Project Report and Future Plans

This report concludes the solar project at the Abha Seva Sadan Health Centre in Jharkhand India.

I would also like to take this opportunity to discuss the needs of the rural population there and to propose a way we, as wealthy Australians; can all make a tangible and lasting difference in this region.

For older posts detailing the history of this project please click on the "archive" links at the bottom of the right column of this page

The Solar System

As I have mentioned previously, the reason for this project was that the clinic had a very poor source of electrical power. Although mains power was connected, it operated only for one or two hours a day and in some periods not at all. Even when functioning, the mains was of very low and variable voltage and thus too unreliable to run the equipment that the clinic needs.

The doctors were often unable to run the clinic computer, there were no lights for nighttime programs; there was no cold storage facility for medicines and in general the lack of reliable power made life quite difficult for the doctors and staff. Since the successful installation of the new solar electric system they now have enough power to run their computers, their cold storage, their proposed X-ray machine and of course lights for the evening. This has made a tremendous difference to the functioning of the clinic.

Below there are some pictures of me installing the solar system

Cutting wood for a switch board, and I’m in desperate need of a hair cut

Drilling holes in the wall to mount the circuit board

Wiring up the circuit board

Putting the solar panels on the roof. Do you like our ladder?

The finished product! And I got a hair cut for 80 cents!

THE SYSTEM FINANCES

The total amount of funds raised from your generous donations was $ 3,687.

Below I have listed the expenses we incurred in the installation of the system.

Item	Indian Rupee	Aus$
		(1 Aus$ = 34.6 Rs.)
4 x 75 Watt Solar panels	65,400.00	1890.16
4 x Photovoltaic batteries	22,400.00	647.36
4 x Solar charge controller	2400	69.36
4 x 25 meter cable	6000	173.4
screws, nuts, bolts, drill bits	231.92	6.7
misc. hardware	122.58	3.54
battery cables, fittings, soldering charge	640	18.5
3 HRC fuses at 410 each, 3 switches	1,468.00	42.42
3 fuse bases	700	20.23
misc. hardware (nuts, bolts, etc.)	66.56	1.92
misc. hardware	150	4.33
hydrometer, distilled water	100	2.89
16 bolts	349.44	10.1
metal frames for panels	1,232.00	35.6
pipes & accessories	110	3.17
silicon sealant	140	4.04
inverter (1800 VA)	6,200.00	179.19

Total Rs107,710.50 $3,245.00

Thus:

Total donations Aus $	$ 3,687.00
Total system expenses	$ 3,245.00
Remainder	$ 442.00

The remaining funds will go towards my future project, which I am planning to implement this year. Please read below for details.

Aside from your donations which funded the project; travel and on ground expenses were covered by my parents.

NOTES:

Although solar regulators (necessary for controlling current flow to the storage batteries) were supplied with the solar panels I purchased in India, they were inappropriate for the job and I expect will eventually fail. Therefore I had to buy another solar regulator when I returned to Australia. This is the last expense on the list and is unfortunately a necessary one. We are hoping to find someone traveling to the region to deliver it for us thus saving considerable courier freight costs. Normal post is not safe enough.

So, as you can see the project has been a success. However the two weeks I spent at the clinic has opened my eyes to much larger issues and perhaps an effective way that we can help the many needy people in this region.

The Conditions of the Area Surrounding the Clinic

During my time at the clinic I visited a number of the surrounding villages. Compared to the vast city slums we experienced in Mumbai and other places, life is pretty good in the rural areas. In general the villages have a pleasant atmosphere about them, which is in stark contrast to the cities.

However the local inhabitants live in primitive conditions, which have hardly improved in hundreds of years. 6 people may live in a mud room the size of the average Australian bedroom. With few schools, 80 percent of the population is illiterate. They suffer from chronic malnutrition and many infectious diseases. Primitive subsistence agriculture is the main employment available.

There is very poor health infrastructure in this area. Easily treatable diseases such as tuberculosis, polio, leprosy, gastro-enteritis, cerebral palsy, juvenile arthritis (5% of all children), elephantitis and malaria are widespread (and largely untreated). Many women die during childbirth due to a complete lack of maternity services. Because of poor or inadequate training, village health workers often fail to recognize life-threatening complications. The nearest hospital is over 20 km away; it is private and much too expensive for the villagers to afford.

A typical village scene

One reason disease is so widespread is because their water supplies are often contaminated with animal and at times, human waste. Cows and other animals are allowed to stand around the wells. Manure, garbage and other waste build up in the surrounds and of course eventually fall or seep into their water supply. Consequently people rarely have clean water. Furthermore they often use the same water which they bath in to brush their teeth and wash their clothes and kitchenware! As you can tell they have no idea about hygiene.

