HYDERABAD: Udita Chadha and Gauri Mahendra set foot in the city to potentially change lives of class II and III kids. They arrived as Teach for India Fellows in 2013. While they were trained to execute ‘fantastic’ strategies inside and outside the classroom, something was amiss, they felt.
“There was emphasis on quality education. But what hit us hard was that the kids who were coming to the classroom aged between eight and 12 were child labourers part time or full time. We felt there was no point of using fantastic strategies because they were either rushing for work or preoccupied with those thoughts,” says Gauri. While Udita was teaching at the Government Public School in Raj Bhavan, Gauri was a fellow at Yousufguda, both located in the slum communities.
The duo wondered if they could give their kids books, before bread. “With this underlying thought we wanted to do something to address the issue. The problem is not a new one. We realised only when this issue is addressed, quality education can come into play,” recalls Gauri. With this idea, Umeed was launched in August 2014.
Still in their fellowship programme, the duo started Umeed as a project. They started going to households in the slums, to study and find out the reason behind kids engaging in child labour.
“It is natural to assume that these families have financial problems and hence these kids are forced to work. But the bigger problem was that the mothers of these households were weak. They were not even working members,” points the 29-year-old. They figured that if the adults of the house started to work, then the kids could go to school with a free mind. “The mothers were willing to work. They just didn’t have the opportunity,” adds Gauri. Both working professionals now with full time jobs, then started looking at ways to make Umeed a livelihood initiative.
With a motive to equip themselves with the right skills and ideas to make this idea a reality, Gauri set off to do an internship at Barefoot College, Tilonia, a voluntary organisation that works to understand and build sustainable livelihood opportunities. “I was there for one and a half months and learnt how the locals worked on every step in the chain of building and maintaining a sustainable businesses. I worked in their handicrafts section,” recalls Gauri.
Udita went on a research visit to Well Paper (Women’s Empowerment through Local Livelihood) in Auroville, Tamil Nadu. “We wanted to look at new and different ways to work with this age old problem,” says Gauri.
It was in August 2014 that they kicked off Umeed with a purpose of empowering women in the slum communities in Hyderabad not just economically, but also socially.
They started with three women and currently work with 30. A few of them who benefitted from their training have moved out of Umeed. “Our training programme works in three buckets - skill building, values and mind sets and exposure. Values and mindset is most important to us as we believe a woman needs to be aware of herself personally and professionally first. Only this will determine how the society looks at her. In the process, if the kids see the mother as a strong figure, their values will change as well,” shares Gauri.
The women are trained in handmade, recyclable products like newspaper posters, dining mats, curtains, book marks, pen stands, newspaper baskets and also seasonal products like cards, diyas, embellishments for Christmas trees ranging between `100 and 160. The products are created in the women’s homes after they are trained at their headquarters in Somajiguda. Umeed operates across slums in Attapur, Makta, Amberpet, Yousufguda and Nampally. They have three interns currently and all working towards making these chapters self-sustained.
The women, Gauri tells us, have transformed from being hesitant to making decisions, albeit small ones. “They can now travel on their own. This may be easy for you and me, but for them it is a huge task. They can make those small little calculations. They have developed confidence and a great amount of self-respect,” shares Gauri. They also formed a special, social bond, she noticed.
“Udita and I do not understand all their problems at all times. They have formed a support group, lending a shoulder when there is a need,” she beams. Meeting every week strengthens this bond.
The women are paid a fixed salary and Umeed is funded by Unlimited Hyderabad. Udita and Gauri take care of the funding and marketing of products that are sold at exhibitions and stalls at corporates and also organic bazaars in the city.