It is time to appreciate and buck up women co-operators who have made the country proud by empowering and making poor women self-reliant. Several such women leaders are doing praiseworthy work in not only help fighting the domestic violence but also making helpless women stand on their feet economically.
There are several cooperatives in the country including Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), Working Women Forum (WWF-ICNF) and others who are wholly working for the upliftment of women.
Indian Cooperative movement indeed has several women who are spearheading the movement in their own way. A few names such as SEWA’s Ela Bhatt, WWF’s Nandini Azad, Surekha Khot, Asha Snegar, Sadhana Jadhav, Arti Bisaria, SEWA’s Mirai Chatterjee, Alka Srivastava, Bhavana Gondaliya etc immediately come to mind.
One can also not forget the contributions of Padmashree Jaya Arunachalam who passed away in 2019 but not before igniting a powerful cooperative movement in the southern states. She single handed established a huge network of micro financing entities in the southern states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra.
Arunachalam organized a grassroots trade union of working-class women in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The unionized women are vendors and hawkers, other service specialists, fisherwomen, landless women, lace makers, beedi rollers, silk Weavers, agarbathi workers, embroidery workers, and engaged in several other activities. Similarly, SEWA is doing wonderful work in empowering women in Gujarat and other states.
Several national and international cooperative organizations are organizing workshops and seminars on the occasion of International Women Day.
NCUI education arm NCCE is organizing a training programme for the women physically for the first time after Covid-19. ICA General Equality Committee (GEC) will organize a webinar under the theme of “Women in leadership for a just recovery”.
There are hundreds of unheard and unknown women cooperators who are working quietly in the backwaters for their families and societies.
Indian Cooperative greets all the women co-operators on the International Women’s Day!