Another problem is that the villagers have a complete lack of understanding about medical issues. They are often sick and see this as simply a normal part of life. One of many examples we saw was a two year old child who came into the clinic after suffering from diarrhoea for 2 weeks. The doctor said she would have died within 48 hours if left untreated. The clinic told the parents that they must get her to a hospital immediately and gave her oral re-hydration to keep her alive in the interim. The parents didn’t show the slightest bit of concern! I asked the doctor whether he had convinced the parents of the urgency. He said he had done his best but was unsure whether they would go to the effort and expense of getting to the hospital. We can only hope that they took the advice but we have no way of knowing if this child survived. This is a perfectly everyday response to life threatening conditions. Unfortunately the clinic does not at this time have the funds to take these more serious cases as inpatients. It hopes to do so in the future but it all depends on successful fundraising.

Lastly the villagers usually have very poor diets. Their diet consists almost exclusively of rice. They consume nothing else. They eat three times a day and are not calorie deficient but get almost no essential nutrients - usually from before birth. As a result they have suppressed immune systems, which makes them extremely susceptible to diseases and infection. According to Dr Gehrman of the clinic, 80% of the disease that they see is directly attributable to poor nutrition. Improve the villager’s diets and they will shake off many of the diseases that now afflict them. Apart from increased disease susceptibility, malnutrition also contributes to lowered IQ’s. If the villagers had better diets (fruit and vegetables which they could easily grow) the number of diseases and disorders would decrease dramatically.

More information about the clinic, its work and its goals can be found on its website at:

http://www.rural-health-india.org/index.html

The lesson I learned from all of this is that the clinic’s most important work is not medical aid but education. This was particularly driven home when we offered to pay for the operation of the boy with a club foot (see the blog for details). This condition was caused by cerebral palsy caused by nerve damage ultimately caused by severe nutritional deficiency prior to and after virth. The operation will cost $300. Dr Gehrman said that while he applauded and supported our offer to fund the operation; he wanted to point out that with $300 he could employ and train a health care worker for 12 months. This one trained worker could prevent dozens or even hundreds of similar cases by educating villagers about nutrition.

Indeed from what I have seen and from what I have heard from other Aid workers this is the situation in most impoverished areas of India and the developing world.

The Solution

The only real solution to improve living conditions for impoverished people, not just around the clinic but I would imagine all over India is to educate them about good nutrition and hygiene. It is to this that I would like to turn my attention for my next project.

My next project – December 2007 to January 2008

From what I experienced, I fervently believe that education is the only way forward for the improvised people of India and I imagine that this would be true for the developing world in general.

By providing them with sufficient education about nutrition and hygiene I believe we can make a significant impact in reducing the many diseases and disorders, which make their lives miserable. As you can see from what I said above, the prevention of these diseases would be very simple. Fresh fruit and vegetables daily for everyone, some cheap mosquito nets, improved personal hygiene and preventing waste from entering the water supply.

With the help of the clinic I plan to implement a program to educate the villagers using their local customs and language. Currently the clinic is doing this by touring villages and giving lectures in the local language. This is a slow and labourious process and is severely hampered by lack of educated staff. A trained staff member costs about $300-500 per year to employ and this is simply beyond the clinic’s resources at the moment.

After long consultation with the clinic I have decided to assist by raising funds to hire a local drama group that will perform a series of educational shows in the local language. We will record these performances onto a series of DVD’s. Then using a laptop and projector (with batteries powered by our solar panels!) we will tour villages playing the DVD’s for all to see. This will be done on a regular basis to drive these important messages home.

I trust that this education scheme would have a tremendous impact on the villagers as when I visited I often had a hand held video camera with me. I would commonly have 50 people flocking around me to see it. Dr Gehrman admits that the current lectures they deliver are rather “dry” and agrees that the impact of a rather large projection screen and an acted drama would draw villagers from miles around. We are also considering some very basic western movies for entertainment while we are set up in a village. Perhaps silent Laurel and Hardy films. I’m confident that the impact would be huge.

If successful this concept could (with the help of other charitable NGO’s) be expanded outside the immediate region and potentially reach millions of Bengali speaking people.

If I may dream for a moment: I would ultimately like to expand this scheme outside the area in which Bengali is spoken. We could in future take this concept into other parts of India and even Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Obviously this would require hiring drama groups to perform in the local languages, film crews and editing and most importantly reputable NGO’s in each area to carry on the work. We will see!

