Success Stories of Skilled Women from Empower Pragati

Anita Kumari – Trainer

Anita and her family originally belong to U.P. but she has been born and brought up in Delhi. After completing her studies up to class 10 in a Government School, Anita was very unsure about her career path. She did not know which stream to take up and faced a huge lack of guidance. To add to this was her parents’ disinterest in allowing their daughters to continue with their studies and their desire to get them married off soon. Her father told them that he would not be able to support them any further. However, her elder brother managed to convince their father to let Anita continue with her studies through distance learning with the promise that if Anita manages to score above 50% in her first exam she would be allowed to shift to a regular course. Anita scored above 50% marks but her brother did not keep his promise. She was greatly disappointed as she wanted to go to a regular school and receive quality education. Thankfully for her, this time her father sided with her and took it upon himself to get her admitted into a regular course.

After Anita completed her Class 12 she was told that she would receive no further financial assistance from the family as they would not be able to afford it. She joined as a teacher at a local school and began earning a salary of Rs 1,600 per month. She worked there for a brief period but very soon her desire to continue studying had her enrolling into a B.A. Programme. She left her job and completed her graduation after which she joined the same school once again but this time with a salary of Rs 2,000 per month.

During her time as a teacher, she heard about Empower Pragati’s ‘Saksham’ training programme in Dwarka. Her father had come across a ‘Saksham’ pamphlet and had shown it to her. Initially she did not believe that such a course would be available for free and did not pay much heed to the information. However, one day she decided to visit the centre and after a brief interaction with the trainer was surprised to learn that this free course would also give her an opportunity to sit for job interviews. She underwent the two month course in Customer Service and Retail at the centre and then also enrolled in Empower Pragati’s Debt Recovery Agent (DRA) course and completed that successfully too. Post training she was placed at Serco, Gurgaon as a Customer Sales Associate with a salary of Rs. 8,500.

While working there she developed an interest in law and began preparing for the L.L.B. entrance examinations. She managed to clear the examination and so left her job and was admitted into the University of Delhi’s ARSD college (2012-2015). Meanwhile, she also began working at Singh Associate in Dwarka to gain some experience in this field. Before her first semester examinations, she was very worried that she may not be able to clear the exams due to her poor English however, she passed the exam with flying colours and completed her course successfully. All this while she had continued working with Singh Associate and so requested for a raise in salary upon completing her L.L.B. degree. She was asked to go through an assessment to gauge whether she would be eligible for a raise. She gave the assessment and cleared it but left the company as she felt deeply humiliated at being made to go through an assessment even after working there for more than two years and delivering well in every aspect of her work.

This is when she posted her resume on naukri.com and received a call from Empower Pragati. She was shortlisted for the position of a trainer and was selected. She joined the Chhatarpur centre on the 24^th of September, 2015 and has since worked at other centres located at Mehrauli and Mahipalpur. Today, she is working as the centre manager at one of the organization’s all women training centres in Chakkarpur.

She is today the only earning member in her family and manages the household singlehandedly. Neither her father nor her brother contribute to the family’s expenses and this puts a lot of pressure on her but she strives to work harder every day. Her dream is to become a very successfully lawyer one day and wants to work in the Supreme Court of India. However, she feels that her communication skills are still lacking and wishes to improve. She says that the daily training sessions and constant question and answer with the trainees help her better herself and instill confidence in her. She has also begun taking English classes and attends these classes every day after work and hopes to be able to converse fluently in this language one day.

Her greatest inspiration is her father and she wishes to be like him one day. Even after suffering a near fatal accident and being bedridden he continues to try and help with whatever work he can do. Anita loves her job and enjoys instilling values of self-dependency and confidence in the girls at her centre.