Dr. B.K. Sinha - CENCORED

When was your NGO conceptualised and what exactly is the motive of CENCORED ?
CENCORED came into existence in the year 1989. CENCORED is a state level support organisation, providing training support to field level voluntary organizations. Perceiving the need of the organisations within the state, the need for strategic planning and technical services to the VAs with reference to the issues that are relevant for the area became the focus.

CENCORED aims to promote and strengthen people centered development with focus on mainstreaming women and children and the deprived section of society through grass root partners. It builds their capacity and provides services and support to work at Community level in an impact generating manner.

What are your views on NGO governance ?
It should be participatory, democratic and transparent. Decentralization of power and resources where decisions and actions taken are participatory.

CENCORED portrays itself as a premier training institute.
Pls elaborate about your activities and agendas, till date.
And what approximately is your training completion schedule ?
CENCORED is the only premier training institute in the state having its Annual Training Calendar. On the basis of need assessment of NGOs a training calendar is developed.

Capacity building of VAs through regular training of staff members is undertaken, who in turn transfer it at the grass root level.

CENCORED is primarily engaged and intends to impart training on the following broad heads:

a. Capacity Building
b. Local self Governance
c. Participatory communication
d. Women and child centered Education

Do you lay any special emphasis on specific segment of training group and how do you identify and evaluate your programs ?
In context of CENCORED, Organization Development exercise is undertaken for orientation of its staff members. In the light of the perspective plan developed a complete analysis of the requirement is made.

Regarding the training need and capacity building of NGOs, Organisation Development Exercise, TOTs and other training's are undertaken. The entire process involves rigorous selection of trainees, getting necessary feedback, impact assessment and practical applicability of the skills and enhancement in their knowledge base.

What is your revenue model ?
Is it based on external funding or self generating ?
Please explain and give details of foreign donors involved, if any, in your projects ?
CENCORED primarily depends on external funding. However, internal funds are generated through various training programme's of VAs. We do have the infrastructure facilities with two well equipped training centres at Dharahra in Vaishali and Bochhan in Muzaffarpur district. The facilities available at the training center are:

• Training Hall
• Dining Room
• Reading Room
• Dormitories to accommodate 40 persons
• Separate rooms for Resource persons

We also have a number of publications on PRI, education material etc. for VAs which is also a source of internal fund generation.

You have also laid lot of stress on Panchayati Raj related agenda.
Explain your modus operandi and the reason for emphasis on this segment.
In that context, elaborate on the "innovations" that you have devised.
The beginning of CENCORED'S intervention in PRI dates back to 73rd amendment in 1992. Series of workshops were held at National level, where CENCORED representative also participated. Back to Bihar, wide ranging discussions were held with the CENCORED team. These discussions resulted into a commitment to work on issues related to PRIs. Bihar Panchayati Raj Act was passed in 1993, this was a clear indication that in future all the people centered development activities will center around PRI. CENCORED primarily working as support organization for VAs of Bihar, it was necessary for CENCORED to orient and prepare its self to meet the future challenges. In order to respond to the needs of the community and to move ahead towards its goal of people centered development with focus on women, children and deprived section of society through grass root partners it provided support services to enable them to work at community level in an impact generating manner.

With this vision in mind, considering the need of all grass root level VAs, CENCORED endeavored to work with PRIA on PRI in Bihar. Plans were developed and strategies formulated, programs were implemented in the field along with host of VAs. But the delay in the Panchayati Raj Election in Bihar was a major set back for CENCORED and its partner organizations. This led to poor people's participation in PRI activities.

CENCORED took the lead to organise and co-ordinate the VAs of Bihar and demonstrate against the delay in Panchayati Raj elections. It took up advocacy work on a massive scale to press for early elections. After much effort elections were announced in the year 2001.

Innovations devised
Working directly with the community on the PRI issues, certain novel concepts got conceptualized while working and learning on PRI. To surmount the host of problems and difficulties suffered during the implementation of programs.

CENCORED's endeavor since 1994 in the area of Panchayati Raj were its innovations.

These innovations are:
i) The Information Center
ii) The Kishori Panchayat
iii) The Paramshakti Programme.

Initially, these innovations were merely perceptions that subsequently got crystallized into concepts through a series of interactions. As such, these concepts have a development history of their own and are inter-linked.

