3) Strategy Summary:
The concept of giving back is not new to India. From Karna* to Vinod Khosla**, we have examples from across the ages, of those who benefited out of their environment, and, as a debt of honor, contributed freely to it. The fact that Non-Resident Indians have made a difference to the fortunes of our country has been established. The Non- Resident Villagers (NRV) Club concept brings the same ethos to Giving back to the village where one hails from/has grown up in.

Ours is a village centric approach and following on this village-based paradigm, we wanted to involve not only citizens in the village, but also citizens who had benefited from the resources that the village had, and have now moved away to other places to pursue further prospects. Almost each household in the villages has a person or links to a person living out side the village. We refer to these persons as Non Resident Villagers (NRVs). It is our belief that such NRVs can actively participate in the transformation movement.

The NRV Clubs will

Be a virtual platform that brings together the village and the NRV through technology
Bring a sense of pride and involvement to the NRVs of each village
Effectively channelise NRV interaction with his/her own village

Guiding Principles

Involvement: the club will pro actively strive to bring together as many citizens and well wishers of its village as possible
Non-Discrimination: the Club will not be biased against or in favor of certain sections based on religion, caste, class, gender etc.
Interest of village: the club will consider the overall benefit to a village in all its engagements
Collaboration: the club will actively seek to bring in as much knowledge and best practices from the various spheres in which its members operate by building networks and relationships

Activities

Establishing mentoring relationships between the NRV and citizens living in the village
Taking up specific projects and volunteering knowledge, skill & time.
Channelising monetary contributions, if any, to the village Acting as a conduit for other NRVs to reconnect with their village
Recognizing NRV contribution and activity in a village on a periodic basis.

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* Karna- a mythical character in the epic Mahabaratha who was known for his giving

** Vinod Khosla, general partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and co-founder of Sun Microsystems, announced a $5 million donation to his alma mater, IIT Delhi, the largest gift by a single individual in the history of IIT Delhi, and it will help maintain and enhance the excellence of the school.

4) How the Strategy Works:
Critical Success Factors

Tangible benefit for every person in the 'supply chain.'

This is key to the success of this strategy. In the diagram below, the list of benefits for each party concerned is documented.

Active participation in the village visioning exercise so that they can be part of the village's future. 'Honored Guest' status for one week in a year for the NRV and his/her immediate family who wish to re establish their contact with the village Annually provide one bag of village produce (such as rice) free to each member of the NRV club Plantation of a tree in a village in the name of each NRV the progress of which he/she can monitor Periodic updates on the transformation in the village

Achievement of Transformation goals for each village Broad basing the funding pattern Getting a wide array of specialists in various areas Attainment of our first Core Value- INVOLVING PEOPLE

Tapping of resources from across the world Interest of the village from people in many countries Concentrated attention of people to the problems of this specific village- micro level understanding an planning Rapid development of the village

People's Participation

This has been discussed at length under the head citizen s participation. It has been a pivotal factor in gathering the whereabouts of over 7,000 NRVs from our 142 villages.

Information and Communications Technology

The evolution of IT has helped us expand the NRV Club concept. It has helped us assure NRVs that their investments are indeed being routed to the village. With the help of video conferencing equipment, NRVs can directly speak to the people in their village, or with Foundation representatives to find out about progress of their initiatives. Volunteering has also become tremendously simplified because of e-mail. Even NRVs who do not have time to visit their village can contribute virtually.

Steps for starting up and operationalizing NRV Clubs

Phase I
This phase in the life cycle of a NRV club begins with going to the villages and seeking their support in the endeavor. Communication campaigns to put across the benefits of these clubs to the village, and the support expected of them. What is very crucial at this stage is to achieve the fine balance between enthusiasm and realistic expectation. The people in the village must see the benefits of the association with NRVs, and therefore must be willing to come forward. But at the same time, the NRV Clubs cannot be seen as the solution to all the problems in the village, and must be seen as a part in the whole scheme of things.

