TAMIL NADU NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

(A STATE UNIVERSITY ESTABLISHED BY ACT NO. 9 OF 2012)

Navalurkuttapattu, Srirangam Taluk, Tiruchirappalli – 620 009, Tamil Nadu

INTERNSHIP DIARY ON
COLD CALLING AND DATA ENTERING

Name: Jai kishore.A

Reg. No: BA0190024
Year of Study: B.A.,LL.B (Hons.) 1st Year
Internship Type: Non-Governmental Organization
 Name of NGO: Bhumi NGO, Alandur, Chennai, TN
Period of Internship: 31 days [03-AUG-2020 – 03-SEPT-2020]
Contact Person in Organization
Tel.: +91 80720 37947 Email: saravanan.r@bhumi.ngo

Declaration form

This internship diary is a report of my work done during the course of the internship.
The work was done in Bhumi, an NGO based out of Chennai under the guidance of the
Program Manager, Mr.PRABHAKARAN K, MR.SARAVANAN, the program
coordinator and along with the help of MR.RAMSARAN.

Date: 03-SEPT-2020  

                                      JAI KISHORE.A

(For Evaluation Purpose at the University)

Internship Approved/Internship NOT Approved
Internal supervisor’s Signature Date:

External supervisor certificate submitted □

Internship diary submitted □

INTRODUCTION:
Bhumi is one of India’s largest independent and youth volunteer non-profit organisations. Bhumi
was founded on August 15, 2006 by a small group of friends with a strong passion to change
society today and build a better India for tomorrow. The organisation provides youngsters a
platform to serve the society and bridges the gap between the educated and the uneducated. The
volunteers supporting Bhumi, educate and mentor children from orphanages, slum and village
community centres across the country to give them a better future, which will benefit them as
well as our country.
Bhumi as a platform enables over 12,000 volunteers in more than 12 cities across India for
causes like education, environment, animals, community welfare etc. Bhumi capitalises on the
volunteering force of Indian youth, playing a catalyst directing India and the youth towards a
better tomorrow. Bhumi has established itself as a front-ranking charity organisation that helps
poor children to realise their potential, raise their aspirations and recognise their achievements in
various fields.
The learning experience is mutual as the volunteers gain perspective and the experience to mould
themselves into tomorrow’s leaders in order to let the country to have a better tomorrow. Having
the only motive to help build a more influential, equal, socially conscious society, Bhumi drives
social change by fostering an environment where young adults & children learn, lead and thrive.
I, being an intern for a month felt really blessed to have connected and to have worked with the
NGO that has so much vision and mission for the society.
Bhumi offered numerous programmes to work with as an intern, as we all aware that it is the
pandemic situation of the COVID 19, they had offered few online internships as well, and
believing in our interns and proving the fact that even at a distant, our hands could reach up to
the needy ones. Two among programmes that I have worked from the online internships during
this pandemic Situation was COLD CALLING for eligible candidate for schooling under the act
RTE (RIGHT TO EDUCATION 2009) using the Indus Action Campaign app and at the same
DATA ENTRYING of those candidates who have been identified as eligible ones in the google
spread sheet.
RIGHT TO EDUCATION ACT 2009
HISTORY:
Education in the Indian constitution is a concurrent issue and both centre and states can legislate
on the issue. In a 1992 Supreme Court Judgment (Mohini Jain Vs. State of Karnataka), the SC
held that the right to education was a fundamental right included in right to life guaranteed under
Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. The Constitution (Eighty-sixth Amendment) Act, 2002
inserted Article 21-A in the Constitution of India to provide free and compulsory education of all
children from socially and economically backward classes in the age group of six to fourteen
years as a Fundamental Right in such a manner. Thus, this amendment made the directive
principle (Article 45) into a fundamental right. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory
Education (RTE) Act, is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted on 4 August 2009, which
represents the Article 21-A.

FEATURES OF THE RTE ACT 2009:

● It ensures free & compulsory education to all children within the age group of 6 to 14.
● No school fees, capitation fees, charges or expenses are to be paid by a child to get
elementary education.
● The child or his parents are not to be subjected to any screening procedure for admission
to school
● Special training provision for a child of above six years not been admitted to any school
or, unable to continue studies, to bring him par with his class and to be admitted in an age
appropriate class. In such cases, the child can continue beyond 14 years to complete
his/her elementary education.
● If a school does not provide facility to complete elementary education then a child of that
school can take a transfer to any other government (govt.) or government-aided school.
● Each child is also entitled to free text books, writing material and uniform.
● The appropriate govt. which means central or state government and its affiliates have to
provide a school within 1 km walking distance for children in classes I to V and within 3
kms for those in classes VI to VIII. These schools are termed as ‘neighbourhood schools’.
● The government has the responsibility to undertake school mapping to determine the
location of the school.
● 25 percent of the seats in private schools are reserved for RTE students which are funded
by the government. The Centre and the State share the joint responsibility to provide
funds for RTE execution.
● Central Government has the responsibility to prepare National Academic Curriculum,
teacher training manuals, capacity building and technical support to the states for the
promotion of the RTE.
● The State Government has to ensure the development of course of study, admission of
children, teaching staff, infrastructure development of schools, completion of education
of children up to the age of 14 and inclusion of children from marginalised section of the
society.
 ● It is the duty of every parent to admit their children or ward to school and ensure that they
receive elementary education.
● Teachers in the schools have to ensure their regular attendance, completion of curriculum
with the specific time, assessing the ability of the child and prescribe special attention if
need be, conduct the parent-teacher meeting to appraise overall development of the child.
● There should be one teacher for every 30 students for the class I to V and one teacher for
every thirty-five students for class VI to VIII.
● There should be one specialised teacher each for teaching (I) Science & Mathematics (II)
Social Sciences and (III) Languages.
● A full-time Head Teacher is recommended for a school with more than 100 students.
● Classes I to V should have 200 working days & Classes VI to VIII 220 working days per
academic year, with a 45 hour work week.
● All weather classroom for every teacher in the school, an office, a store room and a
principal’s room. The school has to ensure hygienic kitchen for midday meals, safe
drinking water facility, and separate toilets for boys and girls along with proper fencing,
playground and a library with relevant books and teaching aid.
● The school has to ensure all round development of the child and practice inclusion
without denying admission to any child on any grounds

