I have disassociated self from DHADAK MOHIM w.e.f: 1st September 1400 Hours!
It is indeed ironical and a very sad experience when you hold someone high for the good work they have done since years... however, a close association do reveal a lot about how things are on the grounds.
I came to know about Melghat Maitri from documentary filmmaker Ajay Saklani who made the documentary on Melghat Malnutrition UPAASMAR – The Taste of Hunger! In June, Melghat Maitri helped me greatly to conduct survey at villages in Melghat Region for three days. So when their DHADAK MOHIM (89 days medical camp during monsoon) was to start on July 16th, it was my turn to lend my support and help them. Through my friends all around the nation, I managed to collect medicines worth 25 to 30,000 rupees for the camp (and more were expected to arrive but now I have requested everyone not to send them). I joined in as a volunteer along with my friend Ms. Anil from Agra on the 20th August.
What I experienced in mere few days was a nightmare as many volunteers and I wondered how can someone who has held such camps since the last 14 years, be so unprofessional in their approach... if there is one flaw, one can say... – ‘we are humans and humans do make mistakes’. If there are two flaws... then one can presume it to be a coincidence but if there are number of flaws in the system, then it a case of total mismanagement... and that is what other volunteers and I experienced @ Dhadak Mohim...
Right from the word ‘go’ things were not as I had expected... a mere 30 minutes Orientation @ Arrival (of the volunteers) by Dr. Ajit Roy about how to detect Pneumonia, diarrhoea and treat the infants, and if required the volunteers would be taught how to administer injections...and yes... he declares you all are doctors now, who can treat patients with the medicines! Initially, I was told that every batch will have an able doctor, however, none of the batches (nine) had a qualified doctor to lead the team of volunteers, who come from various walks of life – some were engineering students, some medical, some BSW / MSW and some professionals from various sections...
It was the job of the Batch Head / Team Leader to explain the intricacies of various medicines to be given to patients and train the volunteers in mere 10 days’ time... so it depends on the respective individual to pick up things fast or just be the way one is... During the Orientation @ Arrival there is no mention that the volunteers are here only for Counselling the villagers and treat only the serious patients without medicines... but when I asked for the short supply of medicines and no dettol to clean the patients’s injuries / boils or body before applying medicines, I was told by Dr. Ajit Roy – ‘We are here not to treat the patients but only to counsel them and create awareness without medicines... we have to only treat serious patients with medicines’. How I wish they had put a placard on each volunteer’s chest saying – ‘We are here only for counselling and not treatment’. I really pity the approach!
The following points of DHADAK MOHIM’s management says it was a total mismanagement to lead the volunteers to believe that they are doing a great job without providing sufficient medicines, training and orientation sans able and qualified doctors, without proper accommodation, safe drinking water, proper toilets etc etc:
Each volunteer was charged Rs. 700/- for the ten days’ work... volunteers travelling from all over India had to spend their own and the Trust which should have provided food, water & accommodation failed to do so. While the Trust will gain everything because of the volunteers, who will remain faceless and nameless, many felt they were taken for a ride by being charged Rs. 700/- since they were giving 10 precious days of theirs to serve on behalf of the Trust so why were they charged?
No pick up from different base camp after the camp ends... girls and boys with heavy luggage were left on their own to walk for two to three kilometres from the interiors of the villages before getting transportation to arrive at the Main Base Camp @ Dharni.
Volunteers were asked to sign a declaration that in case of any casualties, it is not the Trust of the Management who will be responsible but the individual is responsible... it was the most bizarre clause because volunteers were working for the Trust and the Trust sheds its responsibilities with the signed declaration.
No proper stock of medicines provided at each base camp (Rajaram from Trust revealed in a personal conversation)... I had to literally beg for Dettol, Protein Supplements (the camp was actually meant to serve the malnourished patients but the main supplement was not available in the stock) for more than 4 days... for Protein Supplements I had to finally tell Ram Phad to send 20 packets and that I shall pay the amount... and only then it arrived late night...