Phase II
This is the crucial stage in the process. It determines the way NRVs feel about the Foundation (as a mediator) and the cause of Rural Transformation. They must realize that this is an opportunity to help- in any way possible. The first contact must leave the NRVs with the feeling of ability- the ability to make a difference. The instrument-whether physical, or in soft copy, is the clinching part of the argument.

Phase III
This phase will gradually gather momentum based on the interactions the NRV has with the villages, and with the Foundation. Care would need to be taken to make sure that the NRV receives all the information that he/she requires to make any contribution to the village. Also, the flow of updates and information depends entirely on the Foundation. Careful nurturing of these initial relationships is what will lead to a vibrant NRV society eventually

Phase IV
This is when the club has been able to survive actively for over two years. The proof of the strength of association is in the survival itself. At this stage, the NRVs and the villages know each other s strengths, weaknesses and needs. Some capacity building would have happened at the field level to train people form the villages in report writing, and in information dissemination to the NRVs. The clubs can now continue even without the Foundation s support.

5) Key Strategy Elements:

i. Mobilizing Citizen Support:
The NRV Clubs take the concept of stakeholdership across segments. From the village to across the world, it aims to involve people. Some examples

On the occasion of establishing these NRV clubs, we decided to recognize the contributions of all living NRVs in each of our villages. For this purpose, we started a field exercise where a simple form (as shown below) was circulated to about 30 key citizens schoolteachers, postmasters, Govt officials, etc in every village. 141 villages volunteered to give names and contact details of over 7,000 NRVs. And as a testimony to the enthusiasm on the ground, stands the fact that this happened in about 45 days.

Some of the student volunteers working with the Foundation helped us to collate, analyse and create the database. In addition, we have NRV Club coordinators in each village. These are persons who are actively engaged in development activity with us, typically aged between 25 and 50. These are the people that breathe life into our NRV Club concept day in and day out.

ii. Generating Financial and Nonfinancial Resources:
The tangible support extended by the NRVs can be explained with two examples:
1. Education services in our village are more recent on the time scale compared to the health initiatives. However, the community cooperation was evident when we implemented the Model school a school infrastructure improvement program. One primary school and one high school were chosen in every village. For the first time, Byrraju Foundation proposed a three-way funding model of 50%:25%:25% between Government, Village and us. 119 schools from 92 villages participated in the project and the total funds mobilized towards was about Rs.35 lacs (about US$75,000)

2. When Foundation launched its Drinking water scheme (quality as per WHO standards, priced at 2% of the market price) as a pilot, we could tap a NRV who was in the water business, who readily contributed the know-how. Mr. K.S. Raju (pftl@rediffmail.com), a postgraduate in agricultural sciences, followed by post graduate diploma in Management from IIM, Ahmedabad, owns a small-scale unit producing packaged water. Seeing the condition of water that his parents and others consume in his village, he has chosen to give his expertise in providing pure and clean drinking water to the people there. He has been instrumental in setting up a Reverse-Osmosis water plant and also contributed to towards 50% of the cost of plant, which provides bottled quality water meeting the prescribed standards. Now the people of Gollalakoderu village have crystal clear water that they can drink, without the fear of being the target of water borne diseases. Because of the astounding success of the project, the project is now being scaled up to 40 villages with almost 50% financial contribution from the NRVs.

v. Developing Information and Spreading the Message:
The Foundation in its effort to reach out to the NRVs and invite their participation has recently launched the NRV pages in its website (some of the pages are still under construction). The web pages (http://www.byrrajufoundation.org/nrvclub.htm), which start with a song most of the Telugus can identify, convey the core message that they can contribute to their village irrespective of geographical barriers. This also highlights some of the earlier contributions via a Hall of fame and also provides a list of opportunities for volunteering time, skill & even financial contributions for every village.

Simultaneously, efforts are being made to provide a virtual experience to the NRVs which mirrors their own physical experience in every village. This includes usage of videos & pictures of the environment the NRV grew up in, testimonials and even future plans for the village. One such example : http://www.byrrajufoundation.org/appanapalli.htm

6) Increasing Self-sufficiency and Social Impact:
Means of Exit: The Foundation s strategy for Rural Transformation includes an exit strategy from the villages. The NRV Club is a comprehensive means of making the village self sufficient as far as resources and experts are concerned.

