While running a 100-day school at Padsare in Konkan and starting a school in the Naga region, the issues of forest dwellers could be identified. While conducting a children's camp in Balagram, the problems of orphan children were identified.
The issue of juvenile delinquency came to mind while teaching Prabodhini's Barchi dance to the children in the remand home. While teaching computers in Yerwada prison, the prisoners began to understand their pains.
While running a child labour school in Solapur City and conducting a literacy campaign in the urban settlements there, the problems of the urban settlements and child labourers were noticed.
The problems of the landless and small landholding arable farmers who went to sugarcane plantations were noticed. As the activists' experience grew, so did their willingness to work with marginalized groups in society and their confidence that they could do effective work.
It was from this that the work of the Urban Settlement Study Group started in 2002.