A story of hope and resilience in the times of Covid-19

Four years of relentless failures and despair. Then suddenly, an order worth Rs 70 lakh (~ USD 92K) in a humble all-women tailoring unit in the hinterland of Andhra Pradesh, India at a time when the world is struggling with the dark clouds of uncertainty, isolation, and gloom, these 210 women found light and got an opportunity to join nation fight to Beat Covid-19. This is their story.

Many of you would be aware that four years ago, I was working with the Andhra Pradesh government on the Smart Village project. One of the villages that was part of the project was Lakkavaram in the East Godavari region, where my team helped a group of women in a tailoring unit. In 2017 the Smart Village project ended rather abruptly for me and my colleague Abhiram Natarajan. As a team, we were already rather disappointed. But what really hit a raw nerve for me and Abhiram was a conversation we had with the women a few days before we were scheduled to exit the villages. In an honest and emotional chat, they told us about the various organizations and individuals who had come to their village at various points in time to educate them, enable financial inclusion and help generate livelihoods among other empowerment projects. Eventually, these individuals and organizations all left with barely-completed projects.

“I hope you will not be like one of them. That you too will not leave,” one of the women in the group said to me. For Abhiram and me, this one sentence was a turning point. We decided that with or without support, he and I were going to stay invested in the village. Abhiram, in fact, continued to live and work there – without any income for the next 6 months. All because we were going to finish what we had set out to do. This was 2017.

Desi MBA in Lakkavaram

The next three years were difficult for all of us but we raised some money through which we continued to collaborate with and support the women in the tailoring unit. Soon we had a team and recruited a village youth, Sagar to continue the work with Abhiram. Much of this work was what we now call the Desi MBA. It was an upskilling program to prepare the women for industry-level outputs from the tailoring unit. Going from the usual fall-pico work that they were most skilled in to industry-level output required training in design sense, thread work, soft skills like talking to customers, understanding business needs and opportunities, and planning and project management to following health and safety standards. While these professional skills were still somewhat easy to pass on, mindset change was harder. The ability to get out of comfort zones in terms of work and skills, finding true empowerment by addressing challenges like an unsupportive family or other commitments and mental blocks were some of the top-most issues. And the women continue to work on these aspects of their evolution.

In 2019 in an attempt to go beyond skilling, to fundraising and market connections, Abhiram and I discussed the tailoring unit and many such other opportunities in the villages with our other colleagues Ritu Singh and Saffin Mathew. We all decided to create a program involving high school students on grassroot issues through a leadership and village immersion program. In 6 months, one of Ritu’s mentee, a 11th grade student from Bangalore, Agastya Vinchhi raised money to overhaul the equipment and electrical wiring in the tailoring unit, in the hope of industrial orders coming through sooner than later. Abhiram and Sagar continued to work on ground in Lakkavaram and several of us supported him remotely, holding on to hope and optimism. Meanwhile, we continued to approach several big-brand retail and e-commerce companies for bulk orders for recyclable flex bags, cloth bags and more that the tailoring unit could deliver. But no orders came through.

Our continued failure was starting to turn to despair. And then suddenly in 2020 (rather a few weeks back) everything changed.

COVID-19 has brought the world to its knees. But for the women in this tailoring unit at Lakkavaram, it has brought renewed hope.

As medical professionals and citizens around the world ran short of the life-critical Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Kits, the tailoring unit received a huge order from the Andhra Pradesh government worth Rs 70 lakh! Abhiram and Sagar front ended with the government, represented the tailoring unit and all the women working in it to close the order. The tailoring unit delivered its first industrial order of 150,000 masks, 60,000 shoe covers (making 10K a day) and 5,000 coats just 6 days. All of this while also picking up brand new and life-critical skills like taking care of one’s own health and hygiene when stitching masks, sanitizing hands before and after each PPE output, adhering to all other rules and regulations like daily temperature checks, and socially distancing at work. The women are saving themselves from COVID-19 just as well as they are helping save the world from it!

Further, there is another bulk order of lab coats on the way. And just like that, at a time when the economy is gloomy, the tailoring unit and the income of its women is booming!

Today, 210 women of Lakkavaram are gainfully employed in the project – 60 in the units and rest work from home. At a time when migrant, daily wage labor is losing jobs and returning home to the villages, these women – 80% of whom are from families below the poverty line - are making Rs 300 per day. 90 of them are young women whose fathers or husbands used to be daily wage workers and are currently out of work.

And this is just the beginning of their story. If the quality of PPE kits is acceptable, the project will continue for two more months. In these uncertain times, the hope of livelihood for even 2 more months is more than what much of the country has access to.

Sometimes, staying invested helps

For us as well as for these women and their families in Lakkavaram, this has been a story of patience, persistence, and relentless hope winning over despair. Something as simple as sewing machines are liberating women like little else could. But the more important lesson in all of this is that sometimes, hope comes in the bleakest of times when you least expect it to. And when it does, you have no choice but to grab it with both hands and run with it.

In Lakkavaram, this is exactly what our team at 1M1B and these women are doing.

Huge shout out for Abhiram and Sagar for leading this effort. And big thanks and gratitude to Prof Solomon Darwin for introducing me to the East Godavari region in 2016 and giving an opportunity to contribute.