Case study of Champa - Journey from being an illiterate to an Entrepreneur

Pre- Project Life

• She currently resides in a tribal village called Kalimagri in Sirohi, with her husband and two sons.
• Her husband never allowed her to go outside the house and she was also not allowed to come in front of other men.

Life has changed forever

• She joined the Adult Literacy Centre & benefitted from the Naya Savera project of JK LAKSHMI CEMENT CSR projects.
• She owns a local ‘kirana’ store from where she earns Rs. 700 per day.
• She also runs a flour mill after having invested Rs. 60,000 for this endeavor.
• She purchased an auto rickshaw for her husband by paying an EMI to the bank.
• Now, she frequently visits the market near her village, about 30 km from her village and interacts with the people.

Detailed story of Champa

Name: Champa Devi
Age: 35
Husband’s Name: Mani Lal
Village: Kalimagri ( Rampura)

Champa Devi is a 35 year old woman with a dream of becoming the member of a family where her opinions matters in the decision making of her family. She lives in a tribal village called Kalimagri in Sirohi district of Rajasthan. She lives with her husband and two sons.

She was illiterate and after she got married because of her illiteracy, due to the typical stereotyping of Indian women by Indian men, she was never given the desired importance by her husband in taking financial and non financial decisions.

Her husband never even allowed her to go outside the house and she was also not allowed to come in front of other mens. These conditions began demotivating her and she began to lose her self-confidence. Yet she dreamed that she could do something better in life, gain significance in her family as well as in the village and nearby areas. She didn’t know how to go about doing that until she met the JK Lakshmi Cement CSR Team.

The JK Lakshmi Cement CSR team headed by Mr. Kishore approached her after seeing her living in a ‘Kacha’ house with her husband, working in a company for grinding stones. This was their only source of income for living with two children. The team learned that she always had a zeal to learn new things in life, but unfortunately due to her circumstances, she was never given the right opportunity to gain knowledge as per her desires and aspirations in life.

After seeing these conditions and confidence to learn new things in her, Mr. Kishore asked her to visit the Literacy Centre running in their nearby community centre by JK Lakshmi Cement Ltd. where illiterate women are taught the basic education to read, write and do basic mathematical calculations. These centres also taught how to improve their standard of living in their families.

One day finally she visited the centre and saw how the women in her neighbourhood were transforming in terms of education, health and livelihood. Inspired by their transformation, she joined the centre the very next day.

After a week, her husband came to know that she was going to the literacy centre and without a second thought or asking for her opinion he rather restricted her to join the literacy centre. Despite knowing the consequences she would have to face at home if she went back to the literacy center, she dared to go secretly to the centre for three months and trained.

After training when her husband saw the transformations in her attitude of speaking confidently, writing her name by herself and giving logical reasons of how they can improve their standard of living her husband supported her by asking her opinions in financial and non financial decisions of family simultaneously feeling glad and proud of his literate wife.

Now she owns a kirana store from where she generates sales of Rs. 700 per day and has mobility to go anywhere outside the village for any kind of work related to business. She also bought a flour mill for generating more income for her family by investing Rs. 60,000 in the machinery. Recently, she supported her husband by purchasing him an auto rickshaw by taking a loan for it and paying EMI through the income she generated from her Kirana Store and flour mill. She also writes the finance structure of running the shop in her small diary.

She also renovated her house to a ‘Pakka’ Ghar. After this journey of transformation, she and her husband realised the value of literacy for their children. They got both their sons admission in the village school – one was 4.5 years of age and the younger one was aged 3.5 years.

Mrs. Champa Devi says that in future also it will be her sons’ decision of how much they want to study, there will be no restrictions from family to start earning at an early age, if the children wanted to by leaving their studies.

The last words of Mrs. Champa Devi at the end of the interview for JK LAKSHMI CEMENT Literacy Centre for women education was “Hame hao lage”- Now she feels very satisfied with her significance in family and society.