From zero, ‘reluctant’ B’khand village reaches 80% vaccination
10- day vaccination yatra yields dividends, as Bundelkhand Development Board team fights vaccine hesitancy in backward areas, motivates villagers to get inoculated
Removing vaccine hesitancy in the backwaters of Bundelkhand was no easy task, found a team from the Bundelkhand Development Board which was on a mission to motivate villagers for inoculation.
The entire Chak Jagdevpur village in Jalaun district had boycotted vaccination and health workers from the district headquarters had to return twice without vaccinating a single person out of a population of 2800.
All efforts of ASHA workers had also failed to persuade villagers to get inoculated to protect themselves from Covid-19.
When vice chairman of Bundelkhand Development Board Raja Bundela and his team reached Chak Jagdevpur during a 10-day long Bundelkhand vaccination yatra, they came to know that the entire village was against inoculation.
The yatra started from Chitrakoot on July 16 and ended on July 25 in Jhansi after covering around 2180 km by road.
It was undertaken to persuade people to get vaccinated as the Bundelkhand region was lagging behind in vaccination against Covid-19, according to Bundelkhand Development Board.
More than 150 villages were covered during this 10- day yatra, in seven districts of the region.
“When we reached Chak Jagdevpur village, we came to know that the entire village, including gram pradhan Jhidan Yadav, had boycotted vaccination,” said Raja Bundela.
“It was a tough situation. We had to persuade villagers to get vaccinated. We dispelled all myths and even showed photographs of prominent leaders of all political parties getting vaccinated,” said Bundela.
“These photographs helped a lot in persuading villagers to get vaccinated. When health workers arrived in the village for the third time on our request, 40 people got vaccinated. Now, almost 80 per cent of the village is vaccinated,” he said.
“There were a lot of misconceptions about vaccination in our village. But this team cleared all our doubts and made us realise the importance of vaccination as a potent weapon against coronavirus,” said Jhidan Yadav, gram pradhan of Chak Jagdevpur,
who was also opposed to vaccination earlier.
The Yatra also had to face opposition in Gauhani Kala, Dehruch, Ganwa Prasidhpur and Kalvaliya villages in the forests and hilly terrains of Chitrakoot district, where people were reluctant to get vaccinated.
“Chaupals were organised, local youths, ASHA workers and recently elected young gram pradhans were mobilised to remove misconceptions among villagers about vaccination,” said Bundela. “Bundelkhand is a backward region with low literacy rate. Due to illiteracy, people have a lot of superstitions. All this proved to be a hindrance in the government’s vaccination drive in this region,” he said.
However, there was also a silver lining. In Pachpura village in Mahoba district,, where the team had to face hostile villagers, 92-year-old Ram Raja stepped out voluntarily for vaccination. “We had organised a vaccination camp at the panchayat building in Pachpura village in Kabrai block in Mahoba district. We were surprised when 92 -year- old Ram Raja approached us for vaccination,” said Bundela.“vaccination is for our safety. There should not be any doubt in anyone’s mind about its usefulness. Everyone should get vaccinated,” Ram Raja told villagers after he got vaccinated.