Innovation

She Kunj is an online learning platform free for all (with offline classes). She Kunj functions without charging for its services. Providing free training removes financial barrier to education. This enables women to resume careers after a break. She Kunj connects women to job openings in full-time, part-time, work-from-home, freelance, and returnee internship positions.

Initially, the idea was to provide free education to women during pandemic in 2020. She Kunj is a part of R Dot group of companies which involves IT Services, Recruitment Solutions, Audio & Acoustics. She Kunj used to operate through the group’s retained earnings. There were times during pandemic when other arms of their business did not generate profits and She Kunj could not afford to pay its trainers’ salaries. The founders themselves went to teach the courses. Giving their valuable time for the sake of continuity of training. The founder, Rahul Bhargava, thought of implementing a business model that will generate required cashflow to keep his services free. This is how She Kunj transitioned to a for-profit business for the benefit of society.

“Our purpose is to bring open source of learning to women and girls and contribute to closing the knowledge gap as well as gender gap.” (https://www.shekunj.com/about)

The vison is to help women realise their dreams on their own. According to WEF Gender gap report 2022 the rate of female participation in the labour force (LFPR) is only 19.23%, compared to 70.09% for men. “The fall in women’s LFPR should make us turn the spotlight on the nature of work availability, especially non-farm opportunities” according to Indian express. This is where She Kunj steps in to provide skills that are demanded by the industry like python, java etc. Providing opportunities to women to learn. Providing counselling and guidance to connect them with jobs.

Inspiration

Main inspiration came in COVID when the whole education sector was disrupted as the poor’s especially the girls were deprived of their education.

To make the girls educationally stable and financially independent was the main reason for starting this organisation. In this they cover the SDG’s 3,4 & 8. With education they also focus on the well being of women for which they have team of more than 52 doctors empanelled with the organization. They organize different workshops all over India to raise awareness about different types of Cancer. In education domain till now they have certified 20780+ women in age group of 16 to 52 yrs. in different domains among them 4000+ women are working in good companies. Under SDG 8 they are working with women entrepreneurs to help them secure funding’s under different government schemes and providing technical skills that help them earn good money.

“When we teach the women some technical skills, rather than being a labour she can work as skilled employee with good salary.”

Overall impact

Shekunj works towards 3 initiatives namely Imparting Siksha (Education), building awareness on Swasthya (Health) and Spreading Samriddhi (Prosperity).

The shiksha initiative has empowered women to be self-sufficient and confident. It has assisted Indian women in resuming as well as nurturing their careers. In addition to creating more than 4000 jobs, the Shiksha initiative has assisted more than 20700 women in acquiring modern technical skills. under the swasthya initiative team shekunj organises free workshops and awareness sessions on breast and cervical cancer in collaboration with 52+ doctors and the samriddhi initiative has assisted more than 45 rural women in connecting with various government schemes.

Business benefit

Woman are involved in family activities (Care work and economic work i.e., farm activities). Her contribution to economic work would not be paid. In such a case, it is highly likely that she would not be seen as a worker, neither by her family nor by herself.

Women’s economic empowerment acts against poverty. Financially independent women can walk away from abuse. Gender equality reduces violence against women.

"Since childhood, we have seen that our moms manage many tasks without any complaints. During my entrepreneurial journey, I have roamed almost every part of India and seen distressing conditions for women. Due to a lack of knowledge and awareness about their status among the public, women are still lag in some areas. sometimes the anguish is also exacerbated by the age-old practices and traditions still observed today. Because of the society they brought in, women in rural areas have reached a point where they have either stopped caring for themself or just accepted that their fate is this. So, I decided to create an ecosystem where women can feel accepted and equally valued. I started exploring ways to empower women and couldn't find a more beneficial way than EDUCATION!"

~Rahul Bhargava, Founder SheKunj

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Social and environmental benefit

SheKunj has been able to provide support to women who have never thought that they would be able to make a living for themselves, just by sitting at home.

Societal development starts from the most basic element, which is a household. The courses like affiliate marketing had offered the females an opportunity to generate an additional income of about Rs. 1 Lakh.

This, in turn, helps women become more independent & have a say in family decisions, which helps them to have an option to move out of abusive marriages or other issues which they might not be able to address due to extreme dependency on male counterparts. On the other hand, this helps share the financial burden of male of the family, & hence, improve living conditions & enhance lifestyle.

Interviews

Rahul Bhargava, Founder

Rahul Bhargava, Founder

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