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On the third floor of an unassuming apartment block in the heart of Kolkata’s Salt Lake locality resides the headquarters of Anudip Foundation, an NGO that creates livelihoods for rural youth and women. This is where I spent part of my summer vacation this year as an intern. Over the next few weeks I’ll be blogging about my visits to their various centres around West Bengal in eastern India.Greeted with chai and two Marie gold biscuits, I was met by Anindya Chattopadhyay, a big burly man who looks after projects staffed by students from Anudip’s 32 active training centres. Anindya is a Vice President at iMerit, a global IT services organization recently spun off from Anudip. Being in his early forties and with many years of experience in the BPO sector, he told me that he still sees his time at work as a learning curve. His role is to interpret contracts that the company receives from the US and elsewhere and to allocate the work to project staff. His enthusiasm for this work is obvious,
“At Anudip we can harness the rural energy by educating AND employing the youth across India,” he says. As an avid trekker he dreams of opening an iMERIT centre in the Himalayas, “where the youth lack opportunity causing them to give up on their education by 16.”
To see first-hand the energy he spoke of, I travelled to Metiabruz, an industrial neighbourhood in the southern outskirts of Kolkata along with Saurabh Raj, the HR manager.
Our bumpy drive was severely impeded by the incoming lorries heading to the nearby clothing factories. A pungent chemical smell was noticeable as we drove onto the busy market street. In the peak heat we walked off the main road and down a cramped side street lined with tea and carpet shops. On the third floor of a run-down building was the two-year-old iMERIT centre.
It was a jump back into the 21st century! There were rows of computers, whiteboards and projectors like any typical office space; except that all the employees were Muslim women living in the local area. To set up a centre in Metiabruz, Anudip partnered with Swayam, a local NGO committed to ending violence against women and children. As they were from very traditional and insular backgrounds, Anudip felt an obligation to employ only women at this centre. Their families restrict their movements to within the community which meant that whatever their education, they weren’t allowed to work.
Saurabh had accompanied me. As he was explaining recent policy changes that had taken place about pay and compensation, instead of listening in silence the staff actively questioned the policy initiating a conversation.
“They were not always this confident” Saurabh explained. “When they first came to train at Anudip they were very shy and would hardly make eye contact”.
“All these women are my friends. We love coming to work because we can gossip without our husbands!” says Faria.
As we sat in a group, Saurabh went on to ask the qualifications and dreams they had. I was surprised that many of them had degrees from the local university and wanted to pursue their education further. Razda Parveen had finished her bachelor’s degree in Urdu and hoped to become a professor.
Even if the possibility of this was slim, the job at iMerit was a way to earn many times more than their family income and also stay within the community. In my opinion this centre is key example of what Anudip and iMerit are trying to do, managing to work within the limitations of a community to tap into unexploited potential.
About the author
Abhiram Nandakumar was born in Chennai, India and lives in the UK where he is currently doing his Masters in Chemistry from the University of Southampton. Recently he has become the Chairman of UNICEF on Campus where he will be organising events to raise awareness. Last year he raised over £10,000 for charities including Amnesty International, British Red Cross and Greenpeace. He has strong ties to India and loves to visit regularly. In his spare time he enjoys writing, travelling, tennis and playing the classical guitar.
