The people of BT Village* have proved teachable hearts after receiving Transformational Community Development (TCD) Lesson on water and micro-loans. The GHNI Nepal team shares stories about Maya and Basanti, who took these TCD lessons to heart.
“Villagers were taught TCD lessons on water management for better drinking water. To develop ownership of the project, we explored ways to get community participation. Villagers are committed to give their labor to dig 20 meters deep well themselves. Community will oversee the entire project from beginning to end. After completion, villagers will charge each family certain amount of money for maintenance of the project.
“After the TCD lessons, villagers said that now they have become more conscious about the importance of safe drinking water for their children as well as for themselves. Although wells in the village are still uncovered, which makes the water in the well dirty to drink, 45 year old Maya* says that she has started to boil the water to drink to make it free from water borne diseases for her family.
“Basanti*, 40 year old housewife, had lots of problems in her family before coming to TCD lessons. As her husband works in India, she is left alone to look after her children. Whenever she had financial problems she used to go to landlords in an adjacent village to get high interest money as her husband only sends little amount of money two times a year. After TCD lessons, she realized that help comes within the community.
“Realizing she has to do something on her own, she started to talk about forming committee for raising money every month to help each other when there is financial need. Now anybody with money problems can consult the committee to get loan with very low interest. Now, people in BT Village don’t have to go after landlords who charge them high interest rate. Basanti is helping them so much.”
*For purposes of security and well-being, “BT Village” is a pseudonym of the village being helped by this project.
- For purposes of security and well-being, “Maya” and “Basanti” are pseudonyms of the women being helped by this project.