Susheelamma,
the founder.
An ashram volunteer advising a woman about health issues in Shaktinagar. |
In
southern India, women who once fled their homes with nothing in hand are now helping
others to earn a living and playing a role in health and education programmes
It all began with one
woman’s dream to help those in the same situation as herself: poor, uneducated and
in urgent need of a safe haven.
In 1975, Susheelamma found herself with two children to support and a broken marriage.
The daughter of a weaver, her education was cut short because her family couldn’t
afford secondary school fees. Today, she is at the head of the Sumangali Seva Ashram
in Bangalore, staffed by a dedicated team of 450 full-time volunteers. Day after
day, the ashram offers destitute women who come knocking at its door a roof over
their heads and a chance to get a new start in life by learning a skill. Once they
can stand on their own feet, the women are free to look for jobs outside the ashram,
or to work with its myriad projects for a small stipend and two square meals a day.
Many of them have never forgotten the hope it provided, and continue to contribute
to the ashram’s smooth running in some form or other.
It is a gaping vacuum in social services that prompted Susheelamma and a group of
friends to found the ashram in 1975. At the time, they managed to convince the state
government to allot them a plot of land to build a small shelter and a school to
educate destitute women. But the land had a deep open pit on it, and filling it was
beyond their financial reach. Slowly but surely, Susheelamma and her friends convinced
people to donate to their cause, and eventually a school shed was built.
“We did not have the money to buy books for children or to feed the women who had
arrived at the ashram to stay,” says Susheelamma, a petite and frail 65 year-old
who continues to preside tirelessly over the ashram’s activities. She and the other
volunteers would work all night to make little trinkets, which they sold to raise
meagre sums of money. When she started the ashram, she was earning a mere 170 rupees
a month (around $4) from her work as a warden and a nursery school teacher. Of this,
she used Rs100 to maintain her family, and the rest to launch the ashram’s programmes.
“Some volunteers, like Parvatamma [who is a member of the ashram’s core committee,
and more fortunate], would hand over their entire monthly salary cheques to us,”
recalls Susheelamma.
The ashram’s first income-generation scheme involved cutting and twisting wires into
a U-shape to be sold as metal poultry feeders. One kilogram of these would fetch
40 paise (less than a cent), but drop by drop, they had enough to make ends meet.
Then they made garlands of silk cocoons. Volunteers would carry sacks of them on
their backs in the overcrowded state transport buses to deliver them to stores across
the city.
Lifelong
loyalty
Today, the ashram receives grants from the government as well as financial and material
assistance from international aid agencies, along with individual donations. Its
real asset, however, are the volunteers: from the outset, the ashram was based on
the principle of recruiting those who once benefited from its services. Committed
to improving the lives of their less fortunate sisters, the volunteers run education
and training programmes, provide counselling to women in distress (who may not need
shelter) and conduct regular adult literacy programmes, health check-ups and immunization
campaigns. The ashram also runs two primary schools, 130 anganwadi (or childcare)
centres, which provide supplementary nutrition to children, pregnant women and breastfeeding
mothers in slums, 25 crèches, and 19 non-formal schools, also in slums.
People like Shantamma make this whole endeavour possible. One of the pillars of the
ashram, she trains volunteers and is a source of strength and guidance to all those
around her. The unassuming lady vividly recalls the day, 25 years ago, when she and
her two infant children came here, seeking shelter. Her eyes still moisten as she
recounts how uncertain the future seemed after walking away from an alcoholic husband
who beat her in front of the children and brought another woman to live with them.
Uneducated and unemployed, she had no idea how she would fend for herself and the
children. Then someone told her about the ashram, which willingly accepted her. Initially,
Shantamma worked only in the kitchen; then she took care of the children in the ashram’s
crèche. Meanwhile, she followed a literacy course offered by the ashram. Then
she was trained by other volunteers to become a health worker, advising women in
villages on nutrition and immunisation.
Adopting
a shanty town
Today,
Shantamma lives in her own house but comes to the ashram every day to help in the
kitchen and train other women to participate in income-generation projects. “I lived
in the ashram for seven years,” Shantamma says. “It gave me ashreya (shelter) when
nobody else wanted me. I can never forget that.… I will help others who come here
as long as I can.”
The atmosphere at the ashram is tranquil, if business-like. Residents rise before
dawn and after meditation and a spartan breakfast, they set out to work. Although
they are not obliged to, just about all of them, including those with mental and
physical disabilities, volunteer to help. This willingness has been the mainstay
of the ashram from the outset.
In addition to full-time volunteers, many others from the community at large give
some of their time. Shakuntala, an engineer in a government department, spends a
few hours each weekend helping with odd jobs, affirming that it makes her feel more
worthwhile. Some contribute through active service, others through financial donations.
Philanthropy is well-entrenched in Indian philosophy; volunteers are convinced that
they must help others in order to enjoy prosperity and peace of mind.
Many of the ashram’s women now volunteer in the nearby Kuprajbande slum, which was
so run-down that the ashram decided to “adopt” it and improve the lives of its inhabitants.
Fifty-six shanty dwellings were rebuilt by volunteers, and awareness campaigns launched
on health sanitation and against alcoholism. Today, the slum has been renamed Shaktinagar—the
City of Strength. Volunteers claim their drive against alcoholism has been so effective
that almost 80 percent of the men (the women rarely drink) have become teetotallers.
Susheelamma’s story is proof of how individuals with no means, but plenty of courage
and determination, can bring about lasting change. “There’s still a lot to be achieved,”
she muses. “What we have done is but a drop in a vast ocean of need.” |
