We have been working in several communities where excluded, vulnerable and disadvantaged women have no clue of what their future can be like. Having been deprived of any learning opportunity, they may have faced systematic abuse and disempowerment, lack of choice and attacks to their identity and self-esteem. Their future holds nothing interesting except for giving in to the demands of the society of early marriage and family responsibilities.

Therefore the programme that we run ensures that women and girls from such situations gain a level of healing, as well as social, personal, emotional and work related skills that enable them to make right choices, take up employment of their choice and to be able to live within community to which they can contribute.

In my experience of over 10 years, one thing for sure it’s not easy to motivate women to take up another employment. It takes a long time before a woman accepts let alone the duration of any training.

There are two categories of people; one who was earning while in situation of exploitation for whom the challenge remains that alternative employment may pay much lesser .

The other is one who have been employed and have no clue to what is stable employment is and used to sometimes easy money through begging or borrowing. Either of the categories have huge debts.

However there has been success over last year of young aspirants looking to stabilizing their family have taken up employment with Oasis India’s social enterprise initiative, gained confidence and moved on to more lucrative employment.

 About the Author:

Sulekha  currently works as Head of Programmes at Oasis India. She also manages several support functions. An alumnus of University of Mumbai, Sulekha comes with grassroots experience in healthcare, counseling, learning and Livelihoods and Prevention of Human Trafficking in an NGO set up. She has over a decade of experience in health education as Senior Tutor, Bombay Nurses Training Institute of Bombay Hospital and Dr. B. Nanavati Hospital. She is Passionate to see people from vulnerable and marginalised backgrounds find a footing in life from where they can easily take off.