Training Centre for Rural Women
Our work in Nadakuppam to date
Pitchandikulam has been working in the Nadukuppam area since 2003. Since then, it has grown into a major part of our work: covering everything from teachers in local schools, indigenous forest planting, traditional water management, organic farming, rural enterprise for women and a wide range of training. To date, we have helped to set up five rural women’s enterprises in the area, and would like to be able to help even more women setting out in the world of cooperative enterprise.
Our Dream
To consolidate over a decade’s worth of work, our dream is to set up a dedicated centre for women’s training, which will act as a traditional knowledge hub for the Kazhuveli bio-region and its natural and cultural integrity, and allow women to explore new ways in which they can blend different knowledge systems. We can share our experience with other women’s development programmes across India, invite participants and volunteers from our network in India and abroad, and create a centre of excellence in rural enterprise training for women.
We want to build an ecologically friendly place for the trainees to stay, so that all participants can live in a rural environment while learning and sharing their stories. We envisage a sustainable livelihoods learning centre – backed by our experience with the Sustainable Livelihood Institute – with practical demonstrations, activities, intensive education programmes and a regular programme of trainings each month.
How You Can Help
Please contact us to find out more, or contribute to our account below.
SEDAB – Sustainable Enterprise Development
The Sustainable Enterprise Development in the Auroville Bioregion project (SEDAB) provides sustainable livelihood to the communities in the two areas of Vanur and Marakkanam, Villupuram district, that fall within the Kazhuveli bio-region of Tamil Nadu, India. This is a three year project that built on the strengths of research, development and innovation within the Auroville community.
To find out more, please see the SEDAB website.
Rural Women’s Theatre Workshop
GEN Auroville and Pitchandikulam hosted a two day workshop on the 1st-2nd July 2016 for a group of fifteen mostly married women from neighbouring villages around Nadukuppam, Tamil Nadu.
One half of the group worked at Amirtha and the other at Meera, both social enterprises that have emerged from Pitchandikulam Forest’s work at Nadukuppam, a village in Auroville’s bioregion.
]The intention was to explore through Theatre of the Oppressed games and activities what it means to live as a woman in the rural Indian context, trying to unravel the narratives, the thought patterns and societal constructions of gender culminating in a forum play for the larger community.
It was faciliated by Ms. Afshan Mariam, a psychologist working in education using tools of drama, farming and mindfulness.
To see more about the workshop and its outcomes, please see here. Soul of Women workshop.pdf
