It was 35 people who lost their lives in Arattupuzha Panchayat alone as a result of the unforeseen violent attack of Tsunami Waves. We saw in the Relief Camps people who had flown from their homes having lost everything they possessed.

We constructed 16 new houses with hygienic latrine for the victims of Tsunami waves at Arattupuzha. 2 bedrooms, common room, kitchen, toilet, sitout, upstairs etc. are the facilities available in the new house. The electrification, painting, plumbing and installation of oven in the kitchen are completed in fulsense. The building is completely concreted with cement and metal and terrace is provided in the roof for their washing purposes.Enough precautions have been taken to resist the earthquakes or Tsunami attacks in future.Total area of a house is 450 sq.ft. Hundreds of Tsunami victims are still living in temporary sheds. New houses are to be constructed for these poor people.

The concept of Self Help Group is very interesting and effective to see as a tool for social empowerment of women. SHGs always provide an open platform for women for discussion, sharing, initiating, decision making and learning new things. As an initial step in this venture, we could successfully organize 1200 women and empowered them to form Self Help Groups. As a result of continuous motivation, these women groups restructured into 60 SHGs and each unit comprised of 20 women. These groups have undergone training in group activities based on our project programmes. Members of the SHG units sit together to select their representatives.

Fishing is the major source of income of people in our Tsunami project area. Tsunami disaster caused permanent loss or damages to boats and nets of many poor fishermen. As a part of livelihood support programme, we have decided to provide new boats and nets to victims of Tsunami. ‘Denky’ is the small size boat used in this area. This boat can be used both in sea and lakes and it will be an effective means to find bread for at least two families at a time. It requires only two men to handle because of its low weight and size. By this time we could supply 40 new boats and nets to the poor fishermen.We arranged the repairing of 10 damaged boats.

Coir and handlooms are the two major traditional industries of Kerala. Coir and coir products are intertwined with the day-to-day life of the people living in the coastal belt of the state. Coir industry is still the largest source of non farming employment for the rural poor in Kerala. The processing of the fiber and spinning of coir yarn is spread across the entire coastal belt of Kerala especially Alappuzha.

We could supply 50 Ratts to the unemployed and trained women in the project area. 180 unemployed women were given training in Coir spinning.

We purchased and supplied sewing machines to poor women who know stitching well. We also purchased and supplied chicks and chicken cages for 500 poor families.