MITHRA MOMENTS

A personal account of a Susila Dharma Slum Project in Bangalore, South India  

  “Mithra Foundation is a grass routes level organisation working in nine slums at the eastern part of Bangalore city. It was started in 1992 by a group of mental Health professionals to help the underprivileged community living in the slums and pavements of Bangalore. It is also a resource agency giving training on child related issues. Mithra has three sets of programmes, one for children, one for women and one for Human Rights. The aim of Mithra is to empower children and women from migrant communities who live in the slums so that they secure and regain better status and enjoy basic rights”
                        (Annual Report of Mithra Foundation, May 2001)

Susila Dharma Britain is in partnership with Mithra to support their education programmes through work in Pre-schools and a Primary school .

This work aims to reduce the drop out rates from primary schooling, of the poorest children, who become child labourers.  A lack of basic skills due to deprived home backgrounds and lack of nursery education are the main causes. 

The concept of active, creative, discovery learning is largely absent from the education approaches in India apart from a few rare schools that are for middle class children.   Drills, passive learning, ”command style“ teaching and endless turn taking seemed to characterise the schools in the government sector in India. There is never any mention of “play”.  Mithra’s vision is for the poorest children to experience an education that is holistic, active and creative.

Government schools fail to provide adequate learning opportunities. In fact the government have a scheme where local business, NGOs (like Mithra) and civic groups are called upon to volunteer to provide essential resources and services to make the schools adequate. 

Mithra is providing training for teachers in the slum catchment areas of their pre-schools.  The teachers, once qualified, have a job for life.  There is no staff motivation for development, little resources, and no reflective practice on their teaching. 

Child Labour

Although child labour is illegal, children are often made to drop out of school and take jobs to support the meagre family income.  Exploitation is common.  Children work in: gutter cleaning, building work, incense stick production, rag picking, rangoli powder production, domestic work.

Lack of literacy and awareness from generation to generation has led to a vicious circle that has led to a worsening of living conditions of the people.

Of the twelve staff there are five Subud members involved in the project:

Bella, the director, is also SD India Chair.  She has six years experience working as a project director with Oxfam.

Dr. Joe Rosario, is a lecturer in psychology of special needs.  He initiated Mithra‘s pre-school programme and is responsible for the training of teachers.

Chandrakala is co-ordinator of the pre-schools.

Queenie is pre-school teacher and women’s groups co-ordinator.

Amudha is office administrator.

Even though relatively recent members of Subud, they said that doing the latihan helped solve problems and the latihan gives courage: ”helps me conduct meetings with women groups”.

The teachers are trained through weekly sessions at Mithra centre.  Each staff member has to speak at least 3 languages Kannada (language of Karnataka), Telegu and Tamil.  They are all from slum type communities and therefore can have rapport with the local parents and children.  They all seemed committed to the work, giving six days a week and some Sundays for special events women’s days child workers days etc.  They were very open to adapting their approaches to learning and to teaching the children with enthusiasm and resourcefulness as compared with the inert attitude of the Government teachers.

Mithra Primary School

Susila Dharma Germany have helped provide two buildings for Mithra’s work.  One of these houses the new Mithra Primary School, in Muneshwarnagar.  The first year (2000-01) with it’s first cohort of children has just been completed.  The drop out rate at local government schools is about 30% pa.   However at Mithra School it has been 0% in this year.

The aim is to provide an active and creative education for the poorest children in the slums.  Priyalatha, the class teacher, is a creative and resourceful teacher.  The children learn English from the outset as well as Kannada.

Land to the rear of Mithra School was acquired for a playground. This is a rare boon for the children who are used to cramped living spaces.  When created it will be a wonderful outer symbol of the nurturing and growing that a Subud inspired school can be.  I involved the children in designing their playground through painting, modelling, measuring and playing on the derelict site.

Pre-schools

There are seven pre-schools with 166 children in the slum communities of N.E Bangalore.

The contrast is almost unbearable between the Mithra pre-school in Mokatammanager, a room 12 X 8 feet with slate boards and a small bowl of water and the vast gymnasium full of primary coloured climbing equipment and all sorts of cars, buses, carts, trolleys, tricycles in the Shoreline nursery School in Seattle where I took my granddaughter 5 days after returning from India.  Who said life was to be fair?  Yet the light and joy that emerges from these children  in the tiny spaces is a tribute to the resourcefulness of Mithra teachers and the resilience of the human spirit.

In the mornings the 3-5 year olds attend and then from 3.30 until 7.00pm local children attend to get help with their homework (supplementary education).  The numbers of children that attend is overwhelming for the size of the buildings.  

It is not always easy to successfully set up pre-schools in the slum areas.  It all depends on the negotiations with the dalit leaders in the community.  Sometimes they wish to keep control of everything.

How I fitted in

Having a background in teacher training in Art education I was involved in the weekly training programme for the teachers on Education for Creativity - problems arising out of the transformation from passive to active education involved resourcing an active environment.  Improvisation became the key to this development small blocks of marble from roadside work sites, wooden blocks, water play equipment, making clay from local sources.

As part of Mithra’s commitment to training I gave workshops in Education for Creativity to Government teachers and to NGO (Non-Governmental Organisation) workers.  This latter group are hungry for knowledge and seek to get the best for the children they work with.

I wanted to avoid imposing inappropriate British models of education, so we visited and learnt from alternative schools, in south India, who provide education based on active creative principles. There were a few, but largely for middle class children.    

I helped with photographic documentation of Mithra’s work, especially seeking out and photographing child workers in action.  This was not always easy as child labour is actually illegal and if we were not quick they would be spirited away to a back room by the employers.

Raphael Bate,  May 30 2001