Srinivasulu is a 25-year-old landless farmer who idles his time playing cricket in the bylanes of Puttamraju Kandriga, the adopted village of cricketer-turned-MP Sachin Tendulkar, in Andhra Pradesh. He should be thrilled with the small playground that is being developed as part of the village modernisation project in Puttamraju Kandriga. But Srinivasulu is not. He wants a bigger, 50-metre radius playground so that they can hold cricket matches there. “There are no playgrounds in the surrounding villages and therefore a big one here will be great use to all of us,” he declares in chaste Telugu with an expectant look on his face. He is willing to pitch in with physical help if needed.

Sridevi, a 30-year-old mother of two, wants a compound wall to be built around her colony of houses. Is it for safety, you ask and she replies: “No, for the look!” Indeed, the houses in this village that did not have toilets just a few months ago, now boast modern, tiled bathrooms. And yes, there is a dish antenna atop almost every pucca house.

The story of Tendulkar’s adopted village is not one of development; it is not one of how a sleepy little village was transformed in a matter of months into one with modern facilities. The story of Puttamraju Kandriga is one of aspirations and how a little development can kindle the desire for more improvement in people’s lives.

A chance meeting The residents of Puttamraju Kandriga owe their modern infrastructure to a chance encounter that Joint Collector Rekha Rani had with Tendulkar on a flight to New York last September. “Though Sachin is a cricketing legend, to me he was a Rajya Sabha MP who had ₹5 crore MPLAD funds and so I wanted to meet him,” says Rekha Rani, now Vice-Chairman and Managing Director, Sports Authority of Andhra Pradesh, based in Hyderabad.

She struck up a conversation with him and it helped that they had a mutual friend. “I was impressed with his awareness on subjects such as health, sanitation, child nutrition and solar power. I invited him to Nellore when he mentioned that he was planning to adopt a village under the Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana.” Her boss, (then) Nellore district Collector N Srikanth, was completely sold on the idea and he quickly put together project proposals which Tendulkar immediately approved.

And that’s how it all began. “It was very good working with Tendulkar and he was enthusiastic,” says Srikanth, now Commissioner, AP Capital Region Development Authority.

But why was this particular village chosen? “We didn’t want to take an unwieldy village; this was a compact one with a proactive sarpanch . It was also a homogenous village without any divisions and a primarily backward class and ST population,” says Srikanth. “This village was already part of a study by the SV University, Tirupati, and also had 15 acres of government land abutting it where we could build infrastructure,” adds Rekha Rani.

Clean drive Tendulkar is particularly proud for having provided toilets and tap water for every home. Kokulu Penchalaiah, a farmer whose house Tendulkar visited in November, is relieved that he and his family do not have to rush into the fields in the middle of the night anymore thanks to the toilets. Penchaliah sheepishly admits that he had not heard of Tendulkar till he came to the village but now never fails to watch video clips of his matches on TV.

Talking of toilets, Srikanth says that while interacting with the younger members he found that their awareness of tiled bathrooms was very high thanks to TV serials. “They wanted similar toilets in their homes too! It is all a question of meeting the aspirations of the people,” he adds.

While construction of stormwater drains, underground sewage network and treatment plant and solid waste disposal site are nearing completion along with the roads, work has just begun on the community centre building and playground. These, along with a burial ground which is under development, will form part of the first phase of the project likely to be completed by November.

An important missing link in the infrastructure is a primary health centre (PHC) in the village. However, M Janaki, Collector, Nellore district, explains that according to government rules a minimum population of 5,000 is necessary for a PHC; in this case, even including the adjacent villages, the population will be just 1,848.

An important part of the project on which work has yet to begin is construction of houses for the ST families that were displaced from government land. This is being funded by the local administration and is now held up as the tribal families are demanding bigger housing units for which extra funding needs to be arranged.

They need more These families are now living in ramshackle tarpaulin covered shelters that can by no means be called a house; these structures are a sore sight given the development in the rest of the village.

However, the Collector assures that work will begin soon once the funding is tied up. Rekha Rani explains that these ST families are migrant sheep farmers and spend just a couple of months in Puttamraju Kandriga. “They have now returned after hearing of the development in the village. They saw a chance to improve their lives with such infrastructure being built.”

Venkateswarlu, 22, a seventh-standard educated labourer from the Yenadi Scheduled Tribe, is happy to see development, but for him the bottomline is a job. “We need a source of livelihood,” he says, taking his right hand to his mouth in a gesture that conveys eating.

With an income of just about ₹100-150 a day for four months a year, those like Venkateswarlu need more than concrete roads and tiled pavements in their village. Collector Janaki says efforts are on to get industries in the surrounding area to employ locals but the problem is one of skills. Tendulkar says skills training will be part of the second phase of the project once the physical infrastructure is in place.

Both Janaki and Rekha Rani say there is pressure from other villages for similar development. That is the best certificate that Sachin Tendulkar could have asked for.

Also read:“I want to do something all over the nation”

Also read:How Sachin transformed an Andhra Pradesh village

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