Lok Astha Sewa Sansthan

Lok Astha Sewa Sansthan is a grassroots development organisation working with tribal communities, Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs), women, children and youth across Chhattisgarh. Its site gives its starting year as both 2006 and 2005. It describes its purpose as empowering tribal, PVTG and marginalized communities for dignity and sustainable development, working through nutrition, education, gender equality, community leadership, natural resource conservation and sustainable livelihoods. Much of its work reaches villages in remote forest areas where transport, health services, schooling and government welfare schemes are hard to access. Its approach is community-centered: it builds village-level institutions, supports women to take leadership roles, and helps families claim entitlements rather than delivering services alone. Several of its founding members and board members come from the tribal and PVTG communities it serves.

Headquarters: Gariyaband, Chhattisgarh, India

Major Areas of Work

• Gender Equality and Participation: Supporting women's active participation in social, economic and community decision-making.

• Indigenous Communities and Social Justice: Advancing social justice, community participation and sustainable development among indigenous and marginalized communities.

• Child Development and Nutrition: Improving child nutrition, health and early learning opportunities.

• Sustainable Livelihoods and Climate Resilience: Promoting organic farming, environmental conservation and community-led climate adaptation.

• Youth Empowerment and Education: Building education, life skills, leadership and civic participation among young people.

Major Initiatives and Programmes

• Sangwari Mahila Manch: A women's collective through which members take up land rights, wage rights, response to domestic violence, and campaigns such as anti-liquor action in their villages.

• Laika Ghar: A creche programme providing childcare for young children in project villages, staffed by its own field and MIS teams.

• Farming for Dignity and Food Security: Support to rural families with sustainable agriculture, kitchen gardens and allied livelihood options.

• PVTG family engagement: Sustained work with PVTG households, including the Bhunjia and Kamar communities, on entitlements, nutrition and community institutions.

• Child rights and protection: Awareness and rights work with children in tribal and rural areas, including collaboration with Childline 1098.

The women's collective work is the thread running through most of the rest. Women who begin as participants in kitchen garden or nutrition activities move into village leadership, then into Sangwari Mahila Manch, where they take up wage rights, land rights and support for survivors of violence. The organisation publishes individual accounts of this progression from its PVTG villages.

Impact

Lok Astha Sewa Sansthan reports reach across villages, community members, women in collectives, children and PVTG families in Chhattisgarh, though the counters on its site do not currently display figures. It maintains partnerships with UNICEF, CRY (Child Rights and You), Childline 1098, DASRA, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, Azim Premji Philanthropic Initiatives, the Dalit Foundation, the Jiv Daya Foundation and The Womanity Foundation. It holds GuideStar India Platinum certification (FY 2022-23, GSN 14221) after Bronze in FY 2021-22, and Credibility Alliance accreditation under Minimum Norms (CA/28/2015). It states it received the Spirit of Humanity National Award from Americares in 2018 for contribution to women's empowerment, selected from more than 400 participating organisations, and a certificate of appreciation from IGSSS for reaching the unreached. Annual reports, FC and local audit reports, management reports and statutory annual returns are published on its site.

Leadership

• Lata Netam, Secretary and Chief Functionary
• Hem Narayan Manikpuri, President
• Vandana Patil, Vice President
• Keshar Singh Bhunjia, Treasurer

Working here means field-level development work in remote tribal and forest areas of Chhattisgarh, close to the communities themselves rather than at a distance from them. The organisation runs programmes across nutrition, childcare, livelihoods, child rights and women's collectives, so roles carry exposure to several thematic areas at once, along with the reporting and compliance discipline that comes with funders such as UNICEF, CRY and the Paul Hamlyn Foundation. It suits people who want direct community engagement in a hard-to-reach geography, who are comfortable working in Hindi and local languages, and who want to see leadership emerge from the communities they work with rather than be brought in from outside.