I am currently in discussion with the clinic to work out the details of this project and the funds required to execute it. I believe it will not be overly expensive and will have a much broader impact than my last project.

Another Important Way That We Can Help

As with all charitable organizations the clinic is chronically short of funds which limits their ability to do the important work necessary in this community. When I asked Dr Gehrman what his greatest need was, the answer was “more staff”.

These are the key people he is hoping to employ in the future and the monthly costs involved:

	Required additional staff	AUS$
	General supervisor	115
	Physiotherapist	144
	Gardener	57
	Part time herbalist	57
	5 clinical assistants at $30/month each	144
	Nurse	115
	Lab technician	86
	Receptionist	57
	Night guard	57

I am considering ways that we might be able to implement a “sponsor a staff member” program where donors would commit to a monthly or yearly amount to go towards hiring these critical staff. Anyone that would like to support a staff member (or part of one) or can assist in fundraising in any way is most welcome to contact me!

I will keep all people on my mailing list updated about the progress of the project and its details. If you are not already on my list but would like to join please contact me at antonszilasi@internode.on.net

Thank You

We caught an overnight train back to Jaipur from Jaisalmer and arrived at 5am on Christmas morning.

One of my first sights was a group of children sifting through a large pile of rubbish in the dark looking for anything of value. Christmas here looks very different to those I have seen in Australia.

We caught an Air India flight back to Mumbai saving us over two days of train travel. The plane was ancient and the seat in front of me broken - it just flapped back and forth. The tray table next door would not lock into position and was permanently down. The reading material included an article about how stressed, understaffed and overworked air traffic controllers in India are. Obviously we got down alive but air travel is not something I enjoy in a country that works like this one!

We are now back in Mumbai biding time till our flight home tonight. What an adventure this has been!

Once I am home I will prepare a report on the project and will edit the video that we took. I hope to make it available on DVD for anyone that is interested.

I have made a commitment to the clinic to fundraise for their education programs which are by far the most important work they are doing. I need to raise money for the operation on the young child with the club foot (I have inserted his photo in an old entry below) and I also need to seek a sponsor or sponsors for our blind freind Cherou in Agra for his ongoing schooling.

I'm developing future plans for another aid project which I need to ponder and discuss at length. I will no doubt be in touch with you all regarding this.

I would like to thank everyone that gave so generously of their time and money to make this journey possible for me. Together we have all done something worthwhile for people who live in a world much different to our own. It would not have happened without the support you have all shown.

My very best wishes to you all.


Anton Szilasi
antonszilasi@internode.on.net

Jaisalmer

We have spent a couple of days in Jaipur and are now in Jaisalmer in Rajasthan near the Pakistan border.

Our journey from Agra to Jaipur was interesting. We decided to take a local bus as it was (in theory) faster and more reliable than the train service. The bus was an interesting design - perhaps best described as a rolling coffin. Ancient of course. The seats were surprisingly comfortable but you had to be a contortionist to get in and out because the access was completely blocked by a steel ladder that led to a sleeping compartment above the seats. This compartment formed a steel plate above our heads and made our ceiling very low. Complete lack of storage left us no choice than to put our luggage under our feet. Bodies without seats filled the floor of the central passageway ready to be ejected en masse throught the front windscreen should the bus come to a sudden stop. To ensure no possibility of escape in the event of an accident, our windows were protected by steel bars.

In the rush to get to the bus I forgot to go to the bathroom and settled in for the 6 hour journey knowing that I was in trouble. Indians are always very helpful (though rarely accurate) and one kindly informed me that the bus did not stop before it reached Jaipur. After an hour I was wishing we had taken a train with it's filthy but accessable toilets (did I ever mention that train passageways were usually moist and muddy as a result of people visiting the toilets and then returning to their seats with wet shoes?). By two hours I was squirming and finally with 3 hours of journey left, I gave up and under cover of my jacket used one of our water bottles to end the agony. Within 3 minutes of doing this the bus pulled in for it's routine half way rest break.

If anyone would like a cheap water bottle, please let me know.

Jaisalmer features a large and spectacular fort on a hill. Inside it is a fully functional small city with many people living there. Tourism seems to be it's most important industry.

We've just come back from a two day camel safari into the Thar Desert. Can't say I enjoyed it much - I prefer to walk! - but the desert was lovely at night.

We were in a fairly new four wheel drive going out to the village where we were to meet our camels. Miracle - it had functional seat belts! When we went to put them on we were assured that it was not necessary as Rajasthan laws made wearing of seat belts optional. Useful information to have!

