The Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society, JeeVika, a state-led women’s self-help group, is active since 2007. Based on primary research, this article highlights the potential role of the individual rural woman – the didi – in driving the social and economic shifts necessary for sustainable poverty reduction in rural Bihar.
The term didi is used to address an elder sister. It embodies the notion of respect. Traditionally, the term has remained within the social domain. This brief overview provides an insight into the emergence of rural self-help groups (SHGs) for women – the Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society (BRLPS): JeeVika – where the term is formally deployed to address member colleagues. The article also explores how this nomenclature can influence in mobilising the immense underutilised social capital of rural women.
Based on the primary research done by the author, this article highlights the potential role of the individual rural woman – the didi – in driving the social and economic shifts necessary for sustainable poverty reduction in rural Bihar.
SHGs in India
The SHG network in India as noted by Ramesh (2007) has emerged as the major conduit for microfinance delivery. The second generation of SHGs, mostly in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, is attributed with acquiring roles geared towards livelihood securities and harnessing of social capital (ibid). The V elegu SHGs in Andhra Pradesh is worth mentioning as the Bihar initiative has emulated the conceptual model for Velegu. The Velegu SHGs work within a “saturation-approach”, where the aim is for all poor and socially excluded women in a village to achieve self-reliance and livelihoods security.
The raison d’etre for each unit of the pyramid structure – the SHGs, the village organisations and the community block organisations – is embedded in inclusion, participation and ownership. The SHG movement is estimated to have attained 10-15% self-sustaining status in Andhra Pradesh (ibid). Hence, while much remains to be achieved even in the model state, the progress, in terms of enabling the rural women to harness the social, economic and political opportunities and reclaim self-respect and dignity, is highly noteworthy. These are critical drivers of human development within the discourse on the capability and the well-being approaches (Sen 1999; Alkire 2002; Gough and McGregor 2007).
The SHG endeavour in Andhra Pradesh was initiated in the 1990s within a relatively progressive development environment – female literacy, poverty incidence, and the gender indicators in particular, were near or above the national trends (GoI 1991, 2001). In addition to the political support, there was also a healthy engagement of the civil society organisations (Narayanasamy and Boraian 2005). But, the context in Bihar presents significantly a divergent socio-economic structure.
JeeVika: Bihar SHG
For the past three decades, Bihar, although rich in fertile land, continues to exhibit the lowest human development index (HDI) amongst the major states of India. Ninety per cent population of Bihar lives in the rural sector and poverty incidence is at 41%. Health and education outcomes are the worst in the country for the rural women. The maternal mortality rate is at 707 (the national average is 404) and literacy level is just 34% (World Bank 2006). It is characterised with rigid “semi-feudal” tendencies, complex social-exclusion politics and fragile state structures. Mushars and Santhals continue to be the most impoverished groups with absolute capability and asset deprivation (ADRI 2007). The financial sector delivery in rural areas remains sterile from microcredit access to the poorest cohorts.1 Such households remain dependent on informal sector credit at very high borrowing costs.
JeeVika is a state-led initiative, launched in September 2007 and funded by the World Bank. Based on “savings-led” SHGs, it comprises the poorest, and the most socially excluded women. It is conceived in terms of (1) individual institutional-building: situated within the discourse on well-being and empowerment, (2) individual and collective capacity-building, drawing on the discourse on the capability approach, and (3) adoption and participation in self-selected livelihoods opportunities. The focal point of the process is the individual rural woman and her “agency”. Each of the 15 rural women that make up a single SHG is the main stakeholder – the operational unit and the lifeline of the movement.
By addressing each other as didi, numerous social barriers are broken and new bonds of collegiality and social networking are created. Complexities of caste and religion-based exclusions are engrained even within the lower caste communities. The nomenclatures – JeeVika and didi – may weaken such social rigidities and have an equalising influence. First, since women understand the meaning of Jee Vika, it is easier to identify with the movement to improve their livelihoods, irrespective of their social background. Second, the social attributes of the term didi usher in reverence for each other beyond that conveyed by mahila, bahin or sakhi, irrespective of their caste, religion or age. Thus, it weakens the barriers of caste and religions. The didi of JeeVika SHG can be a young mother, grandmother or a widow. The newly created bond is reinforced at the weekly group meeting held in rotation in the social space outside the dwellings of each member.
