Immersions as a form of

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apprenticeship at PRADAN

by HRD UNIT at PRADAN with a contribution from VISHAL JAMKAR

development in our country. Rural community development

PRADAN (Professional Assistance for Development Action) is a complex process involving the interplay of social, political,
recognises that grassroots community work requires young and economic forces. Capable and caring people can accel-
people to ‘swim against the social current’ of erate this process, and make it more humane, especially for
contemporary India. It offers an apprenticeship programme the poor, by working among them in the village in a sustained
during which new trainees can reflect on their career way. Not everyone is cut out to be a ‘helping person’, which
choice. The account here includes views from the is at the heart of grassroots community work. Such work also
organisation and also an account of the experiences of one requires youngsters to ‘swim against the social current’, and
of their recruits, Vishal Jamkar. bear with unfamiliar and difficult conditions – in both work
and life – by choice.
Because of this, PRADAN has developed an apprentice-
Introduction ship programme, which provides new development trainees
Established in 1983, PRADAN (Professional Assistance for with an opportunity to assess the pluses and minuses of life
Development Action) is an India-based NGO working with in grassroots work. It also gives time to reflect upon alterna-
over 100,000 poor rural families. PRADAN’s mission is to tive career choices, and to think about the expectations of
enable these poor families to live a life of dignity by strength- family and significant others, as well as the trainee’s respon-
ening their livelihoods and giving them access to sustainable sibilities towards them. The cost of apprenticeships is
income-earning opportunities. This involves organising them, supported by reputable Indian and foreign donors (e.g. Sir
enhancing their capabilities, and introducing ways to increase Ratan Tata Trust, Ford Foundation).
their incomes by linking them to banks, markets, and other PRADAN uses a carefully designed multi-tier selection
economic services and opportunities. process to recruit trainees to the programme. Trainees come
PRADAN owes its genesis to a strong belief in a simple from professional backgrounds or are post-graduates with
idea – that caring and capable people, rather than material social science/pure science backgrounds. Our aim is to
resources, are crucial to accelerating the process of social prepare them to use their knowledge and skills to fight

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19HRD Unit at PRADAN with a contribution from Vishal Jamkar

Vishal Jamkar with his

hosts sowing SRI
paddy in Tetar village.
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Photo: Vishal Jamkar

poverty and work for the benefit of the rural poor. The devel- tunity to make an informed career choice as to whether or
opment apprenticeship runs for 12 months, and allows the not they want to do grassroots work. An apprenticeship
trainee to experience and explore life and work in grassroots allows one to experience the living conditions and broad
community development. Refined over the years, it is the content and pace of work in villages. The apprentices expe-
main mechanism for PRADAN to train university graduates rience and learn about:
of varied disciplines as development workers. • the contexts in which poor people live;
Most of the programme takes place at the field level. A • the conditions in which they would work; and
trainee is attached to a field guide who has been trained • the kinds of impact they might have/make.
through a three-phase field guide development programme. While learning, apprentices also explore the changes they
This programme prepares PRADAN professionals with more would have to make in their own lives. The programme aims
than 3 years’ experience in PRADAN and strong roots in to instil sound professional values in the apprentices and to
development work to become a ‘mentor’ to the trainees. help them develop attributes such as how to:
The learning ground of the apprentice mostly overlaps • adjust to difficult living conditions;
with the work area of the field guide in the project location. • manage with poor logistics;
The learning cycle is: • have empathy for the communities they work with;
• guide does, apprentice observes; • stay a step behind the community to facilitate them to take
• apprentice does, guide observes; charge;
• we both experiment together to find better ways of doing • facilitate women to manage their self-help groups; and
things. • facilitate the community to take up income-generating
The programme offers these young people a ‘reality activities to improve their economic conditions and ulti-
check’. It gives them a chance for reflection ‘inside’, and for mately their lives.
motivation and exposure ‘outside’. It gives them the oppor- Above all, they learn the practical skills of grassroots

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 Immersions as a form of apprenticeship at PRADAN
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Vishal Jumkar at the castor

plantation in Bondri village
with Jhingobai.

