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Department of Science & Technology http://www.dst.gov.in Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay http://www.idc.iitb.ac.in
Occupational health hazards: women rag pickers Conversion of text based information on occupational health hazards to visual narratives
Occupational health hazards: women rag pickers Project by Lavina Vernekar & Sneha Karandikar Project co- coordinator: Prof. Shruti Nigudkar BVP College of Fine Arts, Pune Project guided by Prof. G.G. Ray & Prof. Mandar Rane, ndustrial Design Centre, IIT Bombay External examiners: Dr. Shashi Ahuja & Dr. S. K. Dave, Department of Science & Technology, Government of India
Occupational Health Hazards: Women rag pickers | www.idcdstprojects.com
Approval Sheet:
Project entitled “Occupational Health Hazards of Rag Pickers” for IIT Bombay by Lavina Vernekar and Sneha Karandikar is approved, in fulfilment of the requirements for Project on Occupational Health Hazards in Industrial Design Centre, IIT Bombay
Project guided by:
Prof. Head G.G Ray
Prof. Mandar Rane
External Examiners: Prof. Shruti Nigudkar
Dr. Shashi Ahuja
Dr.S.K Dave
Declaration:
We declare that this report represents our ideas in our own words and wherever others ideas or words have been included; we have adequately cited and referenced the original sources. We also declare that we have adhered to all the principals of academic honesty and integrity and have not misinterpreted or fabricated or falsified any idea/data/fact/source in our report. We understand that any violation of the above will be a cause for disciplinary action by DST and IDC can also evoke penal action from the sources which have thus not been properly cited or from whom proper permission has not been taken when needed.
Name of the Students: Lavina Vernekar & Sneha Karadikar
Acknowledgement:
We wish to acknowledge our gratitude to our Guide Prof. G.G. Ray, Head- IDC, Bombay, and Prof. Mandar Rane. Prof. Shruti Nigudkar - Project Coordinator who has always been there to support our ideas and not letting us give up hope during the complete journey of our project. They have been wonderful mentors, with their expertise in this field and we have learnt a lot form them in terms of perfection and precise communication. Feedback at review sessions from Dr.Shashi Ahuja and Dr. S.K. Dave has been helpful. We thank ‘Swach ‘, ‘KKPKP’ and Pune Municipal Corporation for giving us the required information and guidance regarding the rag pickers. We will also like to thank Staff members and Principal of Bharati Vidyapeeth’s College of Fine Arts for their support and encouragement and our gratitude to our entire batch mates for being a constant support in reviewing our project works and giving valuable inputs.
Occupational Health Hazards: Women rag pickers | www.idcdstprojects.com
06 Introduction 07 Brief - Overview of the Project 08 Data Collection 09 User Studies 10 Findings and Insights 11 Choice of Visual Medium 12 Conclusion
Occupational Health Hazards: Women rag pickers | www.idcdstprojects.com
Working conditions of rag pickers:
Occupational Health Hazards: Women rag pickers | www.idcdstprojects.com
Introduction: Rag pickers have recently become a part of the growing population of urban poor. The rag pickers currently refer to people who collect rags or recyclable materials that can be sold for money. Rag picking entails the sorting, collection and selling of these various waste materials. Hence, we would like to introduce our project with explaining the term occupational health hazards in detail and also other elements as follows. Occupational hazard refers to a risk or danger as a consequence of the nature of working conditions of a particular job. Every occupation is associated with certain risks because of which the person can get: 1.Certain diseases 2. Injuries This can happen suddenly or may take years. In simple words “Occupational Hazards� mean damage to health or injuries at work place. We also came to know that nine of the ten Rag Pickers are women. We as students have being working on this project since a long time and have
discovered many relevant issues. These are later discussed in detail and we have tried to bring out some solutions through audio visual medium. This research has given us ample of information regarding their lifestyle and health hazards of the rag pickers. Hence, we look forward and hope the best for improvisation of their condition in future.
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Brief – Overview of the Project: Rag picking is the lowest economic rescue net to the poorest of the poor who is full of shirks. Urban poor and the existence of the informal job activities in the urban city are inevitable phenomena. Among various informal activities seen in the urban centre is of Rag Picking as one of the most neglected sector. A considerable amount of urban poor are involved in these activities and for them it is the major job activitiesfor their livelihood. Hence, we have researched in Pune city wherein the lifestyle and health hazards of the rag pickers are mentioned very
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well in detail. Since the increase in the pace of urbanization, Pune has also observed the growth of various informal sectors. It has been observed that there has been increasing growth of pressure of social, economic and environmental conditions of the people living in the city. This study intended to provide details on the nature, processes, and problems of rag picking as an occupation, including the perceptions and behaviour towards education, work and social life. We visited the NGOs in their vicinity and identified their problems.
