No more cocooning...

Sualkuchi, an imminent village, world famous for traditional Assamese silk textile industry, providing livelihood to thousands of its natives has been facing problems of its own. The idea was to help the locals bring out their thoughts and feelings related to their community faced by the people there through a Grassroots Comics workshop conducted by trainers Hima and Usha from 23rd-25th Januray 2010 at Ganesh Das High School, Sualkuchi.

Comics gave them a chance and a medium to articulate their concerns in four frames. 36 of them created extraordinary stories on real life instances and community issues such as political pressure during elections, domestic violence, a child’s worry over having a weaving-loom at home etc.

The comic here speaks of a story about media being manipulated by politicians to defame each other.

One little Step….New Ways completes one year…

We look back at the last year and see ourselves struggling, cribbing, fighting and growing…learning from our own mistakes, but at the end of the day it all seems so worthwhile. And here we are now, elated, celebrating our first birthday...all smiles!

The wave continues….

After Nalbari, GVM hosted another Grassroots Comics Workshop from 9th-12th January 2010, at Rangia this time, with support from UNICEF and ECHO on the theme Disaster Risk Reduction with special reference to women and children. Hence the children of different age groups came together and expressed their points of view in this regard.
The children mostly created comics on flood as it is the most annoying and frequently experienced ordeal here. The girls also made comics on how the traditions and social structure adds up to the inconvenience of the womenfolk during disasters as she is the one who remains indoors and looks after the children, therefore aggravating their vulnerability...

Early Warning saves nine!!!

After the first workshop in Nalbari with GVM on Disaster Risk Reduction, this one was meant to reinforce the need for understanding the signals given by nature prior to disasters and taking them more seriously. Therefore, on similar lines, the next in the series was conducted from 23rd to 25th December 2009 in GVM Office Campus by Sushmita and Usha.
Interestingly, it was more of learning than sharing on our part as the issue was something new for us in the first place. A range of indicators to disasters like famine, earthquake, flood etc. were unveiled by means of comics. Some from these 31 participants have formed a comics group to keep the work going!!

Community Creating Comics….

Children of different age groups came together to represent their community concerns at a Grassroots Comics Workshop at Morigaon from 15th to 17th November 2009 organized by sSTEP (Society for Social Transformation and Environment Protection), supported by ActionAid India. Trainers Usha and Hima helped the children articulate the issues that they encounter in their day to day lives. Most children stood up for inadequacies of their school, the road etc. Some comics like those based on forgoing education because of poor economic condition, lack of higher education facilities among others revealed the much prevalent concern over there- school dropout! Also, how these complicate the situation further and pave way for child labour could be understood as many children have to engage in stone-cutting.

The Gyan manifests….

At Sarla Birla Gyan Jyoti Academy, Guwahati, 23 children literally voiced out their feelings about the chaos going on in the environment due to its mishandling by man in a Grassroots Comics Workshop conducted by Hima and Usha from 30th Oct to 1st Nov 2009, organised by Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti. Children virtually jumped on one another in excitement to put forward their stance during the debate that was started to bring forth the different perspectives people have on ‘how responsible is man in the damage of nature’.

The output revealed a panoramic view of the issue as children developed comics on a gamut of different aspects of environment exploitation starting from stories on animals coming to revenge at their habitat destruction, 2020 situation, end of a love story of fishes due to Tsunami, skyscrapers coming to dust after earthquake and so on.

Same same but different!

From September 22nd to 24th 2009, two comics’ workshops running simultaneously brought a wave of creativity and passion among children of two different sections of the social construction. One workshop was conducted at the Delhi Public School, Guwahati by trainers Sushmita and Usha while the other was held at Surabala Bordoloi Auditorium, Chandrapur College, Chandrapur, Guwahati by trainers Amrith of World Comics India, and Hima of New Ways. Both the workshops were organised by Gandhi Smriti snd Darshan Samiti.

28 children children at Delhi Public School from classes 8-10, in their stories expressed their own adaptation of things they see. They made stories on how a child was neglected for her younger sister, how a child feels when he is compelled by parents to adjust in a new school, exams pressure, chaotic traffic situation, etc. On the other side, at the Chandrapur Workshop, also jointly supported by Manab Sewa Sangh, 50 children brought out their ingenuity in speaking up about the world as they see including subjects pertaining to their village like wastage of water, quarrels among the youth, alcoholism and so on.

Definitely, the concurrence of workshops at two diverse set-ups did bring out a balanced assortment of issues that concern the child today…