MY ROLE AS AN INTERN:

WEEK 1 (03-AUG-09-AUG)
In the very first day of the first week, we were told to join a meeting in the Google meeting app,
we were taught with the history of RTE Act 2009 along with its elements and features. The
intern in-charge told us to introduce ourselves upon the meeting session and he told how
important education to him was as he struggled hard to come up to the society. He told us, the
interns on how to make approach the person with whom we are communicating during the cold
calling. Our in-charge Saravanan told us we would be making the calls using the Indus Action
Campaign app, which is a non-profitable organisation working in the space of policy
implementation in India. This app has had also implemented project like EKLAVYA, nurture
existing leadership within the community. He also added that this network organises existing
resources within governments and civil society to achieve its mission across India. Throughout
the week, we were assigned calls that are needed to be done in order to identify the candidates as
eligible for school application through RTE Act. The calls assigned for the day for first few days
were less as it ranged from 5 calls per day to 25 calls per day. I called them daily, creating
awareness about the RTE ACT and its eligibility criteria as well at the same if they met the
criteria, I gathered their data accordingly.
WEEK 2 (10-AUG-16-AUG)

It is the second week, and as days get over by, the number of calls assigned per day increased
gradually ranging from 25-50 calls per day. Only to realise that, even collecting all of their data
just by a phone call being at a distance was not really an easy task to be done and that too 50
calls per day was really tough task for me. Nevertheless, I really wanted the children from a
darker side to have a brighter of their future. So usually to register themselves, they have to call
the Bhumi hotline and then we will be given their number to communicate with on the query of
the admission process, some of the phone callers were actually playing and mocking at me
during the cold calling session, however I was still determined in the task I was assigned to and
continued my job as an intern. So, this week, the days were all the same, just with different types
of phone numbers assigned to make the cold calling. Everyone had their own family struggles
and background and made me to think how fortunate I am to be in the society to have the basic
needs which many out there who were struggling to get. Many of them were so eager in
admitting their child in the school that they even called back and enquired about the status of
their application that they have applied. As a note of appreciation we were also given a day off
on the 15th of August as it was Independence Day.

WEEK 3 (17-AUG-23-AUG)

I came to the third of my internship program and my intern in-charge told me that cold callings
were done on the past two weeks and he introduced us to the data entrying. My role as an intern
was to key in the data collected from the cold callings done into the appropriate columns made in
the Google spread sheet along with their phone numbers. I personally thought that data entrying
would be more of an easy task perform only to realise that I was wrong, for the second time as
well as it was way harder. I was given 100 data entries to be keyed in , that is actually data of
100 different phone numbers called by the fellow Bhumi intern and volunteer team. I completed
all the 100 entries on the very first day of the week but when days passed by I realised that cold
callings were way better. It was because other intern who uses the same Google spread sheet
would accidentally erase off data I have entered and sometimes I have erased theirs mistakenly
too. So it was hard to cope up as it was new to us, however we accepted each other’s mistake and
we learnt from one another , so to sum up this week, it was data entries of seven days.
FINAL WEEK (24-AUG-02 SEPT)
Week 4, it was the last and final week of my internship programme, we told to clear off the
pending entries that we had on previous week and the work was hectic as some of the entries
were misplaced on the second spread sheet my in-charge made and we have to double check
each and every entry once after it was entered in the Google spread sheet so I decided to have
some of the entries of this week so that I would not confuse myself them with other data
assigned. To ease of our work, our in-charge made a third Google spread sheet where the
numbers and data of spread sheet one and two were collectively put together to avoid
unnecessary overlapping of data entries. It was the day before my internship programme
officially gets completed I was asked to submit all the works and tasks I have done as an intern
where I sent them the things that I have learnt from this internships as well to the Bhumi
Organisation.

CONCLUSION:
According to me, literacy is very important and I consider it to be the backbone of the country. I
feel really proud to work with the Bhumi Ngo Team, helping the children on their right to get
basic education who are economically backward and who are below the poverty line in the
society. Moreover I learnt how to communicate with people, I gained more confidence in speak
out to the society and bringing this RTE Act to light, bringing up to people, creating awareness
among the people around our society and community. As the internship got over, I was told by
the in-charge that I have helped more than 150 children in identifying them as eligible candidates
for application through RTE Act as well. I personally felt satisfied and complete, as realise I
have helped all those children in getting their right to have fundamental and basic education
along with the help of the Bhumi Ngo members.

Just by a single call to them, I could understand their struggles, if the government takes extra
initiatives in getting them together, our country would gain a reasonable place in the rate of
literacy across the country. The best part is the personal messages I receive from parents who get
acquainted over time, sharing the good news of their children’s admission. Every such message
fills me up with joy. I am happy I could support some children in getting admissions in schools
and becoming first generation learners in their families. This has instilled a lot of positive energy
in my life, I am going to continue my efforts and inspire more people to join us in our
endeavours. I am incredibly grateful to Bhumi for providing me with this opportunity. Therefore,
I believe that I have contributed something to their initiatives of Bhumi Ngo, who are taking
many efforts to develop the life of the economically weaker sections and their presence is giving
moral support to the suppressed ones.