Avrodh: NSS Skit during Thomso 09

NSS IIT Roorkee organized an awareness skit “Avrodh” during Thomso 2009. The street play aimed at analyzing the generation gap and bringing into notice the pitiable plight of our elder generation. Many successful people often neglect their parents and their children have a tendency to get involved in the wrong things. Our skit tried to highlight the mistakes of both the youth as well as the elder generation. It was a fifteen minute play which was enacted at the UG floor. The play was successful in raising some very logical questions on our behavior. Even during rehearsals, the gathering of the crowd was highly motivating. The effort was highly appreciated by the crowd though it could have been better had there been the absence of loud music.

Newspaper Collection Drive

To get the best out of the waste, NSS IIT ROORKEE conducted a newspaper collection drive. The event was held on Sunday, 8th November’09 in the campus of IITR involving all the hostels. More than 80 NSS volunteers participated in this drive. The volunteers started collecting the newspapers at 10 in the morning. Groups of 8-10 volunteers went to each & every doorstep of all the bhawans in IITR. The IITR students willingly cooperated with the volunteers by giving their old newspapers.

The enthusiasm and zeal of the volunteers was very well depicted when the pile of old newspaper was congregated. In terms of facts, a whopping 2730 kilograms of newspapers were collected. These old newspapers were then sold to junk sellers (raddiwalahs). Some of the newspapers were also given to village women to make envelopes out of these. The money collected from selling the newspapers is used by the finance section of the NSS for constructive purposes. The old newspaper waste is converted into a productive and beneficial form. The drive was very successful as it not only cleared the campus of its paper waste but also provided NSS with funds and the village women with some employment. Similar drives will be held in future for the benefits of the society as a whole.

EDUGAMES: A new approach to teach children

NSS organized an educational games session at Rajakiya Prathamic Vidhyalaya, the elementary school at Ramnagar, Roorkee, in association with PRATHAM on October 10, 2009.

A team of 27 NSS volunteers and 5 PRATHAM volunteers coordinated by Mr. Bhagat Singh, Block coordinator PRATHAM went to the village for the same.

It’s easiest to educate children by the way of games and we realizing this tried to introduce as many educational games as possible at the same time taking care to make them play games which promote physical fitness.

Needless to say, the prospect of a fun filled gaming session drew a large number of kids. In a few games we kept some loopholes of which the players could take advantage and to our delight many students rose up to the opportunity giving a visible proof of their keen intelligence! We took care to make the kids familiar with the most basic elements of education like alphabets, numbers, the names of fruits trees etc. To hone their spoken language, we made them recite poems. All in all, the session proved to be a highly entertaining and enlightening one for the participants and the organizers likewise.

We could see that many of the kids were bright, quick and had a superb grasping while the others just needed the practice and the opportunity. No wonder that the kids wanted the session to go on forever in the perfect child like spirit!

It was with the reluctant goodbye waves and sweet promises of returning soon that we returned back to the campus.

Yoga Camp for Students

With a motive to help the students in maintaining the integrity of their health in a heavily burdened and stressed academics environment and to inculcate the Yogic culture amid the younger generation, NSS IIT Roorkee organized a three day Yoga Camp at the Khosla International House Faculty Club(from 19th September to 21st September). More than 200 students participated wherein they learnt Pranayama- the breathing control exercise which develops a steady mind, strong will-power, and sound judgement along with numerous Asanas of which mostly Shava Asana, Utrasana, Padmasana, Simhasana, Vajrasana and Hasyasana were practised.

Starting at 6:15 in the morning every day the one and a half hour session was presided over by a trained professional from Patanjali Yogpeeth as the yoga teacher. The presence of Dr. Puri, Dr. V.K. Katiyar, Dr. Smita Jha, Mrs. Puri and Mrs. Katiyar during the camp was a source of motivation for the students. They elucidated the advantages of yoga by relating the benefits they garnered by practising the art. Dr. Katiyar said that an hour of yogic exercise everyday reduces the need of sleep and keeps body and mind energetic throughout the day. Seeing the enthusiasm of the students another three day yoga camp would be organised in the coming month.

525 lives saved...

