Interview with a woman living in rural India
“The technique of spinning is a skill which I inherited from my mother. It was considered as an asset, something a girl needed to master so she would be able to take care of an income on her own,” says Suneeta. “I started learning how to spin at the age of six.”
Suneeta, now 42 years old, spins organic cotton yarns for SPOKSS in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. She works on the so-called kesan charkha, a ‘farmers’ spinning tool’, which is foldable and easy to carry.
“When I was young, life was clearly organized in my mother’s household,” Suneeta remembers. “Spinning from 4AM until 8AM, keeping house until 10 o’clock and after that working on the fields if there was any work to be done. After that, spinning for two hours again, and around 7PM, it was bedtime.”
The town where Suneeta grew up is about 60 km from the small village Dariyamau where she has lived since her marriage.
“I married when I was 18. We lived in a mud house and for me there was nothing else to do but housekeeping. There was no work for spinners. Only five years back I got the opportunity to start working for SPOKSS. Now I live in a newly built brick house together with my two daughters Kushi (11) and Mahee (7). We share a household with the sister of my mother-in-law and my oldest sister-in-law.”
When a Women on Wings expert was in Dariyamau a few months ago to consult with SPOKSS, which sells its products under the brand name KOSH – the treasure of khadi, she met Suneeta and her oldest daughter Maheema (20). While Maheema is set to go to university, Maheema demonstrated the art of spinning which she inherited as a precious asset from her mother. Since the interview, Maheema has married and moved to Delhi where her future husband lives.
Asked how a regular income changed her life and that of her family, Suneeta shared. “I now can give myself and my daughters the opportunity to follow our dreams. For Maheema I was able to save money for her marriage, and while I only went to school up to the fifth grade, I made sure she finished the 12th grade.”
She continued, “With this education Maheema can make her dream come true in Delhi: go to university to study social science and become a teacher. My dream is different. With the money earned, I want to buy a piece of land nearby to grow mint and poppy. Mint is used to make oil and for poppy I am in the process of getting a license for that first.”
Suneeta was the first woman in the community who volunteered to spin yarns for SPOKSS. Now she has taken up the job as a supervisor. She checks the quality of the cotton yarns, makes sure everyone gets her share of cotton and does a good spinning job.
“I would like to work even more, and I also like the idea of becoming an entrepreneur myself. We are now talking about how we can work on a certain entrepreneurship level with SPOKSS. If we can learn to make our own rates for the different qualities of yarn, we learn to become self-sufficient, and this is something future proof. If something would happen to our employer, we know how to move on.”
Her husband isn’t so much part of Suneeta’s story because he is absent most of the time. “My husband works as a shopkeeper in Lucknow. His employer takes care of food and lodging. Only four days a month will he come to Dariyamau,” Suneeta explains.
Suneeta and all other women of the community who spin for SPOKSS now have a healthcare card for free medical treatment, a bank account and even a provident fund account: 15% of their income, supplemented with 15% from their employer is deposited into this account for their pension.
