Shrota Samwad: Taking the listener village model a step further

Shrota Samwad: Taking the listener village model a step further

BBC Media Action works on bonded labour awareness in 11 districts in the states of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh, and has recently conducted three Shrota Samwad’s across the three states. So, a “Shrota Samwad” ( which translates to ‘Listeners dialogue’) is basically a platform which brings together the listeners of the radio program Majboor Kisko Bola and the district officials, unlike other such events, where the District Magistrate and other high-level district officials visit an event as a chief guests, give a stimulating speech and drive away in their convoy of cars after receiving much adulation.

In a Shrota Samwad the ‘shrota’s’ (listeners) get to interact with the local officials and vice-versa. The listeners along with a new-found awareness of their rights and the responsibilities of the district officials come forward and with the support of our team members gather their confidence and place their problems and objections in-front of the seated officials as well as the several hundred attendees of the Samwad, though hesitant at first, these victims of bonded labour can be seen overwhelmed with an outpour of emotions while narrating their account, the government officials then take action on the grievances of the locals on-the spot in exchange for gaining the confidence of the residents of their districts.

For those of you wondering how the idea of a Shrota Samwad was conceptualised, I’m going to take a couple of steps back from here, I have been working with the BBC Media Action for almost 7 months now on the bonded labour awareness project and about 3 months ago, one morning I found my boss Aashish sitting in my cubicle, viewing the photographs I had clicked on my last visit to a listener village in Jharkhand, which didn’t really surprise me much, but as I stood over his shoulders hoping to claim what was rightfully mine after walking up three flights of stairs – my chair, Aashish just calmly turned in his chair, towards me and the rest of the team and said “ I think it’s time to take the listener village model to the next level”, Ideas started flying as we brain-stormed together, one thing led to another bada-bing-bada-boom and that’s the day when the idea of Shrota Samwad was conceived.

From then up-till now we have organized three successful Shrota Samwad’s across three states, and my colleague Ekta Tokas, who organizes these Shrota Samwad’s is in the process of organizing a fourth Samwad sometime this month (Ferbruary). The first Shrota Samwad was held in Latehar, Jharkhand, the second was in Korba, Chhattisgarh and the third was held last week in Panna, Madhya Pradesh. Talking about our last Shrota Samwad, more than 800 listeners of Majboor Kisko Bola attended, 600 attendees registered their complaints with the Labour Commissioners’ aides and the labour commissioner along with the Upper District Magistrate promised to take action on labour issues ranging from Minimum wages, lack of safety equipment, widows pension to serious issues such as un-willing confinement, physical harm, construction of toilets and so-on.

To view photographs from our Shrota Samwad’s and to know more about our project on bonded labour awareness, do log onto our Facebook page:  https://www.facebook.com/pages/Majboor-Kisko-Bola/197428650403308?ref=br_tf

Adrian is a Project Assistant in BBC Media Action, loves photography and is allergic to shell-fish.