DONATING BLOOD is as good as breathing life into some one. Blood donors deserve highest respect for their self sacrifice. There is a continuous increase in the global demand of blood but there is a severe mismatch between demand and supply. The developing countries are the ones suffering the most in this regard. These countries, home to about 82% of the world’s population receive just 38% of the total units of blood donated. India is no exception, where the demand stands at a colossal 8 million units and the demand falls short by 2.5 million units. The reason for this is attributed to the paucity of donors and improper usage of donated blood. Global statistics say that 3 lives can be saved for every unit of donated blood, but in India only 1 life is saved for the same amount of blood. There is hence a pressing need of more and more units of blood and ensuring their proper usage. Couple these facts with the immense satisfaction derived in saving a life and we had reasons enough to organize a blood donation camp! We did it in collaboration with IMA Dehradun and Himalayan Institute Hospital Dehradun and Government Hospital, Roorkee on 13^th September.

NSS was successful in removing general misconceptions about blood donation among students prior to the camp by the way of a motivational lecture. They were made aware of the various benefits of donating blood like refreshing of blood by production of new Red Blood Cells to replenish the blood lost, and the reduced danger of heart diseases.

We received an overwhelming response from students with a total of 525 units of blood being collected during the course of the day. We had a much higher number of people willing but quite a few were sent back owing to some health problems! It was immensely gratifying to see such an excellent response and to realize that all our efforts in trying to make a difference in people’s lives weren’t futile!

Director Dr. Saxena thanked NSS and all those who could spare a few minutes of their time for this kind gesture and helped in saving countless lives. “Blood Donation is a supreme and noble service to the mankind. It gives great satisfaction and young people should donate blood occasionally”, he said. Dean of Students’ Welfare was also very appreciative of our efforts and commended NSS on its steady progress.NSS also distributed goodies and gifts to the donors as a token of appreciation for being a part of this noble purpose.



A few drops of your blood can spell the difference between life and death for someone. It may be the reason for someone to dream on...

Cloth Distribution

Owing to rapidly growing infrastructure of IITR, currently a large number of construction workers are employed in the campus. These workers, having their settlements inside the campus only, somehow manage to scrape along with whatever meager means they have. Decent food, clothing, shelter and education are luxuries for these workers and their families.

We at NSS believe in serving the society at the smallest possible levels. There is nothing to be achieved by aiming for the overall societal development if we ignore the cruel scene of humanity being played right in front of our eyes! The rags in which these families dress in put us to shame, seeing how lavishly we spend on our clothing and how equally extravagantly we throw away the ones we grow out of. Hence, we initiated a clothes collection drive and roped in the Professors and students likewise to donate their useless pieces of clothing. We even got the students from COER to contribute. It was an extremely pleasant surprise for us to find everyone very cooperative and at the end of the drive we had a large collection of clothes which we then sorted out according to gender and age.

Finally on august 22nd, we organized a clothes distribution camp. Two sets of clothes were given to each individual. A huge crowd gathered on the site of the camp made us feel pleased about the step we had taken but at the same time it was heart wrenching to see the poverty so clearly etched in their faces. Despite their eagerness, they were very well behaved again to our very pleasant surprise, especially remembering the havoc we wreck everywhere there is a gathering of people aiming for the same thing, even chapatis in mess. The whole event was managed very well and the distribution took place in a very orderly manner with some children putting on the clothes the very instant they received them! And to think that the reason for their beaming faces was lying forgotten all the while in junk cupboards most likely to be thrown away in a bin! This event underlined for us the importance of small endeavors we undertake and the profound effect they have.

At this juncture we would like to express a heartfelt thanks to all our volunteers who sacrificed their weekend and chose to work under the burning sun for the same. It gave us immense pleasure to see that the smiles which this simple gesture put on the faces of the workers were a reward high enough for all those involved in the camp.

World Environment Day (April 5th)

NSS IIT Roorkee was not involved in any activity on the World Environment Day but we would like to present our various projects and our concern for the environment with our approach to the cause through the following newsletter.

Our future plans for the next year are:

• Setting up and maintenance of Biogas Plants in and around Roorkee
• Giving "Polythene Free Roorkee" a new boost by introducing fibre and jute bags
• Carrying out a study of amount of polythene that comes in the IITR Campus
• Apart from this, Campus Afforestation Project is on the go
• Study and implement Green Resources wherever we can
  

Newsletter <.pdf> Download here

Contact: nssatiitr@gmail.com for further details

NSS Magazine 2008-09

The year 2008-09 witnessed a number of activities in various fields with more than 8400 hours spent by only the first year students.