The status of medicines’ stock was discussed with Dr. Priyadarsh Ture, who was shocked to hear... and the next two days, he made sure our Base Camp got what we requested him to provide but after two days, it was the same old story... no one bothered to ask what we required or what was our medicines stock’s status...
When I told Shambhaji (the Camp Leader of Paankhalya) that without all the medicines volunteers should not enter a village (to serve the patients) after repeated requests for medicines, that evening medicines arrived after four days of begging and repeated requests.
When I projected and expressed the inadequacies and inefficiency of the management, instead of accepting their inefficiencies, they blamed the volunteers for not doing the job properly.
The status of insufficient stock of medicines in all the 9 Base Camps covering 30 odd villages was confirmed by Rajaram of the Trust, who revealed that every Base Camp was facing the shortage of medicines...
Initially was told that they don’t have enough stock of medicines as they have not arrived from various donors... it was the duty of the Trust to keep enough stock of medicines before the camp starts even if the donors had not send them but such thing never happened and even the day I left, the shortage persists.
No stock taking or daily follow up by the management on a daily basis as to which Base Camp needs what medicines...
Orientation @ Arrival to volunteers very misleading by Dr. Ajit Roy, as first we were told that maximum deaths in the region is caused not because of Malnourishment but Pneumonia and medicines not reaching in time to respective patients... Death due to malnourishment was a rare and not the real cause... so is Malnorishment in Melghat Region a Demonic Myth created by the Media and Government, because while working in four villages, our batch witnessed less than 10 cases of malnourishment...
Volunteers were sent to villages without Dettol to treat the patients with boils / injuries... repeated request failed... Fortunately one of my friends from Mumbai sent me a 5 Litre can of Dettol and another sent me 5 bottles of Savlon... the management didn’t provide us any...
At respective Base Camps, no proper arrangements of Safe Drinking Water (when they have charged Rs. 700/- each), Electricity, Accommodation, and Toilets (for ladies & gents)... Volunteers were left to fend for self at the mercy of their own... Volunteers suffered from Skin diseases and one even became serious, so much that the Team doctors could not treat her and she was taken to Private Nursing Hospital and was administered saline bottles... imagine, if they cannot take care of their own volunteers, how will they treat the villagers? Volunteers were drinking water from wells full of frogs and other insects, fortunately not many fell sick... how can one create awareness and counsel the villagers when the management made the volunteers to go for nature’s call in the open in an unhygienic manner as the villagers live?
Short term vision of the Trust because after 3 months what? The villagers will be left at the mercy of God... what happens to them in the next 9 months if they get sick?
When donations were pouring in from many individual donors (many of my friends too contributed with cash who could not send medicines), why then there were so many inadequacies and shortage of medicines?
Wastage of vegetables were at the peak... as food stocks arrives only when the management is asked... it was not provided on a daily basis.... kilos of vegetables used to get waste and thrown in a region where the sole aim was to serve the malnourished infants... it shows the callousness and mismanagement at its best!
Non-Marathi Volunteers who came in from North were also given the declaration forms in Marathi instead of English or Hindi... when we asked, we were told they have not made it... mismanagement and misleading the volunteers.
Non availability of qualified doctors at each Base Camp, however, initially I was told that every centre will have one qualified doctor.
Improper Division of Number of volunteers in each Base Camp... some camps had 10 to 14 volunteers while some had just 5... it shows how the mismanagement was at its best!
All these points I will be discussing in more detail manner one by one in my blog as a series so that people are not misled to believe what they don’t know happens on the grounds. I am sad that such a thing happens in the name of serving the poor villagers to let the world believe a lot is being done... I am sad, really very sad... It is better not to serve the poor at all but to serve in the name of exploiting the situation of the poor... well, I have not slept properly even when I was serving the villagers there...
(to be continued... )
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