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Photo: Vishal Jamkar

development work through this learning cycle. These values, and West Bengal.
skills, and attributes are the basic preparation for a long-term The apprenticeship programme has been of enormous
career both at PRADAN and in grassroots development. From benefit to PRADAN.
time to time, apprentices and their team members also reflect • More than 936 university graduates have joined the
whether they are suitable for this sector or not, and where apprenticeship programme since its inception.
they are vis-à-vis their learning agenda. All these processes • Of these, 303 apprentices graduated as PRADAN executives.
have been institutionalised and fully integrated into the • Between April 2000 and March 2006, 66% of the gradu-
working of PRADAN. ating executives continued to work in PRADAN and
For PRADAN, apprenticeships reduce uncertainties and another 13% continued in this sector after leaving
contingencies in its core activities. We face many uncertain- PRADAN.
ties in the external environment so it is important that our • In 2000, PRADAN’s leadership pool had 25 executives with
staff are highly professional. The development apprentice- over 7 years’ experience. There are now more than 60. This
ship process allows us a higher degree of reliability. This serves growth is entirely attributable to the apprenticeship
the critically important purpose of building confidence in the programme.
organisation and in its ability to deliver.
PRADAN recruits 100 to 150 development apprentices Challenges ahead
per year. Out of these, 40 to 50 join PRADAN as executives PRADAN is currently one of the largest non-government
at the end of the 12-month apprenticeship programme to public service organisations in India, with a wide outreach in
pursue a career in rural development. Currently, more than regions with high concentrations of poverty. It has the largest
200 PRADAN professionals are spread out in small field-based endowment of university-educated women and men
teams across 3,044 villages in remote and poor areas of Bihar, working directly with poor families in the country. We have
Jharkhand, Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, strong relationships with those we work with, both in villages

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19HRD Unit at PRADAN with a contribution from Vishal Jamkar

Cooking food in
Khohra village, in
preparation for a
marriage.
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Photo: Vishal Jamkar

and in an array of public and private institutions concerned our work and enhance our diversity.
with poverty alleviation. We believe this is due to our human
resource development and a mission-level belief in the simple Vishal Jamkar recounts his experiences as a PRADAN
idea that people make a difference. apprentice
PRADAN is at a unique juncture in its organisational life. I am a chemical engineer and after graduating I felt I wanted
We are now in a position to grow rapidly and expand our to use my technical knowledge for social purposes. This is
outreach. Realising this goal presents a number of key chal- how I decided to apply for a job in PRADAN.
lenges. At this point, we need to: I had no social and/or field experience. So I enrolled with
• enlarge the pool of human resources available to the PRADAN’s one-year apprenticeship programme. During my
organisation; apprenticeship, I first went for a month-long village stay.1 I
• develop career trajectories for young people within then went on to do a study of a new village (where PRADAN
PRADAN, and also in the ‘mainstream’; was yet to work). Finally, I feel I’ve learnt the nitty-gritty of the
• develop curricula, systems, and processes to enhance effec- project through a guided practice.
tiveness; and I remember my village stay in Khohra at Manturiyabai’s
• enable experienced staff to play wider leadership roles. house (Manturiyabai is one of the self-help group members).
Our aim is to scale up the 12-month long development For the first 3 days, I interacted with nobody except the
apprenticeship programme so that 50 to 60 new executives family with whom I was staying. I used to shy away from
join PRADAN each year. In addition, PRADAN needs to approaching neighbours. Villagers were very curious to meet
develop new recruitment and induction strategies to bring
1
During the village stay, the newly inducted apprentice stays with a family in a
in 20 new executives with 1 to 5 years’ work experience community where PRADAN is already working. The Field Guide and Team Leader
outside PRADAN, across all sectors. Not only would this add look for a suitable, willing host family for the apprentice and discuss the stay with
the host family.
to the numbers, we believe it would add new dimensions to

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19

me. Being from Mumbai, the youngsters were very eager to vatibai’s house; I was ‘lecturing’ them on why they should

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ask me how films are shot, and how the romantic songs and have sent their children to school rather than sending them
scenes are filmed. I was more used to reading books about to collect mahua and feeding cattle. I repeated it three times,
rural India than actually speaking with people from rural with a tone of superiority as if I was a graduate and knew all
India. For me, the ice-breaker was a village marriage cere- the advantages of it. Everyone went quiet and began to
mony, where I helped to cook food and danced the chitkor, avoid looking at me. I could not understand why they were
a tribal dance. behaving like this. Then Mangat bhayya, Shyamvatibai’s
As part of my assignment, I had to find out the income- husband, replied silently,
expenditure levels of a number of families. After my initial
attempts, I realised the importance of asking open-ended Brother, we don’t have or are able to get enough food
questions. I had spent a sleepless night thinking I was not fit here; what we can cultivate from agriculture is not enough
for the job. I couldn’t ask questions, such a simple thing! I to cook our meals for a whole year. We have to migrate to
then realised that I had become assignment-focused, manip- other places to earn, taking all our belongings with us. So
ulating data, as I used to do in my engineering laboratory. first of all, let our food requirements be met, and then we
Some time later, when I became genuinely interested in will think of education.
people’s lives and not just their incomes and expenditures,
everything became easier. I found I could complete my This incident is embossed on my memory. I was petrified.
assignment and enjoy the remaining time there. Nothing taught me as much as this event did. I realised then
I remember once talking with a few villagers at Shyam- that I can never say I know it all.

CONTACT DETAILS Vishal Jamkar

The HRD Unit Executive (Projects)
PRADAN District Hoshangabad
Niti Bagh Madhya Pradesh
New Delhi India
110 049 Email: [email protected]
India
Tel/Fax: + 91 11
26518619/46039245/460432456/26851171
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.pradan.net

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