Individual Vs. Joint Action: NRVs efforts so far have been on an individual basis. The NRV Club brings together an army of citizens concerned about the development of EACH particular village.

Network Externality: Because of the inherent nature of the NRV Network, members have a constant initiative to bring in more NRVs. This widens the involvement of the external community thus broad basing the social impact

Local Knowledge & Global Exposure: NRVs understand what needs to be corrected in the village; they also understand how we intend to correct it. This is what makes them the ideal group to involve in the transformation of their village.

8) Organization Mission and Vision:
Our mission is to create a world-class platform for sustainable rural transformation. Currently, we operate across 142 villages impacting about a million people in 5 districts of the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. (We are a public charitable trust registered u/s 12 A of Income Tax Act, 1961(# F.NO.HQRS--I/207F/01-02/DIT (E) and have been granted tax exemption. We are also registered under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act. (FCRA) (#010220137)). While we deliver services through a physical presence in each of our villages, we believe that rural transformation can be sustained only if the transformation process is disaggregated and the processes are institutionalized. And more importantly, the transformation process needs to be owned, managed and led by the community itself.

Some of the highlights of our achievements in the last three years are,
2.5 million patient visits
24X7 Emergency services
A doctor for every village with 100% attendance
10 Rupee Diabetes testing
100 villages with waste management systems
27000 Individual sanitary latrines constructed
First non-profit organization to implement Oracle

Financials

In our approach, management and technology are the two pillars of transformation. We apply these at the Foundation through
A metrics oriented approach to transformation
Application of Six Sigma principles
Disaggregation of interventions into small units called modules
Real time leadership and
Virtual delivery of services

Organization Size:
We are headquartered at the Center for Rural Transformation (CRT) in Hyderabad. The team at the Foundation is very diverse, ranging from corporate to development expertise. Our true strength, though, lies in our volunteers- we call them Change Agents. In each village, we have a local leadership body called the Grama Vikasa Samiti (GVS) with 18 members who take responsibility for specific initiatives such as Health, Education etc. They are typically opinion leaders and therefore are able to mobilize community participation. For every 10 villages or so we have a Nodal Coordinator who takes responsibility for implementing our initiatives. At each district, we have learning centers with adequate support staff. In total, we have about 2500 persons, including Change Agents, working towards the common goal of Rural Transformation. Please visit www.byrrajufoundation.org for more details on our work.

Looking Forward to the Next Three Years:
The initial success achieved in the last 6 months in a select group of villages has provided the ideal momentum for the launch of this strategy to all the villages we work in. In the next 3 years the NRV clubs would establish themselves as an ideal platform to work together for rural transformation and can even evolve to include people, who are not necessarily hailing from the geography, but are interested in contributing to their cause. Technology would play a major role in breaking the distance barrier and multiply the opportunities to connect with the villages.

One such experiment is currently on in terms of Project Ashwini. It uses a combination of terrestrial and wireless technologies to provide a 2 Mbps bandwidth to each of the 32 villages covered through a cluster system impacting over 500,000 lives. This system would enable the population from any of the 32 villages covered, to interact in real-time via a video-link with experts and service providers located anywhere in the world. To bring focus into the endeavor, the services are divided into Knowledge Blocks (KB) of about 2 hr each. Every KB covers one sub-topic in the broad area (Eg. Gynecology, Pediatrics etc. under the broad area of Health). The beauty of the system is that people with specific issues/queries would be able to connect to the corresponding expert virtually at their doorstep without exerting too much pressure on the expert/volunteer. The demand on the expert is just a 2 hr session once a week. The NRVs would play a major role in providing the access to best-in-class experts and bringing them to volunteer their time & skill. Some of the NRVs can be the experts themselves because of professional backgrounds like Doctors, Scientists etc.

J K Manivannan , Partner
Byrraju Foundation, 2/74, Jeedimetla Village, Nh-7, Secunderabad - 500 855, Andhra Pradesh
India
Telephone: 914023191725
Fax: 914023191726
Email: manivannan_jk@byrrajufoundation.org
Web site: www.byrrajufoundation.org

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