Under their quarterly community initiative and Global Give Back Day, Intel - Bangalore has approached Divya Jyoti Jagrati Sansthan (DJJS) to conduct health and hygiene awareness in 3 villages Kooguru, Gunduru and Bagur around Brahmi NGO's school Anjana Vidya Kendra School in Bangalore.
Firstly, DJJS volunteers under its Health Initiative ‘Aarogya’, conducted surveys in these three villages and later on findings were discussed with Brahmi NGO, which is locally very active since years. Dr. Channa Raju, Founder, Brahmi NGO also shared his experiences and observations and after a detailed discussion following were the findings that came out:
1) Total population in each village is around 500 members, so total 1500.
2) Most of the villagers are farmers or laborers.
3) The villagers have poor hygiene practices. For e.g. not washing hands before having food, not taking bath regularly, poor waste management etc. due to which they get diseases caused by germs and parasites like skin infections, gastroenteritis, diarrhea etc.
4) They believe that evil forces cause these problems.
In order for covering the villages exhaustively in one day only, around 50 Intel volunteers, 15 DJJS volunteers, 10 students and 5 teachers from Anjana Vidya Kendra School gathered for this community awareness program on 9th October 2015. With a brief informal introduction amongst the volunteers, according to the findings made, briefing of the instructions were given to all the volunteers (Intel, DJJS, teachers & students) on how to carry out the activities with the villagers. All the volunteers went from door to door and counselled the villagers on- Proper way and time of washing hands, harmful effects of germs and bacteria carried by unwashed hands, diseases caused due to careless personal hygiene etc. Posters were also handed to villagers depicting importance on hand washing and filled some counselling slips with inputs from residents.
The villagers responded well to counselling & other activities and around 57 families in the villages got benefitted in the three villages. Post lunch session; DJJS shared its vision and various activities that are being conducted at both social and spiritual fronts in order for achieving ‘Global Peace’ – the ultimate goal of the organization.
