Chief coordinator of Sewa International, India, Mr. Shyam Parande was on whirlwind tour of Boston between September 15 and 16th, 2009. Mr. Shyam Parande, a civil engineer by profession, was born and brought up in Nagpur. During 1977 deadly cyclone in Andhra Pradesh that devastated lives of millions, Mr. Parande,  personally supervised rehabilitation work and became responsible for construction of hundreds of houses in 5 villages in coastal Andhra. It was beginning of his life time journey to volunteer and coordinate volunteerism to assist those in need.  Mr. Parande has lived in Andhra Pradesh for more than 15 years intimately involved in thousands of Sewa Bharati service projects.  With his dedication and organizational skills, Mr. Parande has not only developed many service projects in rural and tribal areas of Andhra Pradesh, but also initiated and mentored numerous batches of young volunteers who have dedicated their lives in the service of the needy throughout India and other countries.

Today, Sewa International consists of more than 150,000 volunteers, 64,000 programs and 80 types of service activities in sixteen countries. This article summarizes brief interview of Mr. Parande taken at Burlington Public Library.

Can you briefly provide background of Sewa International, your specific role within?

Well, Sewa International is an umbrella organization that focuses on relief, rehabilitation and developmental work among the needy in India as well as other parts of the world. We promote such selfless work by promoting volunteerism among youths, professionals and life long experienced citizens and by training grass root organizations in developing responsible non-profit structure that in turn help within their specific region to uplift the downtrodden and those affected by natural or man-made calamities by means of micro enterprise development, employment generation, education, health and self help groups. I serve Sewa International in a role of international coordinator. Under this role, I am primarily responsible to coordinate various sewa activities, to train organizers of different non-profit groups in writing proposals, reports, as well as in managing projects in timely manner, and finally be an active link between international organizations/volunteers and local non-profits.

Within non-profit work of relief, rehabilitation and development, what is the focus of the work as far as Sewa International is concerned?

Good question, as it is the core of what Sewa International stands for. When there is an unforeseen disaster, the entire society, sometime the whole world faces a shock that creates a wave of assistance from all over. In recent time, Tsunami is such an example, that destroyed several lives, affected families and changed regional landscapes within many nations. Entire world was shocked and there was equally large wave of financial and volunteering assistance that followed in all the affected regions. Similar things are observed during earthquakes and other calamities.  However, once the initial help is provided, the trauma among potential volunteers and donors dissipates resulting a void of assistance for further development.  It is this time, there is more need to help the families to get settled, to raise the children, to train the people for different skills and once again make the local society move on with life in a vibrant manner and with confidence.

Keeping this wholesome development approach for the entire society, Sewa International help developing self help group that share financial resources and further development collectively. Once these groups are successfully in place and functioning, we coordinate their activities with different banks and national institutes such as National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) that assist them with micro-finance. Microfinance in turn help in creating micro enterprises.

Could you describe some of your projects?

Sure. After devastating earthquake in Gujarat, there was severe disturbance in local enterprising activities, especially in Kutch region. That time Sewa International initiated women self help groups that started with as little money to contribute by individual as possible. These kind of activities assisted big time to help each other while reestablishing the lives and livelihood. US based India Development and Relief Fund (IDRF) at that time helped to start "Micro Credit to Micro Enterprise Development through Entrepreneurship Development Training". This project was highly successful in terms of capacity building, cottage industry development and employment generation. NABARD and Dena Bank also help in establishing mirco finance to further these goals.

Among training programs, I would like to highlight computer training centers in Jammu and Kashimr. These training centers help young generation of families regardless of faith, thar are affected due to terrorist activities. Similar training centers are also in place and are in planning stage in other regions.

Arogya Rakshak is another project active in many states of India where volunteers are trained to provide basic medical assistance. Approximately 1,50,000 patients from villages are treated by Arogya Rakshak door to door campaign.

Apart from projects in India, we coordinated community building efforts in Sri Lanka after Tsunami and in the United States after Hurricane Katrina.

Are these projects replicable in other regions?

Answer to this question is yes and no. As a broad vision, we always could achieve relief to development by means of self help groups to micro-enterprise development. However, such enterprises are sometime made up of local craftsmanship that are unique to the places, sometimes even to families. So micro-enterprise development in Gujarat can be different than that in Tamil Nadu. However medical and educational projects have many similarities regardless of the region that are being initiated.

What was the intent of your present visit in the US?

Sewa International coordinates activities in about 16 countries of which one is the US. For past 20 years we (Sewa International) are working with IDRF and this visit was great opportunity to meet the IDRF volunteers and supporters. It is important to meet donors and report the project activities and invite them to projects when they are visiting in India.  We have projects in all parts of India, so regardless one's destination in India, we can arrange one's visit to such socially responsible project.

Additionally, I came to visit, assist and also learn from a major project initiated by Sewa USA  to help needy within the US. Bhutanese Refuge Empowerment (BRE) project that is fully functioning in the US and is helping Bhutanese refuges to settle, retrained and finally immerse in the new culture and newly adopted land.  This project is active in all corners - east coast to west coast and southern states to mid-west. It is heartening to see all the work that our volunteers from IDRF and Sewa USA are contributing time, money and innovative ideas to help locally as well as internationally.

How can one help from the distance, from the US? Should we contribute by donating to any specific cause?

Monitory donation is the last thing that comes to my mind. Money should be followed by large pool of volunteers. If time is money, we would love to request you to contribute by giving some time to our various activities. One can volunteer by performing some work or sharing some knowledge. We started project called Yuva for Sewa. Under this project many youths of Indian as well as non-Indian origin visit and volunteer for specific Sewa activity in India. It is a lifetime opportunity and experience to live day and night for several days or months with a community in need. It changes the whole perspective about the life and we start understanding the world that is beyond our conventional borders and safety net.

Thank you for your time

Thank you

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