Our communities give our lives purpose. A community is literally just a collection of people. However, you can be among a crowd at the airport without feeling like you’re part of a community. For us, a community is defined by the purpose and value that a group of individuals brings to our lives. More than anything else, our connections determine our overall health, happiness, and well-being.
People are not meant to live alone. We must surround ourselves with others to live a fulfilling life full of significance. A community may help us learn, maintain our physical, mental, and spiritual well-being, and offer us a sense of identity and belonging. Here are a few of the main advantages of creating a community.
Approximately one-tenth of mankind, or 70% of India’s population, reside in rural areas. These factors make rural India a focal point for issues of national and international importance, such as the effects of rapid population growth and development on the environment, the health effects of poor sanitation, water pollution from raw sewage and pesticide runoff, soil erosion and desertification from overgrazing and deforestation, and water pollution from raw sewage.
This is also the reason why India’s villages’ capacity to provide their residents with happy lifestyles is essential to the country’s future as a major world power.
Here are 6 Indian villages that have demonstrated what a community can achieve when it unites for a better future, from organic farming to renewable energy. These villages have also walked the talk.
1. Dharnai, Bihar
Dharnai, which was once like most Indian villages in battling to secure even the most basic electricity, has turned its fortunes around and is now the first hamlet in India to function entirely on solar power. For decades, Dharnai residents had been meeting their electrical needs with expensive and unhealthy diesel-based generators and dangerous fuels like cow dung. Since the inception of Greenpeace’s solar-powered 100-kilowatt micro-grid in 2014, over 2,400 residents of this village in the Jehanabad area have had access to high-quality electricity.
2. Chizami, Nagaland
Chizami, a little community in the Phek region of Nagaland, has spent the better part of a decade leading a quiet revolution in environmental preservation and socioeconomic transformation. Chizami, a model hamlet in Naga society, is now visited by young people from Kohima and nearby villages in order to complete internships in the Chizami development model.
3. Gangadevipalli, Andhra Pradesh
India may need to take a cue from Gangadevipalli, a hamlet in the Warangal region of Andhra Pradesh, where every home has all the essentials for survival and more, if the country is made of villages. This model village has been steadily becoming wealthier thanks to a disciplined and determined community that has also managed to work in harmony towards goals set collectively. This includes a scientific water filtration plant, a community-owned cable TV service, concrete, well-lit roads, and a regular supply of power and water.
4. Khonoma, Nagaland
Khonoma, India’s first green village, has come a long way from being the birthplace of resistance to British colonial control. This distinctive, self-sustaining village in Nagaland is a monument to the determination of the tribal communities of Nagaland to preserve and safeguard their natural ecology. It is home to a 700-year-old Angami community and exquisitely terraced fields. The village forbids hunting of any kind and instead improves the soil with its own sustainable kind of jhum agriculture, which replaces the old slash-and-burn method.
5. Payvihir, Maharashtra
A small village called Payvihir, located in the foothills of the Melghat region in the Amravati district of Maharashtra, has become a model for the nation, regularly demonstrating to others how NGOs and communities can collaborate to protect the environment and guarantee sustainable living for people.
The United Nations Development Programme awarded Payvihir the Biodiversity Award in 2014 for converting a 182-hectare plot of barren land under community forest rights into a forest. The hamlet also just came up with the creative concept to sell mangoes and organic sitafals (custard apples) in Mumbai under the brand Naturals Melghat!
6. Punsari, Gujarat
Merely 100 kilometers away from Ahmedabad, Punsari hamlet is a picture-perfect example of progress. The village boasts air-conditioned classrooms, biogas plants, closed-circuit televisions, Wi-Fi, biometric devices, and water purification plants. And at a cost of Rs. 16 crores, it was all completed in just eight years. Himanshu Patel, a 33-year-old tech-savvy sarpanch, is the driving force behind the makeover. He says with pride that his village has “the amenities of a city but the spirit of a village.”
In conclusion, funding rural development has shown to be a successful and significant strategy for promoting long-term development in rural India. The rural population has continuously brought about revolutionary change in rural communities and continues to do so with an integrated, collaborative, and community-centered approach, greatly enhancing the socioeconomic and environmental well-being of the country.
References:
- Jefferies, T. (2023, February 1). Why community is so important—and how to find yours. Reader’s Digest. https://www.rd.com/article/what-is-community/
- Pal, S. (2017, February 13). 15 progressive Indian villages that will make you want to ditch your city life right away! The Better India. https://www.thebetterindia.com/85354/inspiring-indian-villages-sustainable-development/