One of our camel drivers turned out to be albino. His face was bright red from sunburn and eyes nearly closed from the constant glare he is exposed to. We told him about the dangers of skin cancer and the importance of covering up. This seemed to be news to him but sadly not something he was going to do anything about.

I've received word from home that my Diploma of Renewable Energies has come through. I'm finally qualified to install solar panels (among other things). That's a relief! I now have to wait until January 11 to see if this has gained me entry to Engineering at QUT.

An overnight train back to Jaipur ahead of us and then a flight to Mumbai and finally home.

Looking forward to some real Aussie food!

Agra

We are in Agra - home of the magnificent Taj Mahal.

Agra seems cleaner than the other cities we have visited but still far from acceptable by Australian standards. Streets are still chaotic and cattle wander everywhere.

While viewing the back of the Taj Mahal we came across a 15 year old boy begging for money. This is very common and we have learned to ignore beggars as we were told that they earn more than labourers and often pay a cut to the local "mafia". However we saw that this boy was blind with what appeared to be cataracts on both eyes. Knowing that this was easily cured by an operation ($200 -300 for both eyes) we got the hotel we were staying at to help us locate the mother who agreed to have us take him to a hospital for assessment. We promised to have his eyes fixed if we could. This created great excitement in the family and we took both mother and son in the next day.

Unfortunately our hopes were quickly dashed when the opthalmologist told us that his blindness was due to an untreated eye infection he had when he was young and was now incurable.

However he recommended a school for the blind where he could be taught self sufficiency and musical instruments and would have a chance at a reasonable life. We drove him out there with his mother. They both liked it and said that they would come back in a few days to apply. It is on the outskirts of Agra and will require him to board if he does end up going there. If he chooses to do so we will have to fund this which will cost around $50 a month - more of a commitment than we had anticipated! I am going to have to find a way to raise this money so if anyone is willing to support all or some of this please let me know. An Aussie we met on the train coming in to town has generously paid for the first month's expenses but from here on we are on our own with this one.

The work we have done seems like such a drop in the ocean. The needs are huge in countries like this. We have promised ourselves not to find any more needy cases on this trip (although they are everywhere).

I have spent some hours talking to a group of young (all under 10) children that sell cheap tourist trinkets near the Taj. They are from one family and their father is a rickshaw driver. They live in poverty but are all smiles and laughter. They don't go to school although the parents could afford to send them because they do not want to lose the income the kids are bringing in each day.

Varanasi

Hi,

We have spent the last few days being tourists in Varanasi - a holy city on the Ganges river. Quite beautiful in it's own way but a city that raises the concept of filth to new levels. In the old section near the river the streets are very narrow which thankfully keeps the cars and motor rickshaws out but they still have their mandatory densely packed population of cows, goats, dogs and urinating humans. It makes for quite a smell!

The river is something else again. Each day thousands go down to bathe, brush teeth, wash clothes, swim and pray in this holy location. They also burn bodies on wood fueled pyres at the rate of 150 a day. Children run with kites between the pyres and the unburned remnants - usually pelvises and ribs are thrown into the river. If the body was that of a holy man, pregnant woman, child or snake bite victim (and a couple of other categories) it is not burned but weighed down with rocks and dropped into the river whole. Sometimes the body breaks free and floats to the surface along with the occasional dead cow floating by.
As it is currently the dry season the river is very low and barely flowing. This means there are thousands of burned and unburned bodies building up metres from where people are immersing themselves in the river. A little downstream people are fishing with nets. Further down is the water intake that supplies the city. I think you get the picture!

Mission Accomplished!

Well, we have finished at last! Two days work completed in just two weeks. Only in India!

In the end we did not have to change the faulty switch. It turned out that it had been sitting around so long (I really wouldn't be surprised if it were 50 years old) that the contacts had corroded and were not passing current. A little sandpaper solved the problem and the entire system is now functional. The clinic now has a reliable electricity supply. I just hope they get the monkey barrier up soon.

There is just one other item I would like to attend to. As I have mentioned before, the equipment available in India is often dodgy to say the least. The Solar Regulators which came with the Indian solar panels and which control the flow of power to the batteries are cheap and fragile. I don't expect them to last the distance. When I return to Australia I will purchase a proper regulator and send it to the clinic.

We have experimented with solar cookers in the last couple of weeks. The main use for these would be to cook rice and unfortunately the winter sun is not sufficient to bring the water to boiling. However I expect that in summer the cooker will work well. The clinic now has the design and will test it in a few months and if successful will train villagers to utilise this cheap and envirnmentally freindly form of heating food.

