Location: Rayagada District, Odisha
Under the Mission Shakti Scheme, SNEH established Shakti Sadan – an Integrated Relief and Rehabilitation Home in Rayagada town during 2024–25, creating a safe and supportive space for women and girls facing domestic violence, trafficking, abandonment and other forms of distress. Shakti Sadan is implemented as a Centrally Sponsored Scheme under the Ministry of Women and Child Development, Government of India, with funding shared between the Centre and State in a 60:40 ratio.
As the only shelter home of its kind in Rayagada district, Shakti Sadan provides an integrated package of safe accommodation, care and protection, counselling, healthcare, legal assistance, psychosocial support and rehabilitation services. Beyond immediate protection, the programme focuses on helping women rebuild their lives through vocational training, livelihood opportunities and pathways towards social and economic reintegration.
During 2025–26, Shakti Sadan provided shelter and support to 125 women and 25 children and successfully facilitated the rehabilitation of 104 women and 18 children. Through legal assistance, counselling, skill development, awareness activities and community engagement, the initiative addresses both immediate vulnerabilities and longer-term recovery. Shakti Sadan ultimately seeks to enable vulnerable women and girls to move from crisis and dependency towards safety, dignity, confidence, self-reliance and resilient futures.
SNEH began its peace-building intervention in the G. Udayagiri Block of Kandhamal district in Odisha, in the immediate aftermath of horrifying communal conflicts in 2008. Initiatives on conflict resolution and restoration of communal harmony and peace were undertaken in the beginning. Later, endemic issues like malnutrition, health, hygiene and sanitation, and livelihood strengthening activities were also included in the intervention.
SNEH has introduced modern farming practices through popularisation of SRI (System of Rice Intensification) and row transplantation of paddy. Farmers have been trained in ‘natural farming’ through the use of Indigenous Micro Organisms (IMO) prepared by using locally-sourced materials. This new technology has also contributed to improve the health and nutrition of the local people.
The floods of 2014 left more than nine lakh people, across 23 Odisha districts, marooned and homeless. The worst affected were the people of Jajpur, Kendrapara and Jagatsinghpur districts, where the district administration, in the aftermath of the floods, focused its evacuation and relief work. But the biggest challenge faced by the administration once the waters receded, was a plethora of ailments and epidemics like diarrhea, cholera, skin diseases and general fever, cough and colds among the flood-affected people. A more long-term problem was that the open wells, which were a primary source of drinking water for the people in these districts, had become contaminated. Urgent steps were required to clean and restore the wells, and spread awareness among the local people about purifying their drinking water.
SNEH rushed a team of doctors, paramedics and volunteers to Patamundai Block in Kendrapara district, to administer emergency healthcare to the flood-affected people. SNEH organized health camps in the remote areas and distributed essential medicines, while simultaneously carrying out awareness programs about flood-related health hazards.