In 1988 a group of social activists, led by Bhabani Sankar Mahapatra, Manoj Satapathy and Manasa Kumar Rout, initiated a total sanitation programme for the Kondh tribe in the Athmallick Block of Angul District. In the same year it was registered as a Society under the Societies Registration Act XXI 1860, by which time its operational area had extended to 50 villages in four Gram Panchayats of the same Block.

VIRD is a non-political, non profit and secular organization working on community development with a holistic approach. It operates in the most marginalized communities in two districts of Orissa, Angul and Deogarh; who, because of their caste, religion, culture, gender or economic status, have been excluded from the social, political, economic and cultural mainstream; in partnership with people and institutions. Disempowered, they are highly vulnerable to extreme poverty, inequality and to oppression. VIRD’s vision – to assist the people in organizing themselves in a new social order – has spread and is shared by about 2, 50,000 people who are now actively involved with it's activities and its programmes/ initiatives and its networking partners.