The various activities undertaken by NSS IITR this year are summarised in the annual NSS Magazine. Download NSS IITR Magazine 2008-09

MY EXPERIENCES WITH NSS

"After since i have joined NSS, which i did as i had no other option left, i noticed some changes in my life. I know they are not so major that i can boast about them, its just about a feeling that matters. Suddenly my life seemed very beautiful and valuable to me. I noticed that people whom I just took for granted in my life, suddenly became so close to to me. I realized their importance in my life. And the reason behind these changes is NSS. When I saw the kids in NSS, lacking such basic requirements of life without which i can't even imagine my life, i came to know how well off and lucky I am. My problems which seem to me as the worst ever tragedies one can face in life, are just uncomparable to what these kids face. The good thing is they know the importance of their life and have no regrets. I had many such experiences in NSS which made a remarkable impact and will always be remembered..."

-Khushboo Mittal
NSS volunteer

Well, all of you must have had some beautiful experiences while working with NSS which you will like to share with others. You all are invited to feel free and express yourselves and quote your experiences with NSS. Your feelings are welcome.

Why opt for NSS?

You say its a thankless job.
You say that others don't work as much.

You say that you're not making a difference.
You say that profis are useless.
You say that people don't care.

You say that you don't care.

You might even say that NSS is useless.

There are a hundred and one reasons to say no to NSS...

But just think...

Has someone smiled because of you?

Has someone jumped up in joy to have you teach them?

Does someone respect you for the change you've brought around?

Have you ever made a difference?

Does someone, somewhere owe you their small comforts?

Think and think hard...
This is the time to choose.

The time to decide: Will you stay and help NSS?

Will you make a difference next year?

Can you?
Only you can decide.

You can choose to walk away or stick around. You can choose your comfort over others' pain. You have the power to be the lifeblood of NSS next year.

The question remains - What will you choose?

Online Registrations for proficiencies are now open on the intranet. Choose, and choose wisely.

Contact @ nssatiitr@gmail.com for queries

announcing New Executive Team for the year 2009-10

With the great satisfaction driven from achievements of NSS IIT Roorkee activities this year and a little sadness for leaving such a nice team mates and NSS which made me to realize my potentials, I would like to thank you all team mates from all years(1yr, 2yr, 3yr, 4yr). Without you people NSS would not have achieved great heights that it possesses in people's hearts now. I apologize for being harsh at times. I hope you can understand that all that we have done is not having any personal agony but for a cause, for NSS, for the Nation.

NSS Executive Team

After seeing an overwhelming majority of students interested in working for NSS, for the Nation, I can proudly say we had achieved what we aimed for this year, namely "motivating students to work for social cause(NSS)" may not be by giving motivational lectures but by showing the real picture of the rural India or the real need of the hour.

Now we are almost at the end of the year and need of the hour is new executive team for the upcoming year. We were so satisfied to see overwhelming response from 2yr students to carryout responsibility of different NSS activities. In keeping view of the hike in the no.of new activities that come up this year organization structure of NSS have been departmentalized into three different departments namely, Administration or Oncampus activities, Rural Transformation and Communications. And to give the flexibility for expansion of NSS into new areas or activities Executive committee and to bridge the gap between B Tech students and PG Students on the campus, while helping in activities PG Advisers have also been selected .

Now I would like to take pleasure of announcing new team of NSS IIT Roorkee chapter for the academic year 2009-10.

•Gen Secy : Kulvaibhav Kaushik

•Joint Secy(Admin): Shruti Nagani

•Prerna : Garvit Agarwal, Shweta Agarwal,Rohit Batra

•Nirmaan : Bhushan Goel, Nitin Iyer

•Health & Human Welfare: Abhitej, Ramnik Jain

•Joint Secy(Rural Transformation) : Chaitali Chhikara

•Kaliyar : Ibrahim, Rahul Sahu

•Telliwala: Bulbul Saraf, Shiv Ram

•Joint Secy (Communications): Naisheel Verdhan

•Design & Publicity: Khushboo Mittal, Neeraj Sharma

•Techno Creative: Prachi Agarwal, Akanksha Kostha

•PG Adviser : Priyanka(MSc in Bio-tech), Bhakti (MSc in Maths)

•Executive committee: Shivaasheesh Singh, Sweta Jain Kothari, Abhinav Tallapally

We hope that you all will be happy to work with the new executive team and support them to achieve aims of NSS, in the same manner you have supported us. If for any big reason you ought to opt any other proficiency than NSS for next year, just keep in mind about NSS and give whatever support you can from there.

