Organisational History

With a vision of enlightening healthy and democratic Bundelkhand free from hunger, poverty, environmental degradation and all forms of exploitation based on age, sex, religion and ethnicity, HARITIKA has been established in year 1994. Haritika was started as an organization to work with people in the backward Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh in India. We focus on pro-poor initiatives through enhancement of environmental and agri-based livelihood systems. We have worked for more than 24 years and been part of number of government sponsored development initiatives for Water Supply, Sanitation, Natural Resource Management and Poverty alleviation programs. With 25 full time staff having professional background such as agriculture, engineering and social sciences, Haritika is equipped to achieve the project goals.

Now along with Bundelkhand Region, we have started to expand our efforts to the other needy regions too. Building upon the years of efforts and depending upon the trajectory that each location is progressing on ecological, economic and social dimensions, the areas of strategic action are crafted to suit the niche specificity. Currently, we are specifically oriented towards:

Establishing reliable, safe and sustainable water supply for the community and to work for making project villages “Swachh Gram (Open Defecation Free) by emphasizing on hygiene education among women & children.
Livelihood improvement of poor, small & marginal farmers through capacity building on techniques of less water intensive agricultural based interventions and the establishment of their own business institution for continuous professional, backward & forward linkages support. (Productivity and livelihood improvement of poor, small and marginal farmers through agricultural interventions, water resource management & irrigation interventions and overall capacity building of farmers).
Ensuring Water Resource Management through creation of new infrastructure for water conservation, for increasing the groundwater recharge in the watershed area and increasing water use efficiency in agriculture and domestic sectors by ensuring the adoption of water management techniques and awareness creation among community by Community based Water Budgeting.

Promoting ecological balance in the local project area by promoting renewable energy like solar based electricity, smokeless chullha, solar based water supply, Bio-Gas etc. and by promoting organic farming.
Work towards upbringing significant improvement in the quality of life among the rural and tribal families that make up the local population through adoption of convergence and holistic development approach
Assuring the sustainability of HARITIKA’s initiatives done in villages by empowering the community with especial focus on marginalized section of society and ensuring their active role in village institutions like Village development committee (VDC), Village Water & Sanitation Committee (VWSC), Farmer Producer Company (FPC) etc.

Spread across diverse ecological and social geographies, Haritika works towards conservation of nature and natural resources through collective action of local communities. In Bundelkhand, Haritika has played a pioneering role in furthering the concept of Commons as an effective instrument of local governance, as economic assets for the poor and for the viability of adjoining farmlands. It has also highlighted that by strengthening the institutional dimension, the collective action spins off from effectively managing natural resources to other spheres of village life such as education, health and access to economic opportunities.