Group Meetings of JeeVikas
The professionalism exhibited in conducting the meetings is most impressive. With members seated in a circular formation, the meeting begins with a secular song in the local dialect calling for individual and collective strength, knowledge, faith and courage to follow the right path to bring happiness and well-being. The circular seating enables dispelling of any hierarchical notions that may arise out of social status or being office-bearers – president, treasurer or secretary of the group. Each member first introduces herself, then greets, all didis with not just a namaskar but pranam. This again has higher connotations of respect in the cultural context, further strengthening the bond. The encouragement given to the shy and less articulate didis from the bold and vocal ones is a lesson for any researcher of adult learning.
The meeting starts with rules of punctuality, regular attendance or request for absence and meticulous minute taking. It also maintains detailed records of the weekly savings and repayments. There are individual member passbooks as well as group ledgers. Savings and repayments are passed down the circle to each didi, who is encouraged to count, add their input and say it aloud, to finally reach the treasurer. The practice aims to instil a sense of ownership and entitlement by visually and physically handling savings and repayments. A Rs 10 note growing to Rs 150 at the end of the round certainly provides a sense of material security – the group has Rs 600 at the end of each month and the assurance of accessing this money with dignity. The social and economic implications of borrowing at 2% compared with at least 10% from the local moneylender are unmistakingly clear to the group. The practice also helps with numeracy skills though at an aggregate level these are already high in comparison with the calculator-dependent literate western population.
Decision-Making Process
The agenda moves to assessing the loan applications for the group money. Each applicant makes a case by outlining her need, urgency and how she expects to pay. The decision-making process is participatory. All didis barring the applicant discuss the proposal to arrive at a consensus. The arguments are lively both in terms of questioning the merits of the case and in supporting the application. In clear contrast to a commercial lending process, the groups relegate the “ability to pay back” to a much lower priority, where the need is either for life-threatening treatment or for a daughter’s marriage. The group offers “softer” repayment terms extended over a longer period to such applicants. However, concerns of accountability, defaulting repayment and savings as well as inadequate information indicate a strong sense of ownership of the process.
Didis are not wanting in vociferously expressing their views, be it a criticism of their treatment at the bank, or by the village head, or by the panchyati raj institution officer or how much they wish their children to be educated, so that they can live a better life than their parents. The motivating nudge given to the less vocal didis by the others is an indicator of the growing social bond in the group.
The meeting concludes with the summary of the actions to be taken and the minutes being read out aloud. Lastly, a didi is asked to volunteer to host the next meeting and the group leaves with a confirmed timing and venue.
The community mobiliser, who is a JeeVika staff and a resident of the same village, facilitates the bookkeeping. Most members use their thumb mark as a signature or have learnt to sign while being in the group. The sense of pride in being able to sign even at the age of 65 or more instead of the thumb mark (angutha chap) for their identity is fathomless, though, they do not lack the ability to participate comprehend, calculate or communicate. The wealth of knowledge and awareness reflected in both articulating and suggesting solutions to social problems of alcoholism, poor delivery of public health s ervices and irregularities in public distribution system (PDS), teacher absenteeism and lack of infrastructure is remarkable. It provides fertile grounds for research on knowledge at the grass-roots and the meaning of literacy. The didis need an empowering mechanism enabling them to express their experiential knowledge, pursue the opportunities they value and live with pride and dignity.
Agency and Empowerment
JeeVika SHGs provide a platform for the bottom-up approach to development. It is anchored in the social context for the didis to confidently voice their views, have a say in issues that affect them and their families and do something about their well- being.
There is growing literature on the meanings of agencies, empowerment and well-being and the role they play in human development. In a very “Sen” language Malhotra (2003: 3) defines agency as the ability to act on behalf of what you value and have the reason to value. Sen (1985: 206) himself defines agency as “what a person is free to do and achieve in pursuit of whatever goals or values he or she regards as important”.
Cleaver (2007: 226) takes it further and defines it as “the capability, or power to be the originator of acts and a distinguishing feature of being human”. In addition, he notes its relational existence, implying its use in and importance of a social context. It is this social context that shapes the opportunities and resources that can be accessed by individuals. Ibrahim and Alkire (2007) draw attention to the opportunity structure and the institutional environment that act as prerequisites for the effective deployment of agency. But a functioning agency itself is considered central to well-being or its absence to ill-being as pointed out by Narayan et al (2000 and 2000). Agency then emerges as a critical component of empowerment – to be able to make choices and translate into desired outcomes.2 It is through meaningfully exerting agency that the choices can be made, as emphasised in much of the literature exploring the role of agency. An earlier definition given by Chambers (1993) is of special relevance to this study. It describes empowerment as the process that enables the poor to have control over their lives and ownership of productive assets to secure better livelihoods.
