SEWA - Success Stories
"Have you saved the data?": Chandrika and Shobna
 ... This enquiry by Chandrikaben to the girls from whom she was taking on the computer to operate was like passing an impromptu exam. It somehow displayed her level of comfort and knowledge with computers. She says, "Earlier when I used to come to the center I would just wonder as to what a computer was and thought that it was something beyond me, but now after having done the course, whenever I come to the center, I am on the lookout for a computer that is free so that I can practice!"
Computers are everywhere, whether we go to buy medicines or tickets. My children are also learning computers at school and as a mother I want to be able to teach them and also earn something
--Shobna, Surendranagar, Gujarat
Chandrikaben and Shobnaben, from Ganjarvav village, Dhrangahdra, Surendranagar, are close friends, who did the computer course together in November 2005. Explaining why she did the computer course Shobnaben says, "Computers are everywhere, whether we go to buy medicines or tickets. My children are also learning computers at school and as a mother I want to be able to teach them and also earn something."
Chandrikaben recounts how people would laugh and deride their doing a computer course. "Computers are for the young, what are you doing trying to learn computers," people would say. Both Shobna are Chandrika are over 35 years of age with adolescent children, thus doing the course was not easy for them given family opposition because of the lack of perception about the utility of the course. "Now that we have finished this course other girls in the village want to do it also," says Shobnaben. "When I used to take the print out of what I learnt in the center my in-laws became very happy and did not say anything after that," quips Chandrika, on being asked how she handled the family opposition.
Doing this course has opened new avenues for employment for these two ladies. Chandrikaben was doing tailoring for supplementing her income but never managed to earn beyond Rs 200 per month. Being computer literate helps them get employment under the e-gram yojana launched by the Gujarat government under which each Panchayat is due to get a computer and all the village records will be maintained.
SEWA has given the list of women trained by them to the government and requested that these women be given employment under this program and the women will be able to earn up to Rs 1,000 per month.
After having done the computer course, the women have become a kind of an asset to the village and the sarpanch invites them to the gram sabha meetings and for any other meeting that takes place in the village and depends upon them to spread message among other village women.
Mukesh, husband of Chandrikaben, says that he did not initially like his wife doing the course as she would be away for the whole day and there were things to attend to in the house. But now that she has done the course he is wondering how she will keep in touch and remember what she has learnt unless she practices regularly. Till the computer in the Panchayat gets operational she will have to come to the center to practice.
"Mastering the keyboard was very difficult, but we have done that and we can now draft letters in Gujarati and also do data entry in English," says Shobna. Both the women said that post this program, they can help their children with their studies, which earlier they could not do so. "Now we discuss their question papers with them and our children also like the fact that we are taking more interest in their studies."
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