Looking back at the time when I was at SRIJAN, there is one
lesson that keeps coming back to me. It is that words have power. When you
explain something or are talking in a meeting, what you are saying is having an
impact on someone in the group. And as professionals working in development, we
have a responsibility for what we say.
I remember a clear example of this lesson when I was forming
clusters of SHGs in Bundi, Rajasthan. I had organized a meeting of women from
three different villages. They had some difficulty coming together and I had
promised a very important message in the meeting. By that time, I had formed a
couple of other clusters and had a set agenda for introducing the concept. I
had a story that I would tell in the beginning of the meeting, about an event I
had witnessed while visiting the federation in Duni, Rajasthan:
A
large group of around 50 women had come together to go talk to a local dairy,
who had bought milk from them but had not paid them in the full amount. Rather
than going individually or even in their SHG groups, all of them from different
villages had come together to go talk to him and settle their accounts. Seeing
such a large group of women had frightened him and he had listened to them.
However, these women would not have been able to organize this event if they
had not met with each other regularly and discussed their problems.
I had told this story many times, stressing the importance
of collective action and how there is power in numbers. The story had been
important in convincing women to form clusters. Until that day, I knew that the
story was powerful, but I did not realize just how powerful it was.
The next day, I got a phone call from Rakesh-ji, whose
villages I had visited. The women from all the different villages had come
together and realized they had a similar problem. While they had completed
their work for NREGA, they had not received full payment for their work. They
had talked after my meeting and concluded that they would get women from their
villages to come together. All of them would go to the local government office
in Nenwa to sort the problem.
It was then that I realized that my story had caused them to
take action to solve a problem in their own lives. I also realized that I had a
responsibility to work with them to solve the problem. If they were able to
talk to the government officers and receive full payment for their work, they
would be completely convinced of working together. They had the potential of
forming a very strong cluster.
I told them to wait a few days, while we found out who they
should talk to. I also told them that we would alert the local newspapers and
come with them to make sure everything was successful. We eventually went with
about 50 of the women and they talked to the government. Some of them were
interviewed by the local newspapers. Perhaps most importantly, they realized
that if something is wrong in their lives, they can come together as a group
and take action to make it better. I realized that my words made them come to this
realization. Ever since then, even if I repeat stories and go through a set
agenda at meetings, I never underestimate the power of the words and stories I
have to share.
