Echoes of Eco

August 2017 Vivekananda Kendra – nardep Newsletter Vol.9 No: 6

Extracts from our book “Green Pathfinders – Part1” In this issue:

 Extracts from our book “Green
Pathfinders – Part 1”

 The Happenings
WATER GREEN
Shri.N.Krishnamoorthy  Visions of Wisdom:

 Prosper – According to Hope

Prelude
 Voluntary Poverty
Annapurna Duval: We customarily describe a spend-thrift as one who  Man-made Ignorance
spends money as if it were water. Now water supply has become so
scarce, that pundits predict wars for water.
Jnani Naval: Increasing population, greater needs for water, newer
applications of water, shrinking water stocks, pollution of ground and
surface-water and lack of structures for storing rain and run -off
water, have combined to create a scenario where water is a most
precious commodity but in terrible shortage. Neighbours fight for
water. Adjacent villages, neighbouring districts, states with common
catchment systems, countries with common rivers flowing through
them, find water as the object of dispute. Industrial pollution and
misapplication of water, add to the problem. They say use of plastic,
and similar materials which prevent seepage, and hinder under ground
storage are related problems. Here again technology, funding
agencies and the users will have to work together for the best
results.

“Whatever I dig up of you, O

Earth, may you of that have quick
replenishment! O purifying one,
may my thrust never reach right
unto your vitals, your heart!

Atharva Veda 12.1.35

Yes! Water is everybody’s business

Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra – nardep, August 2017, Vol.9 No: 6
.
 “Wisdom demands a new orientation of science and technology toward the
organic, the gentle, the elegant and beautiful”
Krish Phidol: Water can be the best community
building bond. In our tradition, water bodies have
always attracted large gatherings of people.
Establishing, repairing and running water-dispensing-
systems bring merit (Puny a) to the donor.
Jnani Noval: Yes. Some of our young men have,
starting with group efforts at water harvesting,
rebuilt towns and villages, revived villages and have
reversed the town-ward migration of people from
draught-hit villages. And the nation and world' have
recognized the importance and relevance of their
work.
Leave the responsibility of water sharing to us
Annapurna Duval: If you leave the responsibility of
water sharing to us, we will ensure better policing,
self-policing, stopping water- theft, prompt payment
of water-taxes and just distribution of water.
Jnani Naval: Yes. Water is every-body's business. It
is not the conservator's business or the
governments' business. By relegating such
responsibilities to others we succeed in creating
vested interests. Water-operations, Pani -
Panchayats have been successful in Western India.
The users know how best to share water, p rioritize
its distribution.
Krish Phidol: But water has to be purified first.
Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra – nardep, August 2017, Vol.9 No: 6
– E.F.Schumacher
Jnani Naval: Yes. Large scale users have started
realizing that recycled water, water with different
levels of purification can be used for various
ordinary day-to-day purposes. Such work has been
under-taken in UT. Mumbai and National Security
Guards headquarters at Gurgaon, Delhi.
Krish Phidol: I do not consider a grain of wheat or
paddy as a single grain. It has consumed so much of
my energy, labour, time and has utilized so much of
our water resources.
Jnani Naval: There has been an increasing awareness
among scientists and policy makers that a kilogram
of grain embodies so much of water, so much of
labour and productive energy. A grain from a rain
fed crop is a symbol of timely rain gifted by God
and Nature. That is why saints who live on god -
gifted alms are said to live by Akasha-Vritti.
(Yadruchcha labha santushtha:) In modern
commerce, the grain markets have been rightly
interpreted as traders in embodied energy. And of
course, there are direct water -uses such as
drinking and cooking which require high levels of
cleanliness. In modern scientific methods various
techniques are being tried. Unfortunately,
desalination and other water-distilling methods
consume so much energy that they are
inappropriate for large scale uses.
Annapurna Duval: When we do not utilize the existing
supplies, diligently and equitably, increasing the
supply will only add to our profligacy. We should
bring home to our people the awareness of the
preciousness of water and teach them to use water
most efficiently in agriculture and at hom e.
Jnani Naval: Only then can water become a
community - building tool.
 “The real problems of our planet are not economic or technical, they are
philosophical. The philosophy of unbridled materialism is being challenged
by events”
– E.F.Schumacher

Happenings this month: Happenings this month: Happenings this

Sustainable Agriculture Cost-effective month:
Construction Technologies Holistic Health

One day Training programme on “Bio- Green health home worked for 4 days
Training programme "Cost effective Bio- and treated 134 patients.
pesticides and growth promotors” was
manure" was held at Technology Resource
held at Technology Resource Center on
Center on 24th May. 21 participants
5th August. 04 farmers attended.
attended the training. Shri.S.Rajamony
Smt.S.Premalatha was the resource
was the resource person.
person.

Shri.C.Vijayaraghavan singing song during

the training on Ferro cement technology

Training programme on “Ferro cement

Technology, was held at Technology Practical demonstration during workshop
Resource Center on 23rd August. 35 on “Siddha Varma Bone setting”
Exhibits herbs used for making Bio-
pesticides
members attended. Sri.V.Ramakrishnan
was the resource person.
Workshop on “Traditional Siddha Varma
Training programme on “Terrace Bone setting practices” was held at
Gardening” was held at Technology Technology Resource Center on 21st and
th 22nd August. 37 participants attended
Resource Center on 26 August. 08
the programme. Dr.V.Ganapathy and his
farmers attended the training.
team acted as a resource persons.
Shri.S.Rajamony was the resource
person.