It would be my pleasure to be a friend of you all. Please feel free to talk to me whenever you need any help or guidance.

HOPING TO SEE NSS IITROORKEE AS AN ICON STUDENT GROUP FOR ALL STUDENT YOUTH OF THE COUNTRY WHO WANT TO SEE INDIA AS A DEVELOPED NATION.

Naga M Reddy A.,
General Secretary(former :)),
NSS IIT Roorkee,
B. Arch 4 Yr,
IIT Roorkee,
India - 247667.
91-9719278700
nagamreddya.ar@gmail.com

NSS Yoga Camp resumed

Yoga Camps have been one of the integral parts of NSS activities to maintain the integrity of student's health in a heavily burdened and stressed academic environment. NSS resumes

YOGA SESSION

for students and faculty from 3rd March, 2009 for 2 weeks. Our yoga teachers are well renowned professionals from Patanjali Peeth, Haridwar.

Start Date : 03/03/09
Venue : Saraswati Mandir (Yoga Hall)
Timings : 6.15 am
Duration : 1 hour

Contact:
K. Swagat
9837335694

Awareness Skit at Teliwala

On March 1st 2009 (Sunday), NSS volunteers conducted a skit in Teliwala Primary School. The main aim of the skit was to spread awareness among the children of Teliwala with the topic

"Importance of Education"

It was a successful event and was attended by many children. NSS is planning to organise a similar street play and a candle march during Cognizance '09. The main motto behind organizing this is to attract eyes of larger mass to Social Service. The ideas for the candle march being thought upon are terrorism, poor upliftment, vigilant public etc.

Similar ideas are invited on nssatiitr@gmail.com
Details about the skit and the video to be uploaded soon. To visit the photographs, click here.

NSS, IIT Roorkee in association with Cognizance, 2009 (The Annual Technical Festival of IIT Roorkee) is carrying out a case study on Kaliyar under the name

Ruraisle

A step for Rural Transformation

Kaliyar is a pilgrimage center visited by thousands of people across the globe. It is situated about 2 km from the National Highway and lies on the banks of the Ganga Canal and is half hour drive from Roorkee.

The tourism industry gives people an opportunity to make easy money. Parents send their children out to beg or to work as waiters at major tourist spots rather than sending them to schools. When asked upon the reason the parents complained that even the educated populace of the village is not able to obtain and keep jobs. This creates a notion of futility of education. On an average, a child begging on the street is able to earn Rs. 50-80 per day.

In such a scenario, a case study has to be done on the following lines

1. A provision for generation of employment
2. A proposal to change the mindset of the general population towards education with the goal to:
   

• Discourage the practice of begging
• Instill the value of education into the minds of the people

• 
  

Resources Available :

1. A canal, diverted from the river Ganges, having a moderate flow

2. A government primary school

3. A private Inter College (teaching students upto std. XII)

4. 3 tuition centres run by the pilgrimage centre holds classes for

students with a major focus on Urdu and Hindi only.

5. Any other resources you may be able to discover on the Internet

Population : 15,000, unvarying demography

Other Problems : Water, Electricity and Sanitation during tourist season

Occupation : Agricultural land minimal, seasonal occupations.

To visit the Ruraisle webpage click here.

For the original problem statement, click here.

Contact:

Sumeet Gupta
+919456320894
sumeet.sum1987@gmail.com

Gireesh Gera
+919997807676
gireeshgera@gmail.com

Medicinal Plant Distribution

NSS is conducting a distribution of plants with medicinal value, specially obtained from Pathanjali Yogpeeth, in Ravindra Bhawan next week. This is aimed mainly at the well being of the environment and the health of students. The details of the programme are as follows:

• Each plant costs only Rs. 30/-
  

• These plants have medicinal value: adding fresh oxygen in students' room, dandruff control and leaves with digestion control capability, to name a few.

• Many other types of ayurvedic plants will also be made available.

• NSS will also be delivering other plants needed, including flower bearing plants of various varieties.