Another project we have left for the clinic is to reduce the internal temperature of the building. It apparently gets in to the mid 40's in summer here and they have a long western wall which would really cause the building to bake in the heat. By putting up a bamboo frame about a metre from the wall and running vines up it, they could drop the internal temperature significantly. If it were an edible vine such as passionfruit then all the better.

When we arrived we noticed that although they had numerous plantings around the clinic, none of it was mulched and everything had to be hand watered daily. We introduced them to the wonders of rice straw mulch and now the plants only need watering every 5 days or so. However it has created another problem: Termites love the moist conditions and there has been a population explosion. When I get home I will be asking my Permaculture contacts what might be done about this.

One of the pleasures of living here has been using cold buckets of water to bathe in. I've designed a solar water heater which will work well all year round and give as much hot water as the clinic requires. If you ever visit you will be able to have a hot shower! We don't have time to build this but it will be done in our absence.

A young patient came into the clinic today - yet another victim of ignorance. This was a little girl perhaps two years old. She has had diarrhea for two weeks and is suffering severe dehydration. The doctor here has given her two days to live if left untreated. The parents seem completely oblivious to the seriousness of the situation and apparently unconcerned when it is explained to them. This child has been saved for now but many in a similar situation are not. Again it all comes back to education of the villagers which the clinic considers to be it's most important task.
Because the clinic is chronically short on supplies we have donated all of our oral rehydration packs. Hopefully we will not need them ourselves before we come home.

Today we visited the village of one of the workers here. He lives in a two room mud hut with his wife, his mother, his brother and his wife. That's five people in two small rooms, one of which is used for rice storage and has just enough room for two people to lie down in - a perfectly normal living situation. He earns about 80 cents a day from the clinic (a normal wage) which supplements the farming income the family earns.

We are now making preparations to leave. It's been a great adventure here and we are sad to be leaving the wonderful friends we have made. We have booked an overnight train to Varanasi (also known as Benares) which is a holy city on the banks of the Ganges river. We will be spending a couple of weeks being tourists before we return to Australia.

That's all for now!

Anton

Hi Everybody,

We are finished… well almost!

As usual, due to local conditions; challenges abound. The system is all in place and I went to flick the switches this afternoon and …….. nothing! After much unprintable muttering I did some fault finding and isolated the problem to a switch that is not carrying current. This is hardly surprising considering the lower quality of many products available here. I have constructed a switchboard out of fuses and switches that I’m sure were manufactured before World War II !! The overall appearance of the board would not look out of place in a Frankenstein movie. Hopefully all will work well once we have replaced the faulty part tomorrow. We will see!

Another unusal challenge - Monkeys! There are about 10 or 15 of them who wander through here every few days. They are quite large and they would have no trouble throwing me off the roof and pillaging all my work if they chose to. Accordingly we are all on monkey watch during daylight hours. The clinic will soon install barbed wire around the solar panels which hopefully will keep the (not so) little devils out.

Patients pour into the clinic daily and many of them are a pitiful sight. Today a young boy of about 5 came in with a club foot. This was caused by cerebral palsy which in this region is most commonly caused by malnutrition of the pregnant mother, the child or both. His foot was rotated at 90 degrees to his leg and turned on its side. He was basically walking on his ankle. Although the clinic’s acupuncture doctor can successfully treat the effects of cerebral palsy, this particular case is so far progressed that it can only be cured by surgery in a hospital. The approximately $300 Australian dollars required is completely beyond the means of the villagers here who earn less than a dollar a day. We felt we had to intervene as the child would be crippled for life unless he recieved surgery. I hope to fundraise for this on my return. If I’m unable to, I will pay for this out of my own pocket. All going well, the surgery will get underway in the next few weeks.


Although these cases are heartbreaking and sadly very common, it’s important not to lose sight of the fact that the clinic’s most important mission is education of the villagers which will help prevent many diseases (including cerebral palsy) before they strike. It’s only by focusing on the task of raising knowledge about nutrition and hygiene that the general health of the community can be improved. To do this the clinic needs continuing funding for the salaries of existing and new staff. With additional and better trained staff the number as well as the sophistication of education programs in the surrounding villages can be increased.

We have taken quite a deal of video and we will create a DVD highlighting the conditions here and the work of the clinic on our return to Australia.

That’s all for now. Will let you know when the system is actually up and running – tomorrow….. perhaps!

Cheers,

Anton