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ublic health and literacy, especially education of girl children, will be the priority areas for RAC Ekamra Kalinga, RID 3262, in the coming years. “But most of the Rotaract clubs depend on their parent Rotary clubs for execution of projects for want of resource material and funds. This should change so that our community activities and outreach are expanded in the near future,” says Dr Soubhagya Muduli, district secretary and club trainer. A number of health camps are being conducted through the year benefiting a large number of tribals, women and children. Rotaractors from Ekamra Kalinga, along with five other Rotaract clubs from Bhubaneswar, conducted an oral hygiene camp for transgenders at a community hall in Bharatpur, a slum colony on the outskirts. “We screened 110 transgenders and advised them on oral hygiene,” says Muduli. Project chair Liza Swain, zonal Rotaract representative, took care of logistics and coordinated with Dr Satyabrata Kar and Dr Sipra Dash who screened the transgenders. Started in 2012 as a community-based group, the club has 31 members drawn from various professions including PhD students. Rotaractors took up a mega tree plantation drive at An oral hygiene camp for transgenders at Bharatpur.
44 ROTARACT NEWS OCTOBER 2021
Odisha Rotaractors reach out to tribals V Muthukumaran
government schools in and around Bhubaneswar. “We planted fruit-bearing trees and most of us camped at Uttara, a suburb, to plant saplings at a school,” says the club trainer. A veterinary surgeon who is into research too, Muduli and his team will be doing an e-learning project, as part of TEACH, at Chandaka village. “We will be donating smartphones to 14 students in the first phase for them to attend online classes and it will be expanded to reach out to more rural children at the upper primary school there,” he explains.