She’s an unusual young woman

She’s an unusual young woman.  Not because she’s young, highly educated and middle class. Not because she’s a kind of ‘refugee’ from the corporate world,  nor because she works long hours, seven days a week.  Chhavi Rajawat is all those things, but what makes her unusual is  her job title.  She’s the sarpanch of Soda village in Rajasthan.  A sarpanch is what you’d have called, in the old days, a village headman.

20 years ago Chhavi Rajawat’s grandfather retired from the job of Soda’s sarpanch, a job he’d held for 15 years.  Before that, he’d been a brigadier in the army, a war hero and when the villagers of Soda asked him to be their sarpanch, he took it on as a moral responsibility. He used his network and influence to bring electricity to the village, schools, a hospital, roads.  But since he retired, all development in the area stopped.

An offer she couldn't refuse

This year, a new bill was introduced in India for the rights of women.  It meant that the job of Soda’s sarpanch had to be filled by a woman.  Many village women decided to run.  Then a group of village elders came to Chhavi’s house in Jaipur with a proposition.

“A village is a small community – and they said that if so many women wanted this job, the community would be driven apart by rivalries, but if I ran, then the village would remain united”, says Chhavi. 

Taking the job would mean leaving her city life and going to live in the village full time, but it didn’t take her long to decide.  And since she took it on earlier this year, she’s had  her hands full.

Problems to solve

There’s the problem of clean water – the only water supply to Soda and its surrounds has been tested and its turned out to be even too contaminated for irrigation.

Then there’s the lack of good education or the opportunities for young people:  “in our school here, in 11th and 12th standards, there are only three subjects on offer – Hindi literature, Sanskrit and geography.  What chance do you have in the future with such subjects?” asks Rajawat.  She’d like to see useful subjects introduced in this primarily agricultural area – “agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry…but teachers don’t want to come here.”

But the most problematic issue facing Rajawat, is a general cultural malaise.  People are used to not working and they're not used to being held accountable;  people have become used to hopelessness. 

Rajawat is bringing her considerable drive and energy to try to change things at this grassroot level, but despairs at the size of the job.  “I wish more educated people would come to places like this – they don’t have to give up everything like I did, but even if they could just come to a village during their holidays, and bring their expertise, their knowledge, we could try to change things for the better.”

Posted in: Chhavi Rajawat