Ongel is an interior village in the Malkangiri District of Orissa. It is geographically isolated and it’s residents cannot easily access their Block Headquarters Khairaput. The few young women and men were interested to learn Oriya and they send a request letterto Asha kiran Literacy Unit. The Literacy workers visited and conducted a village meeting. The prospective learners were asked to visit other literacy center in a village for exposure. Five learners visited centre at village Kangrapada 40 km away. Followed by that a street play was arranged for the village. The learners paid for the expenses incurred for the drama team. Later, 22 learners enrolled for the literacy classes. The learners did ‘coolie jobs’ and arranged for kerosene lamps. Since there were no teachers, the supervisor invited a teacher from a nearby village to stay on and teach the learners. The learners contributed in kind, labour-building a mud wall with thatched roof, food for the teachers, kerosene etc. Overall the village contributed about Rs.3,956/- per year. As part of learning, 9 learners visited Vishakapatnam for exposure, all of them traveling by train for the first time ever, and visited the beach and the zoo. Looking at their friends’ progress, neighboring villages are now asking for literacy classes. They also would like it to be a contributory process. It is encouraging to note that the learners are willing to contribute to their learning. The Literacy & Language Unit of AKS hopes that the surrounding villages will soon be motivated in the days to come.
Gadaba & Desiya communities are predominantly agrarian and a majority of their produce is not sufficient for their subsistence. Globalisation has wedged interior villages and created a desire to amass modern gadgets. In the last decade people have migrated for labour to places like Mumbai, Delhi and AP which has affected them positively and on the other hand left them gloomy about their future. This has jeopardised their language and ethnic identity.
The Literacy & Language Unit works in partnership with community members to facilitate adults learners to acquire reading and writing skills in order to fulfil their social responsibilities like marketing, official works, schooling & banking.
The aim of the Gadaba & Desiya Literacy & Language unit is
‘A majority of Gadaba and Desiya people are functionally literate in their mother tongue and in Oriya and are competent to use their skills in their day to day affairs’
The unit carried out following activities over the years:
- Asha Kiran Society’s Gutob -Gadaba & Desiya language development project began with a Socio-linguistic survey in 1995 . The phonemic analysis of Gutob was completed in 1997 & Desiya in 2002 and the grammatical analysis in Gutob – Gadaba was completed in 2000 & Desiya in 2002. This became the foundation for Bridge Literacy classes as well as for Language development Program.
- Orthography Development – With input from the local community these languages were written in the uniqueness of their sound system.
- Adult Bridge Literacy classes - were run in various villages to link them from their mother tongue to Oriya languages. Currently 2 classes are run for SHG and the learners have moved to their second year.
- Writer Workshops – were conducted for community members to encourage local literature. Folk stories, jokes, poems, riddles, proverbs, songs and real life experience stories. To address socio-economic issues like health and agriculture, books on these topics have also been produced.
- Desiya Bridge Literacy classes are underway for 2 Self Help Groups (SHG) and hoping to extent the classes to more villages in the near future.