An essential ingredient of good compost is farmyard manure. Our staff and even the group of students with us for a gender training all helped to collect sacks of it from the Tapowan farm and carry it to the Nishtha farm for the newly set up compost bins. Thank you everyone for your hard work!

Nishtha tuition classes have started with children from the local government school happily sitting with our two student teachers to help them with their studies. This year Kaniksha is joined by Sapna who is interning with us from the Sajhe Sapne program held at Aaviskhar near Palampur. Sajhe Sapne is a social enterprise providing young women in villages with aspirational career pathways. Both Sapna and Kaniksha have received special training in how to make maths enjoyable for primary school children.

Dr Barbara visits the farm to encourage the farming team and take a look at Ravi’s new composting unit.

We are delighted by the very beautiful rangoils designs painted by the male members of our staff this year. May everyone have a truly peaceful and blessed year ahead. Happy Diwali!

A week spent cleaning painting and polishing leading up to the big day! Finally the rangoli to welcome the goddess into our homes is painted at the threshold of the buildings. Our staff are using only the traditional patterns and colouring materials.

Nishtha NGO was represented by Vijay at a dialogue held the Tibetan Centre for Conflict Resolution on creating peace and harmony. Such meetings of a broad range of local people in the local community are a very valuable way of helping the people of Dharamsala and McLeod Ganj come to understand and appreciate each other. It was agreed that joint activities, especially those aimed at protecting the environment and sharing workspaces such as in hotels and restaurants go a long way to creating the wonderful atmosphere we all cherish.

Our team are out again clearing garbage. How can it be that people cannot see how their dumped waste destroys the breathtaking beauty of our land?

The Rakkar ground was abuzz on Tuesday when the children put on a splendid performance of the Ramayana to celebrate Dusshera. Almost word perfect they gestured and declaimed with great confidence to the delight of the crowd. Our sponsorship students opened the show by performing a local song and a lovely variation of the Gaddhi dance developed during their classes with local musicians Vandhana and Rishi. Vijay Bhardwaj encouraged the crowd to remember to segregate their waste and together with Mohinder sang his now famous environment song accompanied by dolak and chimta. We are very grateful to the Rakkar Youth Club for hosting this event.

Up to seven children with disabilities are picked up from their homes each morning in the Nishtha van and taken to the special school and physiotherapy facility run by the Chinmaya Tapawan Trust.

Throwing garbage along the road is both inappropriate and highly disrespectful of society and the environment. Alone we cannot survive – we depend on both society and the environment in every aspect of our lives so why do we treat them with such distain?