350 rural and tribal Women got together to participate in the First Workshop of Hindustan Zinc’s women empowerment campaign “SAKHI”. The workshop was held at Vidhya Bhawan Auditorium in Udaipur today.

The workshop saw discussion and interactive sessions on changing scenario in the garments and home-furnishing market, development of handicraft industry, quality check in production, colour combination as per changing seasons, production as per current fashion trends and pricing of the products.

These rural women also expressed their concerns about the availability of raw material, need for upgraded training programs, and addition of new markets for selling products.

The interactive workshop was taken by Prof. Anuja Sisodia, Indian Institute of Craft Development. From Hindustan Zinc, Mr. CSR Mehta- Head Corporate Relations, Mr. Pavan Kaushik – Head Corporate Communications, Ms. Sushma Sharma – Incharge CSR_HZL also spoke about various aspects of socio-economic empowerment in rural and tribal women.

Prof. Anuja Sisodia, who took the interactive workshop on designing, colour combination, quality checks, finishing and customer analysis, also spoke about matching production with market trends. She said, it is important to follow market trends to make the products more saleable and get the right price. Prof. Sisodia also showed samples to bring clarity on finishing and quality in products.

Mr. CSR Mehta emphasized on developing a collective force of these women under “SAKHI” banner so that they can command the right price and market their products in new markets. He also emphasized on quality checks in products.

Mr. Pavan Kaushik particularly highlighted the hard work being done by these rural and tribal women and said that the need was to put that extra bit effort towards creativity and innovative products.

Ms. Sushma Sharma assured these women of full support from Hindustan Zinc in resolving their issues so that these women can bring better quality products and enhance their income.

Hindustan Zinc has recently launched its campaign “SAKHI” which will help these rural and tribal women to become a collective force under a single umbrella, have interactive discussions, share market knowledge and get more exposure, to ultimately become more social and economically empowered.

It is said, when you empower a rural and tribal women, you in-turn make a family socially and economically independent, thereby energizing a complete village and ultimately contributing towards progress of a nation. Rural women have always proved their metal and strength in every sphere of life. May it be house-hold work, agriculture, handicrafts, tailoring, traditional crafts or liberal arts, rural women of India have always been in front and have even dominated the global fashion industry with their traditional art and skills.

The campaign “SAKHI” has been launched through blog which uploads success stories of these women. Another platform for discussion, deliberations and knowledge sharing has been launched through facebook page.

Besides 6,000 women and volunteers of Hindustan Zinc’s self-help-groups , about 4,500 people from various fields have also joined the campaign.