Spreading light in the lives of hundreds of disadvantaged children, women, and youth, Nyasa and NEEV, the two social outreach programmes of the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar (IITGN) recently conducted some of the most wonderful and useful summer activities to help them find their hidden potential.

In the first week of June, Nyasa, an informal school run by students and community volunteers of IITGN to provide educational and overall development opportunities to the children of migrant construction workers in and around the campus, successfully concluded a 10-day summer camp for more than 100 children from neighbouring villages and construction workers’ colonies of IITGN. The Summer Camp, which was held from May 25 to June 03, 2023, was aimed at helping these kids explore their hobbies and hidden talents.

The camp featured a plethora of exciting activities on a variety of themes and learning modules to inspire and motivate the kids while having fun. The activities included sessions on arts and crafts, origami, dream catcher making, soft toy making, basics of computer skills, introduction to archaeology, science experiments, pottery, music and dance, artistic yoga, fun games, and sports. This year’s Nyasa Summer Camp also featured an ‘Anand Mela’ to introduce children to the idea of entrepreneurship in a fun way, where two groups with children in 13-16 years of age groups competed with each other to make and sell snacks like Sandwich, Fruit Chaat, Panipuri, Papdi Chaat, Bhel etc. with the raw material provided to them. The other group and visitors were provided with food currency coupons. The group which earned the maximum profit was declared the winner. About 35 mentors, including students, faculty, and community members of IITGN, conducted various sessions with the help of about 50 student volunteers from the Institute.

Sharing the idea behind organising this activity, Vishal Ghoniya, a BTech student at IITGN and one of the student volunteers from the Nyasa Team, said, “The Nyasa summer camp is designed to offer students a wide range of engaging hands-on activities in art, culture, critical thinking, and scientific applications. Utilising the facilities at IIT Gandhinagar, the camp aimed to create memorable learning experiences connecting to the students’ studies and leaving a lasting impact.”

Sharing his experience, Taj, a 13-year boy from IITGN construction workers’ colonies, said, “I enjoyed these ten days a lot. We learned computer skills as well as played a lot of games and learnt to make different things like soft toys, whistles, and so on. I enjoyed the archaeology and art sessions the most. I will remember it for a long time.” Expressing her joy, Bhumika Bihola, a 13-year girl from Palaj village near IITGN, said, “I enjoyed the summer camp a lot. I had several new experiences, including origami, soft toy making, yoga, dance, archaeology, etc. Also, I enjoyed the library and computer class. My friends and I actively participated in the camp.”

NEEV, another community outreach program of IITGN, in association with Desai Foundation Trust, once again successfully organised six Skill Development Summer Courses from April to June 2023, for youth and women hailing from rural areas in and around Gandhinagar. A total of 257 participants were trained by NEEV through these courses, including 21 participants in the Stitching course, 32 participants in the Beautician course, 81 participants in two batches of the Basic Computer course, 40 participants in the Spoken-English course, 66 participants in the Vocational Skills - Computer Hardware Course, and 17 participants in the Vocational Skills - CNC Machinist course.

A valedictory event of NEEV’s summer skills courses 2023 was held on June 09, 2023, in the presence of Mrs Rajni Moona from IITGN and Ms Mittal Gohil from the Desai Foundation Trust, where all the participants received certificates of their training. One of the most encouraging things observed in this year’s cohort is the fact that almost 38 per cent of the participants in the Vocational Skills - Computer Hardware Course were girls, a course mostly preferred by boys.

Encouraging the participants with a message in Gujarati, Mrs Rajni Moona said, “This is an excellent set of training put together by NEEV and its team of trainers. I can see the confidence on all participants’ faces. As you graduate with your training certificates from here, I urge you to put your knowledge to further use so that you don’t forget these skills and can build on them with experience.”

Ms Mittal Gohil from the Desai Foundation Trust congratulated all the participants of the courses and said, “I am happy to see how the number of participants in our courses is growing year after year. I am also particularly delighted to see so many females participating actively in these training courses, including the Computer Hardware Course, and we all should accept and encourage this kind of women empowerment. NEEV-IITGN is our biggest partner in making a difference in people’s lives, and we are proud to have associated with them since 2016.”

NEEV Coordinator Soumya Harish said, “Skill development is the need of the hour. Through these projects, NEEV provides women and youth from underserved communities the necessary skills to help in their education, career, and livelihood. At IIT Gandhinagar, we believe in sustainable and all-inclusive growth through such community outreach programs. NEEV has been regularly organising these courses for several years now with support from like-minded partners like the Desai Foundation Trust.”

Some of the participants from these skill-based courses have already started earning after receiving training. Kajal Sendhaji Thakor from Basan village, a participant in the 10-week Stitching Course, has already earned Rs 8000/- and Monal Chetankumar Prajapati, a participant of the 10-week Beautician Course from Chiloda village, has earned Rs 10,000/- from the recent make-up and mehendi orders.

Radha, a participant of the Vocational Skills - Computer Hardware Course from Gandhinagar, said, “We are very grateful to NEEV-IITGN and Desai Foundation who support students and youngsters like us in learning such vocational courses free of cost. During the course practicals here, I learnt many things like how to assemble and disassemble a computer, join two wires and identify SMPS (Switched Mode Power Supply), transfer network from one PC to another, and so on.”

Since its inception in 2014, NEEV has conducted more than 100 entrepreneurship and skill development projects and activities for 3000+ youth and adults from Ahmedabad/Gandhinagar region, including 15+ villages near IIT Gandhinagar.