A small presentation was held at IDC for the same and then with approval of the committee (IDC Faculty + DST (Department of Science and Technology) on any of the related topic of occupational hazards wherein their main focus was on women. The study or research done for this project is totally in relation to occupational hazards of the rag pickers.
Data Collection: The efforts taken for a perfect survey of Rag Pickers in Pune (Bibwewadi-Katraj). The survey went through many processes which are mentioned as follows in detail: • Exploration: A quick survey of the political sites of Pune was done to identify the major rag collection centre. Tentative number of rag pickers in each area is estimated through focus group discussions. Visiting the NGO’s, Area Offices, PMC, etc. • Questionnaire Design Survey questionnaire was prepared by
us depending upon the sites condition, focussed group discussion with the people and also sometimes interaction with the rag pickers on their issues • Tools of information Interviews with municipal staff, scrap dealers, organizations, and scrap collectors etc , Group Discussions with municipal staff, rag pickers, PMC workers , Questionnaire for rag pickers, municipal workers, staff, doctors, Ngo’s etc, Live Surveys – at work place and out of work place too.
• Activities done Internet survey, interacting with rag pickers at sites, scripting, screenplay, story boards, demo shoot, and final shoot after gathering all the information. The above mention is all the data collection done by us for the purpose of the project.
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User Studies: Setting our objective of the study for this project has been mentioned bellow: • To identify General Characteristics of rag pickers. • To examine the working condition and perceptions towards education, work and social life. • To account their financial status and their skills. • To study their access to basic services
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such as water, sanitation, and health services. • To explore socio-economic issues of rag pickers. • Communicating information/ scientific data to low literate audience or in the language they would understand better and test the comprehension of visual narrative. • The study is limited to the selected in
Pune (Bibwewadi-Katraj). The study is based on primary survey data as well as secondary research data. • The survey has been focused with the people working professionally as Rag pickers.
Findings and Insights: The study’s findings will serve to assist future action programs as well as to provide much needed background information. Either the Government or non – government organizations should devise a suitable proposal to monitor and make use of these unorganised rag pickers who are indispensible for the society.
Problems which can be solved by this project were: • Creating awareness. • Resolve misconceptions. • Informing People. • Developing appropriate mass communication media for creating awareness on Occupational Health to the Illiterate women workforce. • Clarifies misconceptions. • Gives authentic information and proposes solutions. • Creating protocols of work for the chosen occupation. • Communicating about tools already available. • Conducting seminars to educate and inculcate right habits. • Giving a clear view about the hazards and making aware in advance. • Conducting lectures and having interactions with rag pickers in various areas. • Displaying the video in all the related areas of rag picking and inducing behavioural change for better health in future.
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Choice of Visual Medium: The overview of the project is mentioned earlier.The aim here is to create awareness of the occupational health hazards experienced by the women rag pickers is brought to focus. According to the above survey we found out that as most of the women working as rag pickers are almost illiterate or of very basic education. Hence our aim of creating awareness would remain unsuccessful for them if we would take any of the print media as our medium of communication. Hence, looking at their educational status, we as students thought to choose audio-visual
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medium of communication for them. Hence, the medium we have chosen to communicate with the rag pickers after having into consideration of their literacy rate. We have come to the conclusion of making a Documentary on the Occupational Health Hazards of rag pickers. For their better understanding about the language, we will be conducting this documentary in their own mother tongue i.e. Marathi.
Conclusion: We are thankful to all the municipal staff, scrap dealers, rag pickers, other garbage workers for supporting us to go ahead in this field of work. We have concluded this report giving some solutions and recommendations to the various issues faced by rag pickers. Hence, after viewing this video, we as students are hoping to see a positive response from the organizations, municipal staff and also the rag pickers, to look into this matter in future for the betterment of the rag pickers.
Department of Science & Technology http://www.dst.gov.in Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay http://www.idc.iitb.ac.in
www.idcdstprojects.com/ragpickers
IDC + DST projects
Abundant information exists on occupational health hazards in form of research and medical publications. But it rarely translates into holistic conceptual understanding of health hazards on part of general public, given varying literacy levels and lack of exposure. A major roadblock in the dissemination process is the complex and textual nature of such information. IDC + DST projects on occupational helath hazards aim at tackling these problems by converting the text based information into visual narratives such as films, presentations, posters that will communicate the information, to general public, especially women in a language they understand.