The graduates of ‘I, Society, and Public Policy Seminar’ from Delhi formed a group called ‘Prabodh’. The group is currently working on three projects:

1)      Rethinking Reality   

a)     This is to spread awareness about Right to Information among school students. The group is working with 'Beyond Borders', a 'Connecting Futures'  project of the British Council on their action project 'Democracy'. The project aims to further the understanding of democracy: what constitutes it, why is it important, what threatens it, how is free flow of information related to the functioning of a democracy. 'Beyond Borders' and 'Prabodh' would also be producing a publication on 'Right to Information' for school students.     

b)    Deer park: Prabodh has filed RTIs in DDA, CZA, chief wildlife warden to expose corruption and carelessness in deer park management. One reply has been received till now from central zoo authority that clearly shows that the park has been running as a zoo without renewal of recognition for past two years. It has 205 deer against the norms of 50 indicating A biological volcano like scenario that may lead to  'zoonotics'- dangerous for animals as well as local residents.  

2)    Project Swaraj: Prabodh is an active member of JNNURM state level NGO group that is to discuss urban reforms in infrastructure and governance. The project focuses on 74th amendment that can facilitate local self-governance with sufficient financial powers.

3)    Leveled To Death: This project includes research on Female Foeticide, the legalities of the PNDT act and the disheartening sex ratio.

FOF Guwahati screened 'In Search of a Job' in the Press Club of Guwahati for journalists. The film initiated an interesting discussion around livelihood, was attended by over 35 people and covered by the local newspapers.

A ‘Communication and Freedom Workshop’ and a seminar on ‘Freedom in Career Selection’ was organized on March 7-8, 2006. The faculty consisted of professors, psychiatrics and experts in the field of communication, along with members of the FOF who came forward to train their peers. There were 29 participants who attended. It is worth noting that Rajan Kumar Singh, who was the coordinator of FOF Ranchi at that time and had also attended CCS’ Communicating Freedom Workshop, received a ranking of 3.89 (on a scale of 5) and Lix Roj, another member of FOF Ranchi received a ranking of 3.14.

A new working committee has been elected to take over from the earlier one with the following posts: Coordinator, Joint Coordinator, Co Coordinators, Executive Members, Advisory Committee, and our patron Prof. B.K.Sinha and Chief Patron Prof. Sushil Rajgarhia.

FOF Chennai by D Dhanuraj

Jeevika – livelihood documentary festival was organized by the department of Communication of Madras Christian College on 22^nd and 23^rd February 2006. Jeevika films like ‘Turf Wars’, ‘Chakkada’, ‘Fight for Survival’, ‘Real Pillars’ and ‘Of Hawks and Hawkers’ were screened among other films like ‘War and Peace’ and ‘Nanook of the North’ (the world’s first documentary). Dr ParthJ Shah also chaired a panel discussion on some of the films.  

FOF organized a teatime chat with Prof Jacob John from the Madras Institute of Developmental Economics at the IIT campus on 11^th March 2006 on ‘Globalization- Threats, Challenges, and Opportunities’.