The agency of the rural didi that might enable her to have control over her life and ownership of productive assets to secure a better livelihood, i e, to become empowered is constrained by the socio- economic context. This includes being disadvantaged through social exclusion and economic and social vulnerabilities. With stiff historical traditions of social exclusion in Bihar, it is difficult to fathom how the actions of the socially excluded individual alone can influence it directly. The formation and membership of the JeeVika SHG itself is likely to reduce intra lower caste exclusion tendencies. Didis certainly demonstrate the potential to be instrumental in engaging with actions to reduce their vulnerability. They possess the ability to act on behalf of what they value and have the reason to value. This is illustrated by their joining the SHG and actively parti cipating in its functioning in the first instance. They do so, i e, “act” to pursue livelihood and food securities through being ensured an immediate access to money. Further evidence of their agency can be found in their articulation of social c oncerns and in taking action to correct these.
The SHG platform does not create the agency of its members, instead, it enables them to fruitfully exercise their agency. It connects the two components of agency discussed above – the ability and the relational existence/opportunity structure noted by Cleaver (2007) and Ibrahim and Alkire (2007). Further, the SHG platform facilitates the collation and translation of the individual agency into collective agency and action. Thus transforming the process into a functioning agency, both at the individual and the group level.
Didi is able to voice her views, make choices and transform these into desired actions and outcomes. Hence, she is able to participate in local decision-making. They experience this in varied domains and magnitudes – reinforcing the debate on domain-specific empowerment, the interconnectedness between these as well as empowerment through different tasks (ibid). These range from being able to: sign their name instead of using their thumb mark for identity, visit the bank to deposit the group savings, provide some measure of financial security against unforeseen vulnerabilities, visit and register complaints to officials about poor public service delivery and have the confidence of the group support amongst others. This is crosscutting numerous d efinitions of empowerment in the literature – including that of the World Development Report 2000-01, Narayan (2002), Alsop et al (2006), Kabeer (1999) and Chambers (1993).
Conclusions
Didi is clearly demonstrating the ability to act and bring about change, i e, being an agent as defined by Sen (1999: 19) with the SHG platform as the enabling factor. The change entails first the empowerment of the poorest women in both economic and social domains. Second, rudimentary and scattered evidence indicates the JeeVika SHGs influencing the public service delivery and local governance through the collective action of didis. Some noteworthy examples are: measures being taken by the local officials to correct the irregularities in the PDS, bank officials coming to the village to open group accounts, daily availability of mid-day meals in schools and improvements in teacher absen teeism. The shifts in the status of the most disadvantaged women are critical tenets of the current thinking on well-being and human development. The changes can be conceptualised as pro-well-being and pro-development-driven by a bottom-up approach.
The JeeVika SHG in Bihar is at its infancy though already showing immense promise. Going by definitions of second generation SHGs, JeeVika resoundingly belong to the latter category. From the very start they have embarked upon a remit that spans well beyond just facilitating microcredit to the most deprived women. Yet, limitations and pitfalls must be anticipated. The emerging more empowered status of the women is bound to affect the gender relations and the traditional male-female dynamics in the v illage communities. What is for certain is that while a supportive male environment can assist the progress and expansion of the SHG agenda, a non-supportive male environment is assured to impede progress. More research is needed to enable synergies in the male-female dynamics in rural Bihar. A bigger threat to the success of the SHGs in Bihar is the economically better-off from lower castes joining the group while the poorest are left out. This could jeopardise the group dynamics and create a divisive structure with skewed power relations. The selection of the most deprived cohorts is challenging in Bihar because of the disputed below poverty line cards allocated five years back. Additionally, the social mapping process has proved to be more difficult due to the socio-political complexities in rural Bihar. The third impediment is in letting the already formed SHG to break up. It could have an all around dampening effect through distrust and unmet expectations. While much work remains to be done to address these and many other limitations, the SHG endeavour through the rural didi of Bihar – the agents of change, has much to offer towards driving the development agenda in Bihar.
Notes
1 The BRLPS Project Implementation Plan identified a gap of almost 300% between the demand for m icrocredit services and that being delivered by the commercial banks in the rural sector (BRLPS 2007).
2 See Ibrahim and Alkire (2007) for a detailed review of the rich literature on empowerment.
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This brief overview is the first in the series of articles based on a pilot survey of the study “Poverty and Social Impact of Rural Livelihoods in Bihar” funded by the Indian Council of Social Science Research and the Economic and Social Research Council, the United Kingdom.
Meera Tiwari (m.tiwari@uel.ac.uk) is at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of London, UK.