Despite the Rajasthan government raking up a massive COVID awareness campaign across the cities and villages of Rajasthan there seems to be a vaccum with a a certain category of people who are not in sync with the happenings of the pandemic.

Mushkil Daur Hai... Sambhal Jao Na

This vaccum was observed by a student, Satyendra Singh Rajpurohit, who studies Journalism and hails from a small village called Tinwari in Jodhpur district of Rajasthan. Satyendra, while interacting with MNREGA workers, realised that there was no awareness and the campaign was not reaching them. The reason behind this was that this lot had no access to internet or television, since both media and social media were the carriers of this awareness campaign.  Satyendra says that social work is his interest and he could spend a lifetime doing it.

He took the task upon himself, and in the process, has educated nearly 1,500 MNREGA workers in this short duration of 10 days. Satyendra created a movie titled "Mushkil Daur Hai Sambhal Jao Na" through which he educated these MNREGA workers, mainly tribal women. His movie outlined the awareness on COVID and precautionary measures such as social distancing, keeping away from crowds and crowded areas, sanitization, etc.

He spread this awareness message by visiting MNREGA work places across various parts of the district and interacted with the workers, primarily women.  In the process his dialog with these workers facilitated one to one learning. The movie, in vernacular language, made things more transparent and clear.  He also printed and distributed pamphlets across the workers and door to door in the remote villages.

Appreciation of efforts

His efforts were appreciated at the local level and many local representatives and administrative officials shared his movie and his efforts on their social media handles, motivating others to take up similar campaigns. Pali MP PP Chaudhary, Ravindra Singh Bhati, President of Jai Narayan Vyas University, Bhaira Ram, former MLA from Osian and Parliamentary Secretary appreciated Satyendra's efforts and he was awarded at the Independance Day function on behalf of Sub Divisional Officer, Ratan Lal for setting an excellent paradigm.