National Service Scheme (NSS) IIT Kharagpur

Here are few pictures of camp activities. This is in continuation of pictures posted in this blog in our earlier post titled "Annual Camp : Part I" ( Link ). The first three pictures of this post is followed by a series, describing activities of campers on 03rd December. That day in the first session, March Past was presented by every group for which they rehearsed in the preceding evenings. In the second session, a rally was carried out where "World Disability Day" was the main theme. We had a 1992 alumnus present in annual camp in this session. He was on his way to participate Pan IIT meet at Kolkata ( Link ) and was pleased to see the work carried out by young IITians. We discussed if from discourses in Pan IIT meet can emerge outcome based goals where villages around IIT Kharagpur within 5 KM radius, first betters the national average in development indices like infant mortality, mother-child health, school drop out etc. and then target becoming the best ...

Rangametia village unit conducted a survey and found that a large number of villagers, mostly from scheduled tribe and very poor, do not have any caste certificate to get the benefits of the Govt. welfare schemes. The B.D.O. office is about 15 KM away. Besides cost of travel, these daily wage earners misses a day's salary to go there. Also their ignorance on filling-up of forms and providing supporting documents add to the problem. The NSS, IIT Kharagpur unit working there arranged special caste certificate camp in that village with the help of SDO, BDO, Govt. inspectors, Panchayet Pradahan, officials from Panchayet and local community leaders. A training was conducted on 25.2.2012 in presence of Jt. B.D.O. We had overwhelming response on scheduled 18th March camp. The Govt. officials were kind enough to agree to our request and have another camp there on 14.4.2012. They also agreed to have a third camp on 01.4.2012 at another backward community (mostly of Lodha tribe) village na...

Warm wishes of the New Year! The regular activity of this semester for NSS, IIT Kharagpur volunteers starts tomorrow, the 7th Jan., 2012. Besides regular activities we have several special activities scheduled in this month. We shall participate in National Youth Day evening function where Swami Atmapriyananda, Vice Chancellor, Ramakrishna Mission Vivekananda University, Belur will be the guest speaker. On 14th Jan. morning, we shall have National Youth Week rally with colourful posters and on 26th Jan. we shall be part of Republic Day function. Besides the second phase of 'Save Water' and 'Save Energy' campaign, one blood donation camp, one public function (all units and village / slum community together) and several workshops are planned in the remaining period of the semester. More as the semester unfolds and opportunities that come to us or we can create for ourselves in a proactive manner. On 31st Dec., 2011 one Program Officer and the Program Coordinator of ...

Today (5th of December) submission from all groups related to the camp will get completed. We present at bottom of this post, some of the videos individual groups have prepared depicting their journey. One program officer in his feedback aptly summarized this journey, " We see leaders in the making ." The most inspirational of the student leaders in his final speech talked about four principles from Mother Teresa. He said, " There is only one religion - religion of love. There is only one language - language of heart. There is only one caste - caste of humanity. There is only one way - way to service ." We had research students of IIT Kharagpur, spouses of IIT faculty members visiting camp site and helping NSS officials. Everyday we had a responsibility of NSS Camp diary checking of all the campers during 9:00-12:00 hrs. when campers were busy with physical work. We had NSS faculty in tears while going through inspirational anecdotes written by campers in camp d...

The 7th Day of the camp emphasized on sports and cultural activities. The community participated in it with enthusiasm. The local panchayet member and panchayet pradhan graced the occasion. Dean, UGS IIT Khargpur, Coordinator, EAA participated in evaluation of field work and had a close interactive session with student group leaders. We had Quiz, Cloth distribution to needy, camp site cleaning and flag down ceremony on 8th day.     Soccer match     Cultural program : On field    Cultural program : On make shift stage        Quiz on NSS, our neighbourhood and our nation Cloth distribution : Registration   Human chain makes passage to distribution centre     The distribution   Camp site cleaning and preparation to leave     Final assembly : Feedback from students and faculty   Flag down ceremony, local panchayet doing the honour, followed by nation...