Skilling and Training
Young people, especially from rural areas, do not get enough opportunities for self-advancement and better livelihood options due to a lack of education, skills, and awareness of the opportunities available to them. To bridge the gap between youth and their dreams, Udyogini is committed to setting up various opportunities to invigorate youths to get salaried work or to set up their own ventures.
Udyogini has developed the following strategy to connect youths with their dream careers:
- Skill training for youths who are envious of those who acquire or improve their skills and go into formal work
- right opportunities for youths interested in higher education.
- Credit linkage with financial institutions for enterprise establishment.
- setting up and managing the enterprise for those interested in entrepreneurship development (including both farm and non-farm enterprises).
Key Achievements
- Overall, 20,089 youths have received support through the Edubridge programme.
- 718 youths were employed in fields like apparel, manufacturing, textiles, electronics, and IT hardware, with 44% of them being female students.
- Yuva Compass counselled 1808 youth; 98 enrolled in various skill-training programmes, and 36 found employment after completing their training.
- 155 of the 178 youths who received counselling for the Entrepreneurship Development Programme completed it, and 11 also started their businesses. A total of 178 young people received counselling for the programme.
- Of the 309 youths who received direct placement counselling, 103 were offered jobs, and 89 were accepted and started working.
There is a way where there is a will
Kiran, a 20-year-old girl, lives in Sundari Village in the Torpa block of Jharkhand with her parents and two younger siblings. Being the oldest child in the family entailed a great deal of responsibility, as she not only had to assist her parents with household chores and in the field, but she also had to look after her younger siblings. Her parents work in agriculture for a living and are unable to earn enough money to pay for their children’s higher education.
As a result, after finishing 12th grade, she had no choice but to discontinue her education. Kiran wanted to help her parents financially, but she couldn’t find any work in the area. In October 2020, she learned about the Yuva Compass of Udyogini from one of the Sarthi. She first learned about Yuva Compass’s various projects by attending a village meeting. Following that, she became interested in learning more about the opportunities it provides, so she met with the Sarthi along with her parents and shared her concerns with the Sarthi.
Kiran shared that she went to Yuva Compass with a lot of hope and underwent a psychometric test, counselling sessions, and a platform for direct placement. These sessions assisted her in recognising her interests and skills, as well as developing behavioural skills and an openness to sharing her feelings. After 3 months, she was hired as a tailor in the textile department at Breeze Textile Company in Karur, Tamil Nadu, with an initial salary of INR 8,000 per month.
She explained that she now supports her family by paying for her father’s medical expenses, agricultural input costs, and education fees for her younger siblings. She also saves a portion of her monthly salary for her wedding. While staying at home, she hopes to open her own tailoring shop in the village. She expressed her joy at having found the path to success and said that she will continue to work hard to make her dreams come true.
Empowering women through entrepreneurship
Grahini Utpad Samiti is a women’s business group founded by ten women in Torpa Badayi toli, Torpa Purvi panchayat. The members of the group are women who received pickle and papad making training at Yuva Compass Centre Torpa in 2021. The women in the group knew each other because they lived in the same neighbourhood and decided to form Grahini Utpad Samiti after completing the training.
The group began with a small sum of INR 6,000 raised by six individuals for their first order of mahua pickles. Since then, the group has grown to ten members, each of whom has contributed INR 1,000 as an initial investment. Because the group is new, they have limited themselves to making pickles and papad. However, their products are popular and well-received in the local market, where they continue to sell pickles made from various ingredients such as adrak, lehsun, mirch, mahua, kathal, and aam, as well as papad made from moong and channa dal, madua, and chawal. They have also given samples to the NABARD Centre and Udyam Utthan Samiti, a well-established farmer-producer organisation supported by Udyogini. The group is extremely proud of their rapid success, but they are hesitant to expand due to a lack of infrastructure, as they all work from a member’s home.
The group describes how their spare time was put to good use in a profitable venture and how working from home while performing domestic duties was an ideal working environment for them. Clearly, the group wishes to expand and earn more money, so they have decided to purchase a packaging machine worth INR 1,08,000. The funds were raised through a bank loan of INR 50,000 at 5% interest and member contributions of INR 58,000.
The group narrates how Udyogini’s field mobilizer informed them about the entrepreneurship training happening at the Yuva Compass Torpa centre and how participating in that training changed their lives for good. The pickle and papad-making training also taught them about entrepreneurship principles and the power collectives have for running this venture, as women alone are responsible for multiple family duties. The group also sought help from Udyogini in establishing the enterprise, learning about the bookkeeping method, developing retail connections, buying machines, and getting packaging material. As the group only consists of women, they know that they are limited to the location of Torpa, and, thus, support from Udyogini becomes a great deal of strength for them.
