• Overview
• Objective
• Summary
• American Initiatives’ Involvement: How Your Donations Help
• Where We Want to End Up
• Photos

Country/ Geographic Area: India/Asia

Local Partner: Protsahan Charitable Trust

Project Duration:  24 month

Project Cofunder: CAN America Civic Banking

Overview

The level of education of Indian women is far lower than that of their male counterparts. Low female enrollment, coupled with a drop-out rate of 50% before secondary school, puts the literacy rate in India at 48% among females. With a population of over 1 billion, this leaves India with a staggering 245 million women who cannot read or write. Yet, as leaders of the household, it is crucial for Indian women to be educated to secure the health and education of their families. Informal non-agricultural work—which offers neither benefits nor security— constitutes an estimated 86% of total employment in India. Many young girls leave school and their rural villages to search for labor in cities like Gurgaon, in order to support their families. With no marketable skills, however, such women are often restrained to informal domestic work, for which—without regulations and laws to protect them—they are often underpaid and undervalued. The Kamalini Vocational Training Center begun as a pilot project in Shahpur Jat, an area of the capital city Delhi, in 2007. Its success led to the creation of a second center at Kishangarh, another urban village of Delhi, home to many immigrants from other parts of the country. In its first four years, Kamalini has served more than 350 women. The promoters have recently been able to acquire land to set up a new campus out the outskirts of Gurgaon, a district 32 km from New Delhi.

Objective

Kamalini is a response to the urgent need of supplemental educational and vocational institutions dedicated to underprivileged women, who are often victims of labor exploitation and abuses. It’s objective is to create a professional, secure center that will offer young women the opportunity to both complete their formal education – by taking Open School (continuing education) classes, extra tutorials, and English-speaking classes— as well as acquire technical skills such as sewing, hospitality, cooking and nutrition, and computer skills, so that they can obtain higher-paying and more dignified work. Kamalini aims to meet both the physical, mental and spiritual needs of its women, showing them the dignity they have often been denied.

Summary

By supporting the Kamalini Vocational Training Center, rural and underprivileged women will gain access to education and marketable skills, which will empower them in their personal and professional lives.

American Initiatives’ Involvement: How Your Donations Help

American Initiatives’ support for Kamalini will be geared toward the construction of the new campus near Gurgaon, which will include a residence hall for women coming from rural villages. This hall will also be used for coursework in the upcoming year-long Hospitality and Catering Services program.

Where We Want to End Up

Our desired results for project completion are:

• To contribute toward construction of the new center with high-quality teaching spaces and a hostel for residential courses.

• To help make the center a model project in eco-friendly characteristics of harvesting of water and solar energy, recycling of waste, and construction using natural light and ventilation to minimize energy requirements.

• To reach more than 620 women annually once the new center is fully functional, providing them with professional training and basic education.