzy

and the freedom of choice that I have always taken for granted. It was also very frustrating the way men speak to Geoff when they wanted to say something to me. To be honest this drove me up the wall. I would walk into a room and they’d say hello Geoff and chat away to him and I might as well be a fly on the wall! The strange thing is that it’s frustrating, but at the same time I appreciate my presence in Rakkar was not going to change their culture overnight so it was also something I had to accept.

During our six weeks with the project I felt I learnt more about real life in rural India than we did visiting lots of places like a tourist. The things that we took part in and visited in the 6 weeks are too much to for one blog so we have created a few to show you the highlights.

So, enough of this preamble, enjoy Geoff’s photos which give a flavour of what Nishtha is involved with and I’ll get on with the next instalment.

Additional photos below

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