So, GREEN it shall be!

Hi there!
In this section, I'd be talking about the few, little projects I took up to contribute my bit towards having a greener world, through my field - DESIGN. :)
Green World? We ALL want it. Sustainability? We are working for it. Re-Use? We "will" do it. Recycle? We "already" do it. But, all of this with some kind of obvious helpless attitude..

Let's stop that first. I'll share my experience of how I drew the inspiration of doing it.. happily!! It was by studying and working with a few such organisations and on a few related ideas.

JUGAAD

The people behind the brand Jugaad being one of them. Karm Marg is the non-government organisation behind it. Following is the information I gathered by primary and secondary study of the NGO. 

KARM MARG:

Karm Marg is an Indian non-governmental organization committed to the cause of supporting disadvantaged children and young adults. It is located in the outskirts of New Delhi; Karm Marg runs a home, Karm Gaon.

Ideology-

Karm Marg, literally meaning the Path of Work & Action, started in February 1997. As the name suggests, the driving force behind Karm Marg’s functioning has been the desire to be self-sustaining i.e. being self capable, without having an external support. The ideology extends not just to the internal functioning, but also towards the people we support as an organization.

Target group-

They aim to work for disadvantaged children, young adults and economically backward rural women from villages near the campus. Both these groups receive vocational training before joining the production process. Eventually the products made by these people are sold under the brand Jugaad. It’s worth noting that most of the Jugaad products utilize as much recycled and reused raw material as possible.

Visit to Karm Marg Head Office:Office Manager- Mr. Pawan Singh
Karm Marg was started in order to help homeless children, women and young adults belonging to backward classes. They have a home cum production unit in Faridabad, where those children stay, study and learn new things, so that they can be self- reliant. Currently, there are about 60 women working in the production unit; about 60 children staying in the house, who are looked after by 4 caretakers.
Production unit (house)- Khedi Village, Fardiabad (UP)
They get the materials required for the production of Jugaad products either by buying them (left- out pieces) from fabric houses, tailors etc. or they have a few organisations which provide them with the materials like Either Or etc.
There are four units-

• Carpentry unit
• Paper unit
• Candle making unit
• Stitching unit

Jugaad or Karm Marg doesn’t have signature store of their own. They sell their products with the help of other outlets like People Tree, Katha etc. They sell their products to these stores and they further sell the products to customers. 

Jugaad product range:
The USP of the brand is its paper bags, which gained popularity during the Dastakar Nature Bazaar, organized generally in the month of October at Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts' Grounds, New Delhi. However, the brand provides a range of products including:

• Accessories

Wallets, key chains, pencil pouch, toilet pouch (big & small), coin pouch, stoles etc.

•      Bags

Yoga mat bag, working bag ,titli bag, tarshi bag (big & small), sonam bag, sawan bag, small shoulder bag, shopping bag, jug bag jhola etc.

• Cool Maal

Tikona mirror, visiting card holder, wooden glass tray, paper pipe tray (big/ medium/ small), saadi gaddi, wall lamp etc.)

• Feature

 Ruled diary, double silk necklace etc.

• Jewelery

Octopus mala, paper bangles, paper earings, silk cube necklace, boria bangles, three boria necklace, boria mala (big/ small) etc.

• Paper bags

Recylced color paper bags, newspaper bags with cloth handles, newspaper bags with rope handles etc.

• Stationery

Ruled diary, small diary, khaata diary, file holder, cloth folder, meri Dilli telephone index etc.

Jugaad's Market:

Jugaad doesn’t have a signature store of its own, but sells its products in other stores, working towards
similar missions. Initially, when Karm Marg started with its product line, the products were sold by the
name of Karm Marg only; it was with time that the brand name Jugaad was established.

Presently, Jugaad sells its products by the help of stores like:

In Delhi

1. People Tree, Connaught Place
2. Katha, Sarvodaya Enclave

3. The Design Studio, Nehru Place

In Ahmedabad

         People Tree, Opposite AMA

In Pune

        Either Or, Sohrab Hall, Sasson Road

Jugaad also sells its products in exhibitions and fairs which are put up regularly in various cities.
Dastakaar Nature Bazaar, which is generally, exhibited from August to November in Bangalore and
Delhi, books individual stalls for Jugaad products.

Also, the products are directly sold from the Head Office, which is located in Jeevan Nagar, New Delhi and numerous exhibitions which are put up in various cities in India, like Kala Madhyam (Bangalore), Concern India (Bombay), Daaram (Hyderabad(, Samat Kada (Lucknow), Dastakari Art Samiti, Blind School, Festivals organised by colleges, Embassies etc. The products are also exported to various other countries like U.S., U.K., Australia, Germany etc.

To sum it up

Karm Marg works in order to make street children self- reliant enough. It also works for the betterment of rural women, young adults etc. Their funds to maintain the organization come from the brand Jugaad, which promotes eco- friendly products. This shows that their motto of making children
self- sustainable is taken care of by further incorporating sustainability for fund raising as well.

Hence, Karm Marg, as an organization, fulfills the three conditions of Social Responsibility, Economic
Growth and Environmental Care, justifying its sustainable nature. In the production of their products, it
covers up the aspects of-

1. Reuse as it reuses left over sources from various export houses etc.

2. Recycle as it uses the old, torn waste to create new range of sell-able products.

3. Recover as it helps in reducing the waste that goes into the landfill.

4. Respect as it gives the women and children over there the confidence to work and be independent.  


Optimum Commute

I, along with three other group members, started working on this project for the module of Sustainable Systems in order to develop strategies to sensitize people towards any activity which could be carried out in a more sustainable way.
We had several thorough discussions and brainstorming sessions after which working on a more
sustainable transport system was shortlisted, with the help of our faculty, who readily agreed to the existing problems of heavy traffic throughout Delhi and other cities too, for that matter.
Our idea of the system was:

OPTIMUM COMMUTE
A sustainable system which promotes the use of activities like carpooling and other means of shared
travel, so that they are accepted and adopted by masses. The need? The traffic jams that we face every time we step out of the house, firstly. Secondly and more importantly, the ill effect of vehicular emissions on our environment! We are here to sensitize each other, discuss and ACT!
In order to execute our plan..to spread the word, we started with sending out questionnaires to people, which was like a pilot study and gave us positive results.
After that, we created a page on the social networking site Facebook, the link to which is-
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Optimum-Commute/171546496268058

This gave us a common platform to ask various questions and get our thoughts and idea across masses. The logo we designed for it looks something this. :)

..It's time to share!

