India has a strong legacy of civic action which traces its history to the freedom struggle of the country. Over the years, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) in India, working across several sectoral and geographical areas, have provided some of the best models for development, which were mainstreamed by the government e.g. Self-Help Groups and micro finance, Participatory Guarantee System, ecological agriculture, PRA/Participatory Learning and Action tools, Joint Forest Management, to name a few.

Welthungerhilfe has been working in partnership with local CSOs in India since more than 53 years. We work with a mixed portfolio of strong stakeholders- grassroots organizations, national level CSOs, resource/ strategic organizations, networks, campaigns, interest groups, farmers organizations and consumer platforms. We work in a consortium approach, where each project, coordinated by Welthungerhilfe has several partners complementing each other, exchanging knowledge and resources, joining hands for policy advocacy and joint publications.

Supported by the European Union, we work towards building grassroots civil society cadres for effectiveness and transparency in rural India. Our efforts have empowered hundreds of individuals in ensuring their rights and entitlements over water and land resources. These initiatives span across some of the most backward districts of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand since 2016. The efforts have created a widespread network of civil society bodies, grassroots NGOs, farmers, academicians and youth groups, women and policymakers.

All our initiatives have a strong component of building capacities of civil society on thematic areas, internal governance, financial systems, accountability, transparency and building networks. With support from the European Union, Welthungerhilfe works closely with a network of CSOs spread across India to build their capacities, and to diversify their resource base through a combination of methods, without compromising on their core value system. The objective is to strengthen and empower the civil society networks. We are supporting these CSOs on organizational development front, strengthening NGOs’ earned income models, leadership building of grassroots cadres, fundraising and communication skills, and is initiating a crowdfunding platform called – ShareOn.in.

In the state of Jharkhand, the European Union supported in working with the local communities to strengthen and improve access to government services. The tools and processes developed were also endorsed and scaled up by government bodies. Some of tool largely used across the projects include Participatory Learning and Action (PLA), Mobile for Mother pilot, social audits, accessing the government rural employment programme MGNREGA and participatory planning.