1) The Information Centre
It is a people-centered set-up at the District/Block/Panchayat level to promote and strengthen good governance and support development. It is a set-up to articulate the people's needs at the governance level and to familiarize people with the developmental opportunities and programs conceived at the governance level. It is a center of information dissemination as well as the seat of multi-stakeholder convergence. It is also a source of support activities for the empowerment of people as citizens and as persons.

2) The Kishori (Adolescent Girls) Panchayat (the incubation of future women leadership
The information Center as an intervention provided forward linkages to the community. The Kishori Panchayat as an intervention provides "The backward linkages"- backward in the sense of age-group, in the sense of deprived section, gender discrimination, income group-so that, in the years to come, when these adolescent girls would blossom into womanhood, they be the active and responsible women of the society.

The Kishori Panchayat now is an integral part of CENCORED'S women empowerment related interventions.

3) The Paramshakti Programme
The term "Paramshakti is the shortened form of Panchayat Raj Mahila (women) Swa-Sashaktikaran (empowerment) Karyakaram (programme). It is a program package which has been exclusively designed to promote leadership among women at the community level. After the Panchayat elections the program has been suitably repackaged for developing leadership among the elected women representatives.

What is your core project area and the facilities that you provide ?
Our core project area where CENCORED is involved directly in intensive implementation of PRI program with PRIA support are:

i) Two Blocks of Muzaffarpur District

a) Bochahan
b) Gaighat

ii) Two Blocks of Khagaria District
iii) Madhbani where PRIA is in direct implementation of the program. We do have a team of well trained human resource at the center and full equipped training center with residential facilities.

Have you interacted or worked with foreign agencies ?
If yes, what was your criterion for the support partnership and give details of the agencies worked with ?
CENCORED is primarily engaged in strengthening the Panchayats through orientation of the elected representatives specifically women and those belonging to the deprived sections. At the Gram Sabha level the empowerment of community has been the main focus of activities. It provides Trainings and Learning material support to strengthen the Panchayati Raj.

Details of agencies worked with

• (Local Self Governance) supported by PRIA.
• Co-operation & assistance in training and other intervention program in Urban Governance supported by PRIA.
• Radio Broadcasting to strengthen the hygiene and sanitation with support of UNICEF.
• Training on Reproductive Health to newly married couple- supported by- Pathfinder International.
• Research and Study of Kishori and women and formation Adolescents groups in target area- supported by ICRW.
• Swa-shakti project to from women SHG and linkage with Bank for the economic upliftment of marginalised group- BSEDC

What exactly is the role of publications that you print and do you levy any charges for their sale/distribution ?
Is it a sort of an information dissemination about your activities or is it related to social issues in general ?
We do levy minimum charges for the sale and distribution of our publications on

• Panchayati Raj
• Reproductive Child Health
• Education

No doubt, it is a well devised mode for information dissemination on the above issues. Demand got generated from the grass root level organizations to extend support in the form of research, innovations, documentation and its publication. There is scarcity of such publications which becomes a handbook and source of knowledge dissemination for VAs.

In a way, deviated from your core agenda of training for capacity building, local self governance, women empowerment, participatory communications by venturing into awareness creation among voters during elections.(Pre Election Voters Awareness Campaign). what prompted or motivated you to this mammoth but nonetheless
noble task ?
Please explain.
As cited in interview- questions- CENCORED venturing into awareness creation among voters during elections (PEVAC) was in no way deviation from our core agenda. Rather CENCORED involvement with many VAs in PEVAC provided direction and strength to its core agenda of local self governance.

CENCORED along with partner VAs intervened in the electoral process. It decided to carry out an impact assessment of the campaign, which led to many insights into the campaign and help decide on the kind of intervention necessary in future.

The sole future of PRI in Bihar rested on PEVAC. It was a pre-requisite for good governance at the grass-root level.

What are your future ventures or projections and do you intend to take up other agendas besides training ?
Keeping in view our gradual diversifications in interventions and approaches, we are intended to sharpen our focus on activities related to:

• Policy advocacy on issues related to Governance and Development.
• Networking of CSOs and strengthening Civil Society building in the state.
• Reproductive Health as an issue to be addressed through capacity building approach for the different stakeholders.
• PRIs and Urban Governance related activities will be taken up for the knowledge building of citizens, elected representatives and other stakeholders through interventions like Research and Documentation and awareness generation campaigns.