Jun 27, 2022
Away from the Hassle: Sunita’s Story
Hailing from Pithoragarh, Sunita Arya has been working on organic products and providing handicraft training to women in her village for over 2 years. Coming from the mountains, Sunita lives in a very picturesque place surrounded by hills and trees from all sides.
But it is not just the place where Sunita lives which is beautiful and healing. Sunita’s passion and work are equally inspiring. Sunita is an entrepreneur but has multiple passions and interests and diligently contributes to home and farm care, like every other member of her family. She spends time caring for lambs, the cow, and her dog, doing chores, and stitching. Sunita is also a farmer, runs a sewing centre for women, and is a para-legal volunteer. She does not want to become an entrepreneur at the cost of killing her dreams.
Farming is a way of life for more than half of India’s population and the contribution of women in agriculture often gets forgotten. Although stitching is her passion, Sunita is also involved in farming for her family.
For women, especially rural women, passion often gets lost in the hustles and bustles of life. For Sunita, stitching is her passion and she wants to pursue her passion as more than a hobby. She prides herself on being a speedy Gonzales at the sewing machine. She has also been a master trainer with R-SETI, a popular NGO working across the region.
Sunita has a sewing centre which is a single room with 6 machines that were donated to her to appreciate the work she does with the community.
Sunita stitches each bag and starts off by drawing graphs freehand. Her bags are all made by rural women and follow traditional pahadi designs and crafts. She wants to procure business from local government bodies or NGOs like R-SETI to expand her market base further.
Currently, Sunita is focused on helping the women around her in generating monetary benefit for themselves by procuring orders. She is also planning to expand her business by registering the SHG, keeping accounts, marketing, understanding customer experience, etc.
Sunita has entrepreneurial aspirations, but they are different from an entrepreneur hailing from urban spaces. While she dreams of bringing back the ‘potli’ bag, a bag traditionally carried by brides at weddings, she is in no hurry in expanding her business. Sunita has also been working on aipan, a traditional pahadi handicraft style, but she is not stressed about earning much from her passion. She is open to her business growing in capacity, sales, and name. Things happen gradually, she says.
Sunita is clear about wanting to balance all her roles. During the wheat harvest season, the women remain out in the fields and the sewing centre remains closed for around 15 days.
Sunita remains calm and hopeful that they will resume their stitching classes soon after the season. The bustling of life does not end for her, and she will always be a busy person playing multiple roles.
Sunita dreams that someday she will have a thriving sewing/bag making business. IABT’s Margshala programme that she is an alumna student of, helped her realize the importance of marketing her products and running her venture, even if not like an “urban entrepreneur”.
Different from an urban entrepreneur, Sunita will always be busy doing many things apart from managing her business. And she is okay with that. Amidst the calm of the hills and the hectic rural life, her gradual dream of having a thriving sewing and bag-making business is still blooming.
