About this handbook

Community Service Handbook is a free collection of practical guides for young people who want to organise service and volunteering in their own towns and villages, with a particular focus on Northeast India.

Why it exists

Across the hills and valleys of the region, neighbours help each other: cleaning shared spaces, supporting families in hard times and pulling together when the monsoon brings landslides or floods. Young people are often at the heart of this. But a new volunteer group usually has to learn everything from scratch. This handbook tries to put the basics in one place, written plainly, so a group can spend less time guessing and more time helping.

Editorial approach

• Practical first. Every guide is built around steps and checklists that a small group can actually follow.
• General, not local rules. Customs, laws and procedures differ from place to place. The guides describe general good practice and encourage groups to check with local councils, elders and official bodies.
• Professionals lead on specialist matters. Medical questions belong to doctors and licensed blood banks; emergencies belong to official disaster management agencies; enforcement belongs to the police. The guides say so clearly.
• No invented facts. We do not publish made-up statistics, quotes, testimonials or case studies. Where a fact is mentioned, it is general and widely known.
• Respect and dignity. The guides avoid shaming anyone, including people who use drugs, families in grief or households in need.

Guides are reviewed and updated from time to time. The date of the latest update is shown on each guide.

Independence

The handbook does not represent any association, church, government department, political party or company. It does not run branches, hold meetings, collect donations or issue membership. If you have a question about a specific organisation, please contact that organisation directly.

Get in touch

Suggestions and corrections are welcome. See the contact page.