Kothes inject hope in remote Halbaras

NAGPUR: Fifteen years back, the children in Halbaras, a remote tribal village in Kuakonda block of Dantewada district, and adjoining villages in about 40 km radius in Chhattisgarh didn’t go to schools. Most children suffered from malnutrition. A huge majority of them didn’t know that most of their health problems were due to sickle cell, a hereditary blood disorder.A big section, especially women and children were severely anemic.
But, today, a majority of them go to schools, their nutritional status has improved and, importantly, many of these children after completing their high school or higher secondary education have taken to higher education in Polytechnic College in Dantewada. Many of them have also got jobs and some of them even have set up their own businesses.
The total number of such beneficiaries is about 4,000. And out of the 75,000 individuals tested for sickle cell disease about 750-800 (1%) either have the sickle cell disease or are carriers of the gene which causes the disease. Anemia still continues to be the biggest hurdle in women’s health but the haemoglobin status of children in schools has improved both due to the government intervention through anganwadis and regular supply of ‘poshak ahar’ or nutritive supplements like gud, channa, groundnut, coconut etc by the Kothes Ashram.
Halbaras now has a rice mill run by a tribal Surendra Nag alias Bhoyar. He has even managed to repay his Rs 3 lakh loan to the State Bank of India. Ramkumar Baghel could get his six acre land released from the clutches of debtors. Madko Kawasi after doing his computer training in ITI now has a job of computer operator in the forest department. Brijlal is a soldier. His elder brother Naik is a teacher. Somaru is a commando. Harish Madavi who appeared for his XI this year has emerged as a talented sports person who has won gold medals in weight-lifting in district competition and is good at kabbadi and running. The list is endless.
The credit for this change goes to 79-year-old Jayant and 77-year-old Jayashree Kothe from Nagpur. The couple set up an ashram for supporting children who wanted to study in Halbaras in the year 2000. Kothe, a geologist by profession, who retired from the Oil and Natural Gas Commission (ONGC) initially worked for two years in malnutrition in Malebahi and Durgampara villages in Abujhmad area in 1998. But due to inaccessibility to other villages even on scooter due to absence of even kaccha roads there, Dadaji and Dadiji, as the Kothes are called by locals, decided to shift. They stayed in Pharasgaon near Kanker for another year when Jayant surveyed the whole area to see where their intervention was needed most. This brought them to Halbaras where they converted an abandoned police station into an ashram for students and the police quarter into their home.
“Children didn’t go to schools. And even if they did, the drop out number was huge. So we decided to support children who were ready to pursue studies through our ashram. Every year we have about 25-30 students from standard VII to XII or now even those doing graduation staying in our ashram. We pay their fees, buy their books and ensure that they go to school. Jayashree supervises their studies for two hours in morning and another two hours in the night. She also sees to it that they are extremely disciplined and follow their routine religiously,” Jayant told TOI during a medical diagnostic camp organised by the Kothes for the first time last week.
The diagnostic camp showed a very high prevalence of anemia in women, sickle cell complications like joint pain, hypothyroidism, malnutrition, skin diseases, diabetes, cancer, heart diseases which included congenital and rheumatic heart disease, valve problems, hypertension etc. The team of Nagpur doctors, pharmacists and friends and supporters for the camp consisted of Dr Ankita Kothe (Jayant’s daughter-in-law), Dr Urmila Kshirsagar, Dr Ravindra Kshirsagar, Dr Vijay Bedekar, cardiologist Dr Mukund Kalamkar came from Hyderabad, dentist Dr Vaishali Goverdhan and a nurse from Bilaspur Usha Nimsakhare. Sanjay Tatwawadi from Rotary Club from Nagpur, nutritionist and Jayant’s daughter Varsha Tatwawadi, advocate Smita Deshpande and her son Raghav, and pharmacist Rohini Dhume from city also rendered their support. Sulochana Jangale, Gauri Vaze, Ram and Sunita Godbole were local contributors.
The day for everyone in the ashram starts with a morning prayer, followed by yoga at 5.30 am. Since the Kothe couple are too old to cook for so many inmates, the students cook for themselves as per the duty schedule fixed by professor R S Jog, a former ONGC colleague of Jayant who lives in the ashram for at least quarter of a year. Of course, the Std X and XII students are exempted from this duty. Dadiji also helps inculcate good values in the inmates so that they grow into good human beings. Kothes also send some deserving students for tuitions at Dantewada.
In 2005, Dadaji embarked upon the idea of screening the tribals for sickle cell. The ashram is the only place in Jagdalpur district to have a sickle cell detection lab where inmates of ashram trained at Pune carry out solubility tests and electrophoresis. “Since we are not doctors we cannot directly help in treatment. But the ashram students and I regularly hold camps to educate the tribals about how they can prevent the disease from being passed on next generations as well. We will be handing over this data to government so that they can have a rehabilitation programme for affected persons,” said Jayant.
Basically the biggest financial support for all these activities of nutrition, education and sickle cell comes to the ashram from ONGC as corporate social responsibility (CSR). Dadaji runs the ashram under the Bhartiya Kushtha Nivarak Sangh (BKNS) support. Some of Dadaji’s friends -- Anil Dehadrai, retired ONGC colleague, Sudhir Deshpande, retired Central bank employee and M B Patil offer their services too to the ashram as and when they find time.