Sunday, Jan 12, 2003
Sunday, Jan 12, 2003 |
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Andhra Pradesh
By Our Staff Reporter
Four years after bringing home the coveted award, the family of Mrs. Fatima Bee is fighting hard to retain the glory. The debts of the landless family mounted to Rs. 3 lakhs and her partially-educated sons are working as masons for daily wages in Hyderabad. Her elder son, Safruddin, who is married, earns Rs 140 a day and the younger son, Saifulla, who works as assistant to his brother, is paid Rs 40 per day. The sons supplement income of the family. The last son is studying fifth class. Her husband, S. Mohiddin Basha, said the failure of coconut crop in the last two years had brought heavy losses to them. The family, which owns a small plot of 30 cents, ekes a livelihood by leasing coconut groves and selling the produce in the market. The falling prices of coconut and pest problem rendered the business uneconomical. More than the financial troubles, the attempt to sideline her from the thrift movement had deeply hurt Mrs. Fatima Bee. The federation of village-level self-help groups does not invite her to the meetings though she is still a member. She was doubtful about her active association with the parent organisation. According to her, the international accolade to an illiterate woman had been indigestible to members of the thrift groups as well as bureaucrats. She had been systematically sidelined and finally thrown out of the mainstream. When she received an invitation next year from UNDP to be a member of the international advisory panel headed by Dr. Kofi Annan, nobody had helped her to reach Geneva, where the function was held. She could not organise the tour on her own because she was stripped of everything except the certificate of appreciation. Recalling the events, Mrs. Fatima Bee said when she had been in New York to receive the award, the local mosque invited her to participate in the prayer and address the gathering. Pleased by her work and views, the gathering pooled an amount of $1,000 and donated to her. In Indian currency it was Rs 42,000. Some of the members of the groups insisted upon distributing the amount and clothes she had brought from the US among all groups. She was pleased to share the amount with 20 groups of the village but she refused to surrender the certificate to them. Ms. Fatima Bee said she developed great attachment to the certificate and did not want to part with it even under trying conditions. Under pressure from the groups, an MLA interfered and tried to convince her that the certificate be placed in the central office of the groups, but she remained firm and was willing to suffer. She feels that much good would have happened to the self-help movement in her village and others, had she been allowed to put to use the fame she earned. She receives correspondence from different national and international organisations inviting her to deliver lectures.
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