Practical demonstration - Compressed earth

block making

Training programme on “Compressed Earth

Block” was held at Technology Resource
Center on 24th to 27th August. 18 trainees
Camp participants at our Terrace Garden attended. Sri.V.Ramakrishnan was the Dr.V.Ganapathy taking class in the
in Vivekanandapuram resource person. natural surroundings

Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra – nardep, August 2017, Vol.9 No: 6
 “There is incredible generosity in the potentialities of Nature. We only
have to discover how to utilize them”
– E.F.Schumacher

Happenings this month: Happenings this month: Happenings this

Renewable Energy Networking month:
Networking

Workshop on “Crop Residue Management" 55 farmers from Kovilpati visited our

1 cum was held at the following places by the J.C.Bose Nursery on 11th August. They
Portable type Dept. of Agriculture, Kanyakumari. Our learned about Sustainable Agricultural
Shakti staff Shri.Rajamony was one of the technologies. The programme was
Surabhi Bio- resource person. organized by Dept. of Agriculture
methanation S. Name of the Date No. of parti (ATMA), Govt. of Tamilnadu.
plant No place cipants
1. Munchirai 7th 35
2. Thucklay 10th 40
3. Kurunthancodu 16th 40
4. Kozhiporvilai 17th 40
5. Killiyur 18th 40
Construction of Bio-Methanation 6. Thiruvarampu 23rd 39
Plants
Portable type 1 cum – 1 no.
Portable type 6 cum – 1 no.
Fixed type 1 cum
IFAD, Kanyakumari - 10
Sis.Premalatha explaining Azolla cattle
feed technology to ATMA farmers
39 students and 2 faculty members from
VV College of Engineering, Tisaiyanvilai
visited our Gramodaya Park on 8th August 36 students and 2 staff members from
. Tamilnadu Agricultural University,
and learned VK-Nardep activities in the
field of Cost-effective construction Coimbatore visited our Gramodaya Park
technologies. as part of their study tour on 19th
Practical demonstration during Crop Residue
Management workshop
August. They learned about Renewable
energy and Environment technologies.

District Mission Committee Meeting, Dept.

of Agriculture was held on 28th August at
Collectorate, Nagercoil. Our staff
Shri.S.Rajamony attended.

‘Act by taking promise’ programme was

Shri.V.Ramakrishnan explaining about
Cost-effective construction technologies
Shri.V.Ramakrishnan, Director, VK-
Nardep addressed 50 students and staff
of NIT, Trichy on 31st August. Subject
– Waste to Energy.
conducted at Agricultural Research Station,
Thirupatisaram, Kanyakumari Dist. on 29th
August. Shri.V.Ramakrishnan and
Shri.S.Rajamony attended on behalf of VK-
Nardep. 500 progressive farmers, various
distributors, organic sellers participated.
The programme was sponsored by Indian Shri.Periyasamy explaining Shakti Surabhi
Council of Agricultural Research, New Delhi. Bio-methanation plant to TNAU students

Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra – nardep, August 2017, Vol.9 No: 6
 “Man's needs are infinite, and infinitude can be achieved only in the
spiritual realm, never in the material”
Prosper – According to
Hope
Placing all the world under a single
yardstick, so that all forms of
community life but one are disvalued
as underdeveloped, unequal and
wretched, has made us sociologically
blind. By eliminating this stupefying
category from our minds, we should
be able to look at the world afresh
and see not just two possibilities –
development or its absence – but a
multiplicity of actual and possible
ways of ordering communities.
Rediscovering the values in these
diverse communities does not mean
discovering a value in being poor, but
discovering that many of the things
that have been called ‘poor’ were
actually different forms of
prosperity. ‘Prosper’ (Latin pro spere)
originally meant ‘according to hope’.
How and when a people prospers
depends on what it hopes.
C.Douglas Lummis
An American taught in
Japan. Author of a
book “Alternatives 30”
– a study of Gandhi’s
constitutional proposal
Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra – nardep, August 2017, Vol.9 No: 6
Visions of Wisdom
Voluntary Poverty
By contrast, convivial poverty – that is,
voluntary or moral poverty – implies
the ideal of a livelihood based on the
age-old moral principles of simplicity,
frugality, sufficiency and respect for
every human being and all forms of life.
It does not mean ascetism or the
monastic life. It only tries to give back
to everyone that holistic and
compassionate dimension of being,
without which no human relationship is
possible, in the true sense of the word.
As such, convivial poverty could
perhaps serve as both a means and an
end to pauperizing economism.
Majid Rahnema
Basically an Iranian,
and a writer of a book
‘The alternative
Development Reader’.
He lives in France
– E.F.Schumacher
–
Man-made ignorance
The ultimate step in converting
nature into a resource is the
conversion of seed – the source from
which plant life rises again – into a
‘genetic resource’, a commodity to be
genetically engineered, patented and
owned for corporate profit. Nature’s
ways of renewing plants are now
viewed as primitive and slow. Limits
put by nature on the reproduction of
life by species barriers are now to be
crossed by the engineering of
transgenic life-forms whose impact
on the biosphere and life cannot be
known or imagined. The scientific
evolution was to have rolled back the
boundaries of ignorance. Instead, a
particular knowledge tradition, one
which views nature only as a resource
and nature’s limits as constraints,
has created unprecedented man-
made ignorance which is becoming a
new source of threat to life on this
planet.
Dr.Vandana Shiva
World renowned
Environmental thinker
and activist and
Director of Navadhanya