We did a lot of research and data collection regarding the same and used media like poster design to communicate our message. 

PROTSAHAN

Protsahan is an NGO in Delhi, I did my one month long Minor Guided Project with. It is a youth based international non profit organization that uses the creativity of Design, Art, Stories and Cinema to bring grassroot change in the lives of street children facing drugs, sex abuse and disability & thr mothers. It's mission is “Encouraging Skills Development & Creative Education through DESIGN THINKING at the bottomest of pyramid". 

Table Cloth Block Printing 

The project I did included teaching the craft of hand block printing to about twelve adolescent girls of the NGO and developing a range of ten products.It also included promotion of the products by designing a communication strategy mainly consisting of an audio-visual and other visuals for promotion. 

Lamp Shade Block Printing

Here goes my story and experience with PROTSAHAN! :) 

Suman, a 10 year old student at Protsahan; she can’t speak, but they can listen to her; she can’t hear, but they still communicate. I saw it happening..I felt the chills go down my spine! I even saw how Manisha, an 11 year old student, was helping Suman learn the way of holding a block, placing it and printing with it. It was magical. How patient could an 11 year old be with a 10 year old specially-abled child! Here’s what I understood about and through Protsahan.. 

Protsahan, the Hindi word for “Encouragement” and it was indeed an encouraging experience working with them. 

When I heard about “Protsahan” for the first time from my friends, the first thing I did was to study the organization online, through its website and Facebook page. Facebook being one of the biggest craze among youth, has now grown bigger than just a social networking site; Protsahan is quite an example of how people can kick start great things with “just” a social networking site. People say it’s all about doing the right thing at the right time. There is no dearth of opportunities, one just needs to stay alert. We, the lucky ones of the lot, can say that with much expediency as we have access to many little things which are not even regarded as luxuries by the most of us anymore. We get bothered when we aren’t able to check our e-mails or because we just have five sweaters for this winter season and none are of the latest fashion. Ever thought of those who don’t even know that there is something called internet? (Yes, there ARE people who might have seen someone using it somewhere, but have no clue about what it is or how it works). Or those who wear two torn shirts to keep themselves warm in winters like these and still have a smile on their face because they consider themselves lucky to have those two shirts? Lack of monetary resources doesn’t take away their right to be as warm and happy as any of us, but it does force them to do things which they wouldn’t have done otherwise. No parent likes his/ her daughter being a sex worker or son as rag picker or no kid becomes a servant or sweeper by choice. That’s where Protsahan acts, finding its niche in the society with the motto “Encouraging Education and Social Development through ART”. They deserve to be happy; they need to be educated. Doing it through creativity and colors is what Protsahan is all about! 

I contacted the NGO, fulfilled the formalities and went to meet the kids, to understand the organization’s working. I have always been fond of kids and their company. Observing them, listening to their conversations and answering their incessant queries has shown me new perspectives, always being a learning experience.

With a million thoughts in my mind, I finally exited at the Uttam Nagar Metro station, where I was supposed to meet Ms. Sonal Kapoor, the Founder-Head of Protsahan. She recognized me (though, after a little hesitation), did a little talking and got into a shared auto, where the initiation of the ice breaking happened when she offered me to sit on her lap immediately after seeing my discomfort because the auto was cramped. She managed to give me a little idea about the organization on the way to the NGO’s school.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that it wasn't only her who was greeted warmly by the students, they showered a complete stranger like me with unbiased affection. It left a never- ending smile on my face and that is when I realized that it was THE place for me. I was enthused on learning that I would be teaching the kids a craft so that they would have something which they could use in the future for income. Sonal and I thought the craft of Block Printing would be pretty appropriate as it’s ethnic and colorful, and yet easier to learn.

There were around 12-15 girls of the age group 9-15 years to whom I taught Block printing and developed 10 products in order to be sold. Thanks to Sadhna Mam, the kids were well acquainted with colors and had a fair idea of their combinations. How it surprised me every time I saw them making beautiful pieces of Madhubani within a couple of minutes on not only paper but on white board and computer as well! It is a sight worth cherishing forever to see the twinkle in the kids’ eyes while they paint or draw. Enthusiastically, I started with a little introduction to the craft. They were familiar with colors, but had never seen blocks, except for being used for putting mehendi. So, they learnt a few things about a block and its purpose and then started using one for making different patterns initially on paper and later on fabric. Printing and colors always cheered them up, and their smiles always inspired me, de-stressing me.

I used to cover the happenings of the day through photography which is LOVED by the kids and oh, are they good with it! I discovered that they are crazy about it and so, I got my little photographers for documenting the proceedings through photographs. I can now proudly say that I followed “Barefoot Photography Technique” for my project’s documentation.

All the students I met and interacted with were wonderful in their own unique ways. And I might sound biased here, though I tried my best not to let it show, but I did have a personal favorite amongst the students. She is one of those kids who give meaning to their names- Kiran. Her million Dollar smile, the sparkling eyes and the optimism that she lives with gives you a ray of hope..always!