Sanjoy Ghose

Born in Nagpur, Ghose spent his formative years and his adolescence in Mumbai, Maharashtra. He belonged to a well known Bengali family.[3] Bhaskar Ghose, erstwhile Director General of Doordarshan, the Indian public television network, is his uncle. His aunts are Ruma Pal a former Supreme Court judge, Arundhati Ghose, former diplomat and India's permanent representative to the United Nations during the 1990s,[4] and the journalist Usha Rai.[5] His mother, Vijaya Ghose, is the editor of the Limca Book of records[6]

He was educated at the Cathedral and John Connon School.[7] He was the president of Rotary International sponsored Interact club (for young people aged 12 to 18) at his school. His experiences of social work, as a school boy, through the Interact club, changed his life priorities, and set the course for his life.[8] His father recalls, "As a school going boy he spent two nights in a Bombay (presently Mumbai) slum in torrential rain just to get a feel of the real problems that plague slums."[9] After school, he was educated at a liberal arts college, Elphinstone College located in Mumbai. Apart from graduating in rural development and law with college and university honours, he also edited the college magazine, ran the English literature club, and won University of Mumbai competitions for quizzing and debating. He was also active in the National Service Scheme – taking his fellow students to remote tribal villages in the hilly tracts abutting the Western Ghats in Thane district- to experience first hand the poverty and exploitation of the tribal communities.[10][11]

In 1980, he chose to join the then unknown Institute of Rural Management, Anand (IRMA) in its very first batch. He had confirmed admissions to all the three then existing IIMs, (Indian Institute of Management) – Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Calcutta. Joining the prestigious IIM opened the way to very well paying corporate careers. He chose the then unknown IRMA over the known IIMs, in keeping with his personal commitment to work for the poorest of the poor.[12]

Dr. Srikanth Sambrani, the first director of IRMA, remembered the selection interview, in an Indian Express article, dated 12 August 1997, thus – "I first met him in 1980, when conducting admissions interviews for the Institute of Rural Management at Anand. We were highly impressed by his paper qualifications. He walked into our small room, all 5 ft 5 in of him held like the fearless bantam he undoubtedly was. But since he had applied to IIM Ahmedabad also, we thought we would lose him. We spent an hour discussing the relative merits of IIMA and IRMA. When he turned down IIMA, it was a coup for us."[13]

After his post graduation with very good grades from IRMA, in 1982, he chose to work in a small rural development trust, Tribhuvandas Foundation, in Anand, Kheda district, over much more visible and better paying jobs with Government sponsored milk cooperative federations. In Tribhuvandas Foundation, he catalysed its growth from a small family run trust, to working in hundred odd villages, hiring professional rural medical doctors, and extension staff.

After two years with Tribhuvandas foundation, he won the INLAKs foundation scholarship for a MSc degree in economics from St Anne's College, Oxford in 1984.[14] After Oxford, he decided to return to rural India. He set up the URMUL Rural Health and Development Trust — in the desert district of Bikaner in Rajasthan.(1986). While working with URMUL, he won the Hubert Humphrey fellowship — and spent a year with the prestigious Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in the year 1988–89. Working with the sick of the poorest of the poor, told on his personal health. He contracted tuberculosis, while collecting sputum for testing, from potential TB patients. After establishing URMUL Rural Health and Development Trust as a mainstream NGO in Rajasthan, he handed over the organisation to a successor, and shifted to Delhi. This was an unprecedented decision for Indian voluntary agencies — as the founders usually hang on to their leadership position till they die.

Sanjoy Ghose wrote extensively about his grassroot experiences with the URMUL Trust in Lunkaransar Village in Bikaner.[15] The Indian Express, a leading national daily, used his writings to launch a successful monthly column named 'Village Voice'. The "action experiment" of tapping the power of the mainstream middle class urban English media to reflect unheard rural voices spoken in local languages, grounded in very local realities, got a measure of success.

Recognizing the potential of writing in mainstream media to highlight rural development issues and catalyse change, Sanjoy conceived of CHARKHA. CHARKHA appears to have been initiated to exploit the legitimate opportunities available in the national media for influencing policies related to rural development. It also addressed the concern that such a massive task, required more support than his single voice. His discussions with senior media persons from the national dailies seemed to suggest that an organisation dedicated to development communication could work. CHARKHA in a sense was an attempt to "institutionalize" the success of the "Village voice" experience — and broaden the scope to bring in more writing talent and different geographies. On 24 October 1994, CHARKHA was formally initiated in New Delhi- with the goal of spinning action into words.Its formal vision is "To contribute towards building a harmonious, inclusive society empowered by knowledge."[16]

Sanjoy appeared to have been a firm believer in the philosophy of Reflective practice. He wrote and published extensively, analytic pieces on rural development- which would have incorporated insights from his own personal experiences as a catalyst for rural change .[17] The World Bank had also published one such paper.[18]

After launching CHARKHA, he decided to work in the insurgent prone Upper Assam, specifically in Majuli island on the Brahmaputra. His father recollected the family discussions around this decision. "When we were dissuading Sanjoy from going to the terrorism-ridden Assam", he replied, "then whose son will you send?"[19]

Sanjoy Ghose with his team of social workers in Majuli island.

Through the sponsorship of Association of Voluntary Agencies for Rurul Development, North East (AVARD-NE) Sanjoy and seven colleagues set up base in Majuli island on the Brahmaputra river in April 1996. The island faced annual flooding and erosion of land. The island had shrunk by around 500 square kilometres in the last twenty years. Around February 1997, he and his team mobilised around 30,000 human days of voluntary labour (shram dhan). An experimental stretch of 1.7 kilometres of land was protected from erosion, by building embankments: using only local resources and their knowledge. The following year this protected stretch of the island survived the floods.[20] Sanjoy, in this short time, had also diversified the social activities in Majuli: around health (Malaria prevention), livelihoods (design, and manufacturing of bamboo and woven products), and education (village libraries).

It appears that by doing so, Sanjoy and his group had displeased a powerful local Government works contractor lobby: which also provided patronage to the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA). When posters were put up by presumably this contractor lobby, which would have lost its annual lucrative contracts for "flood protection": many locals participated in a public meeting on 1 June 1997, to express solidarity with the constructive work done. The local police offered Sanjoy protection, in view of the public threats issued by ULFA. Sanjoy however refused this, in tune with his personal beliefs that "local people are my best protection". ULFA abducted Sanjoy on 4 July 1997.[21] Some of Sanjoy's written work, was put together and was released as a book by Penguin Books in 1998: titled "Sanjoy's Assam: diaries and writings of Sanjoy Ghose"[22]