Panellists of ‘We Knit 2019’ at Don Bosco Campus, Dimapur on May 4. (Morung Photo)
Morung Express News
Dimapur | May 4
Nagaland has had quite the NGO boom. For a state that had only around 20 lakhs population, going by the 2011 census, there are 30, 000 registered Non-Governmental Organization (NGOs) in the state. This would boil down to one NGO per every 66 person in Nagaland.
Chairman of NGOs’ Forum Nagaland, Dr. Hesheto Chishi revealed this mind-boggling statistics on Saturday. He was delivering the keynote address during the ‘We Knit 2019’ held under the theme, “NGOs in Nagaland: Challenges and Ways Forward,” at DBIDL Hall, Don Bosco Campus, Dimapur.
Dr. Hesheto who is also the Director of Indigenous Cultural Society said 545 NGOs were annually registered in Nagaland out of which 293 were registered with the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. “However, in reality, only few NGOs are fully functional,” he said putting the number of functional NGOs to around 50. Dr. Hesheto further informed that there were 6, 20, 000 NGOs in the country.
‘NGOs and civil societies are different’
Dr. Hesheto also pointed out that people in the state do not have a clear picture of what a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) was and added that NGOs and civil societies were different.
He said NGOs tend to use interchangeable nomenclature and stressed on the need to first clear the concept of NGOs and civil societies.
According to Dr. Hesheto, NGOs are established to assist the government in order to address particular issues but added that NGOs were neither government nor members of the state. He said civil societies were those organizations like Naga Hoho, NSF, Naga Council Dimapur etc and appealed the people not to confuse those NGOs formed for particular purpose with that of civil societies.
He said operational NGOs could be relief oriented, stress on service delivery, religious or secular oriented, public or private oriented etc adding that the purpose of NGOs might vary.
In his inaugural speech, Dr Fr CP Anto, Principal, North East Institute of Social Science & Research (NEISSR), Dimapur said the purpose of organizing the programme was to make organizations more competent thereby enabling each to grow.
During the day-long programme, the panellists presented papers on the topics; Financial Inclusion and Sustainability of NGOs, Strategic Leadership and Good Governance of NGOs, Network with Government, Organizations and Community, Social Welfare Programmes and Schemes and Partnership of NGOs. Among the panellists were Asha Sanchu, Director, Miqlat Ministry, Dimapur; K. Ela, Director, Prodigal’s Home, Dimapur, N. K. Gurnani and Gracy Aye, State Co-ordinator, State Resource Centre for Women, Nagaland.
The programme was organized by NEISSR in collaboration with other organizations.
