Snippets from Nagapattinam

The villages in Tamil Nadu hit by the Tsunami are by no means poor. And therefore you can see lot of relief material being wasted .. heaps of clothes, loafs of bread, packets of water ..you name it! There is enough rather more than enough relief reaching affected people only they don't want what is being provided. The only voice that echos here is "return our boats and our houses, we'll feed ourselves!"
It is estimated that in Nagapattinam alone the loss in prawn culture is about 10 crores. At certain places one can see boats on the road - alomst a kilometer from the shore!

Kumaravein, a small time fisherman says he earns Rs 5000 per month on an average. He sells Vanjaram, a fish that costs Rs. 250 a kg (a kg holds 2-3 fishes) and his boat costs about 2 lacs. He has no faith that the government will help them get back.

But spending time at the Collectorate you can see how much effort the Govt and NGOs are putting. There is no place that has short supply of anything - including human resources like doctors or relief workers.

I wonder how much of a difference our project will make .. maybe isn't even a scratch on the surface but it's still a begining a way to make people aware how technology could be used for their advantage. There has been much learning but I guess the message that a system could be built to help displaced people in any situation - even in a disaster and crisis.