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Today is the very first meeting with one of the 3 NGOs we’ll be visiting this week. Saroj Nalini Dutt Memorial Association

is a nearly 100-year-old NGO. The Saroj Nalini Dutt Memorial Association (SNDMA) was founded by Shri Gurusaday Dutt in 1925 after the death of his wife Smt Saroj Nalini Dutt. He did so to realize his late wife’s philanthropic vision. The main aim of this institution was to train helpless, needy women and transform them into independent, strong-minded individuals.

The association continues to pursue the fundamental objectives set by Shri Gurusaday Dutt. Some of these objectives are as follows:

• Educate women from low-income groups in both urban and rural areas.
• Set up structures for maternal and child healthcare, and teach hygiene, basic health principles and childcare to rural and urban women.
• Teach women about nutrition and family planning to improve their overall quality of life.
• Create and manage vocational training centers to improve the economic status of women.
• Working for the well-being of children through health, education and other development activities.
• Raising women’s awareness of their socio-economic status in society, with an emphasis on women in rural areas.

We met the members of the board: Aditi Choudhury, president; Aparna Ghose, secretary and Sreemoyee Ganguli, treasurer.

We spent a long time talking about their work with vulnerable women, and then visited their various workshops: weaving, printing and sewing, as well as the store where they sell their creations.

We then met the class of educated women. The oldest was over 60. She was in 1st class (the equivalent of CP for us). This woman is starting her literacy business because her husband is 80 and when he dies, she’ll have nothing left to support herself.