While Munni Devi became a beneficiary of the Ujjwala Scheme that gave her a stove and a gas cylinder, she was at her wits end wondering where she would find the money to refill the cylinder.
Not any more. Munni Devi will not have to return to using polluting fuels in order to cook as she had feared. A new scheme has ensured that she and many other women like her in Sukhet village, Madhubani district in Bihar, will not struggle to refill gas cylinders.
The Dr Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University in Samastipur and the Krishi Vigyan Kendra in Madhubani have started an initiative — ‘Sukhet Model’ — whereby people can get gas cylinders in exchange for waste and cow dung they sell. This initiative was lauded by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Mann Ki Baat radio programme last month on August 29.
The prime minister said, “There are obvious advantages of the Sukhet model. Pollution will come down with the use of cooking gas; there will be less garbage; the farmers will get organic manure.” This is what self reliance is all about, he added.
Munni Devi is all praises for the Sukhet model. “Cooking has become so much easier. I was using wood and cow dung cakes to fire my chulha, because I did not have the money to refill my cylinder,” Munni Devi told Gaon Connection. “My husband works as a driver in Delhi and I have a family of five to support here. Refilling cylinders was not an option,” the 42-year-old said.
Recently Gaon Connection did a ground report from various states in India that showed how rural women were forced to go back to using firewood because their families were unable to afford LPG cylinders due to loss of livelihood in the pandemic and steep rise in the cylinder prices.
1200 kgs waste = one cylinder refill
The work in Sukhet began in February this year. The initiative was the brainchild of Ramesh Chandra Srivastava, vice chancellor, Dr Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University.
Keeping the Swachch Bharat as well as the Ujjwala initiatives in mind, Srivastava came up with the idea of making vermicompost out of waste.
Ratnesh Kumar Jha, scientist and project director of Sukhet Model, explained to Gaon Connection how the initiative worked. Everyday cow dung and crop residue is collected from the cattle rearers and farmers in the village, and the amount duly noted down, so that there is a record of how many kilogrammes of waste each of the household gave.
“If a family can collect twelve hundred kilos of waste, it will get a refill cylinder,” said Ratnesh Jha. According to the project director, a survey was conducted and it was deduced that at the rate of 20 kgs of garbage collected each day, a family would have the required amount to exchange for a cylinder at the end of sixty days. It should not be a problem because most of the villagers are either farmers or cattle rearers, the scientist added.
Sukhet responds positively
“The response to the initiative from the village inhabitants has been so positive,” said Ratnesh Jha. He explained that the waste is a combination of cow dung, crop residue, banana leaves, water hyacinth… anything that is biodegradable. But it is cow dung that makes up the bulk of the collection.
Also Read: “If the farmers take meaningful initiatives, income can be generated from cow dung”
“It takes forty per cent of crop residue and sixty per cent of cow dung to make the vermicompost. One could also have a fifty-fifty ratio,” the project director said. A shredder takes care of crop residue and breaks it up into small bits that is then mixed with the cow dung.
“The government rate for vermicompost is six rupees a kilo. We used to buy vermicompost from elsewhere, but as per our new scheme, we give farmers the vermicompost we make here,” Ratnesh Jha said. It costs the university Rs 1.50 to make one kilo of vermicompost which it then sells at Rs 6 a kilo.
This project has resulted in the surrounding areas of village homes becoming cleaner as the waste gets collected for converting it into vermicompost.
Also Read: “Do we refill the cylinders or feed ourselves?
“Women have been a big part of our project. They are invested in it as it is they who have to cook, and they understand the reason for our project,” Shankar Jha, scientist, Dr Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, told Gaon Connection. “Fifty six women from the village have benefitted from this scheme, and our aim is to reach out to a larger number,” he added.
Plans are afoot to replicate the Sukhet model of Madhubani in the villages of other districts of Bihar such as Siwan, Gopalganj, East Champaran, West Champaran, Vaishali and Patna.
Also Read: Despite having LPG cylinders, rural women are back cooking on woodfired stoves
A model villager
Meanwhile, Dr Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University scientists are using about four kattha (0.3 acre) of land donated by Sunil Yadav, an inhabitant of Sukhet village. “When I heard of the project, I wanted to contribute to the good cause. We are also learning how to make vermicompost. The land will be used for this purpose by the University for five years after which, I will take over,” Yadav told Gaon Connection.
He hoped this project would spell the end of miseries for the women who were for so long forced to use wood and cow dung to cook. “Henceforth they can use clean cooking gas,” he said.
Read the story in Hindi.