The names of plants to be distributed are:

1. Flower bearing plants: Kehl , Baby Doll, Saplera, Bigonia
2. Medicinal Plants: Ashvgandha, Tulsi, Piabasa, Bramni, Khatmi, etc

The interested students are requested to send their names and names of plants needed to

K. Swagat

Room No : S-87, Ravindra Bhawan

swagatata@gmail.com

+91-9837335694

NIRMAN- Carving Future

The construction activity in IIT Roorkee campus is going on in a full fledged basis in order to accommodate more and more students to the "developing" IIT system so that the newly arrived students have greater comfort. The dark part of this construction activity in the construction work is the lifestyle and development of those who are sacrificing everything in order to add to our comfort. Their children once studied but their rapid migration have kept them away from joining schools.

NSS had taken its initiative to educate these children last year in front of the NCC canteen. This activity continued fairly well. These children were also taken to a movie that was being screened in IITR and to to Srishti, the annual exhibition of Hobbies Club.

This year we have resumed our activity of teaching the construction workers in co-ordination with Cognizance '09 under the name

Nirman - Carving future
for those who are carving our future with their own at stake

Feel free to join hands with NSS in order to teach these students. We have this programme running daily at the NCC Canteen Verandah from 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm.

Contact:
Praveen Sehrawat
(P.G. Student Representative)
+91-90276043604
amnithari@gmail.com

EDUSLUM- Mainstreaming the slum children to formal education

NSS IIT Roorkee has been working in the village Teliwala for the education of children and aiming at serving the larger cause of Rural Transformation. Teliwala is a small village near Roorkee Railway station. There is a slum adjoining the village. Most of the people in the slum are migrants from BASTI district in UP. They have migrated to this place 15 years back and go back to their native place for 3-4 months each year. Unfortunately, for the remaining 8-9 months almost all the residents in the slum earn their livelihoods from begging at civil lines and other places and that Includes children as well.

There are are around 80 children above 5 years of age who live there and are engaged in begging and other such activities. As a result they are deprived of education and other basic facilities. NSS is planning to work for the upliftment of these children by educating them. To serve this purpose we interacted with the parents of these children and they gave us very positiveve response.

NSS, IIT Roorkee in co-ordination with Cognizance 2009, the Annual Technical Festival of IIT Roorkee has started "EDUSLUM", an initiative to educate these slum children at the Teliwala Primary School(behind Roorkee Railway Station) from 4:30 pm to 6:00 pm daily. The duration of camp will be for one month.

Interested volunteers should contact:
Naga M. Reddy
+91-9719278700
nagamreddya.ar@gmail.com

A Republic Day of Social Service

On the occasion of Republic Day, NSS-IITR has organized yet another successful 

Voluntary Blood Donation Camp

The participants which included not only students from the campus but the professors of various departments ,showed their patriotic fervour and humanistic feelings. The camp was conducted by two blood banks namely The Govt. Blood Bank and The Himalayan Blood Bank of Dehradun.

The camp saw a total donor strength of 272 units of blood which is less than the number in the previous camp organized in September, but this can be called a successful one as it has attracted these many participants just after 4 months of gap from previous camp. Even though the cold weather was not helping for the cause, people immensely dedicated for the cause.This weekend being a bit longer one has been affected in participation as students tend to go to their home towns for a break.

The event was inaugurated by the Director of IIT Roorkee, Prof. S.C.Saxena. The event was also graced by the presence of N.K.Goel, Dean of Students Welfare and Prof Kansal, the Dean of Mess and professors from various departments. The Director and the Dean also saw the video “Not for ME, but for the NATION” made to enlighten the humanistic spirit in people. Please follow the link to watch the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B04ImtpgDA0

The other important event on this Republic Day was the Launch of Paper Bags in the IIT-R campus. This has been launched for making the IIT Roorkee 

“Polythene Free Campus”

These paper bags are set to replace all the polythene usage in the campus as they will be in use by the fruit vendors, canteens and other common places in the campus and bigger shops in Civil Lines. As a pilot, the refreshments to the blood donors were served in paper bags only.

Cloth Distribution to the Construction Workers

The last but not the least, on this auspicious day only NSS distributed clothes to the Construction Workers working in the campus.The clothes were collected in the clothes donation drive among students conducted earlier by NSS.