It has been two years since the village and ward volunteer system was introduced by the YS Jagan Mohan Reddy led government in Andhra Pradesh, to provide last-mile delivery of welfare programs. Each volunteer is responsible for around 50 households, identifying beneficiaries of welfare schemes and ensuring services like pension, ration etc. are delivered. Rajesh*, a village volunteer in the tribal Agency area of Visakhapatnam district, is responsible for a little less than 50 households. But these are spread across three villages. While two villages are nearly 10 km apart, the third village is not connected by road and requires him to trek in the hills for nearly 3 kms. And for all this trouble, he receives the usual volunteer’s honorarium of Rs 5,000 a month. Activists from the Human Rights Forum (HRF) and Samalochana, an organisation working on social justice issues in north coastal districts of the state, have called for the Andhra Pradesh government to rationalise the village volunteer system in the Agency areas (Integrated Tribal Development Agency) of the state to ensure each volunteer is assigned not more than 30 households, considering the added challenges in these regions.
Volunteers are flooded with work regularly from various authorities, from COVID-19 and fever surveys from the health department, to work related to various schemes from the departments of housing, horticulture etc. “On the first day of every month, we are required to disburse pensions to all the beneficiaries. I visit the village secretariat, travel to the first two villages 10 km apart by bike, walk 3 km to the third village, and then have to further travel another 4 km to a place with network connectivity to log the data,” Rajesh says. Most volunteers in the Agency areas end up travelling 12 to 15 times a month to the village secretariat, nearly thrice a month to the mandal headquarters, and visit their assigned households almost every other day in person to address grievances, considering the poor network connectivity in the region. Most of the Rs 5,000 honorarium goes into travel expenses, he says, amid much pressure from officials as well as beneficiaries. “Some volunteers even have up to 70 households assigned. We would be able to perform our duties in a better way if we can handle around 30 households, and if travel expenses were covered separately,” he says, adding that most volunteers are unable to raise similar demands fearing backlash from officials.
Chakradhar, Convenor of Samalochana, says that when the volunteer system was first mooted by the government, civic society organisations working in Agency areas had suggested a smaller household load to Agency volunteers, and government officials had assured that a 30:1 household to volunteer ratio would be ensured, instead of the 50:1 ratio stipulated in plain areas. However, this remains to be implemented, he says. “The number of government scheme beneficiaries is usually higher in tribal regions. With the excessive workload because of the difficult terrain and network issues, while volunteers themselves suffer, it also impacts the delivery of services extended to the tribal citizens, who are unable to properly access government schemes,” he says.
HRF and Samalochana have called for the state government to ensure the volunteers in Agency areas are allotted not more than 30 households each, considering the “complexities of network coverage and geographical challenges related to travelling across villages in the Agency mandals.” In a statement, the organisations said that on examining data from 29 tribal mandals across 4 districts of Andhra Pradesh, it was found that each volunteer covers more than 60 households on average, ranging from 47 to 78 households per volunteer.
Noting that the honorarium for volunteers in tribal villages remains the same as elsewhere despite having a more challenging workload, the statement pointed out that “the Tribal Sub-Plan directs states to invest more in the tribal areas in order to achieve similar results as the plain areas.” The tribal village volunteers must receive extra benefits as they cover a larger geographical area for a given number of households compared to plain areas, the organisations demanded.
*Name changed on request