In Latur, 14-year-old scripts an inspiring tale; teaches others to learn new ski

While National Girl Child Day is celebrated in India every year on January 24 to spread awareness among people about inequalities girls face in the Indian Society we get an inspirational story of a 14yearold Gita Karade from Dongargaon village in Jalkot taluka 100 kilometres from Latur district who studies in class nine in the villages Secondary Ashram school developed a skill on a borrowed mobile phone and is now empowering other girls in her village through it and has managed to make few hundred rupees of her own to continue with her studies as her parents daily farm labourers are struggling to have a living with a meagre daily wage of Rs 150 per dayGitarsquos parents Yamunabai and Rajkumar outside their home in Latur districtGitas family consists of five members including parents ndash father Rajkumar 45 mother Yamunabhai 36 an older sister Krisha 16 studying in class eleven and younger brother Karan 12 a class six student and Gita herselfldquoHer parents earn their living by working as daily wage farm labourers in the village itself And with three children to support they are always short on cash Their only means of survival is when they have a steady flow of work which in turn gives them some cash to buy food With no work there is no food The Karade family live in utter poverty in a small house which has no electricity nor any furniturersquosrdquo said Asha Gadkar 35 a local community social worker from neighbouring village who visit Dongargaon village four times in a week to giving counselling to adolescent girls from the village of which Gita is a memberldquoThe Corona pandemic outbreak and extended lockdown left the family in the lurch as they parents werenrsquot able to find any work and added to that was the famine that struck the district Our NGO Kalapandhari which is partnered with CRY provided them with regular ration during the last few months and they even had to borrow money from their neighbours in the village to meet their endsrdquo said Jaywant Jangapalle 30 who handle Management Information System MIS for the NGOFurthermore looking at her own parents without work Gita thought that it may be a good idea for her to learn something online and look for work that can also enable her to help her parentsKeeping this in mind Gita told the community organizer one day Tai everything is closed now schools are not open so I only have time If I get a mobile temporarily I will learn something through YouTube that will make me selfsufficient in the future recalled AshaAsha added ldquoShe Gita is a member of the adolescent girlrsquos group that we run in her village where we counsel young girls the importance of education and attending schools regularly as they come from poor families with no regular source of income Also we help these young girls to bring out their hidden talents by encouraging them to come up with ideas for skill development so that they can become selfreliant with possible guidance and supportrdquoldquoGita is a multitalented child with good grasping and creative quality She would watch the mobile videos for hours and within a few days was confident of making similar artwork but the challenge was she had no money to buy materials required for the decorative art piecesrdquo recalled JaywantHe added ldquoGita asked her mother to lend her Rs 200 for purchasing the decorative materials and the reply from her mother shattered her from within ndash I have no money and we owe money to our lendersrdquoAs lockdown began to lift work too began trickling in for her parents and Gita found herself opting to work with her parents on a nearby field to lend a hand to themShe worked on a cotton field picking cotton for three days and was finally able to afford to buy some materials like threads wool decorative pearls etc to create her products from the Rs 200 that she earnedGita ended up making four new items from the material that she boughtmdasha mobile bag a doormat a scarf and a veilInterestingly when Asha along with a few women from the villagersquos Self Help Group was paying a visit to Gitarsquos home she happened to see the items she had created and liked it The women accompanying her also loved her work and ended up purchasing them They themselves decided on pricing them and soon Gita sold all the items that were priced by these women from Rs 150 onwards to Rs 300Encouraged by this Gita has been creating many such pieces and not only selling them but also has been volunteering to teach the rest of the girls from the adolescent girlrsquos groupsWhen asked Asha how she managed her footing mobile bills as it was used to watch videos for hours she said ldquoI have an unlimited prepaid plan of 196 rupees which helps me to get 2GB of data free My otherwise use of mobile data is limited now with Gita also using the phone the data is hardly 15GB which still is affordable Had it been a postpaid plan it would not have been feasiblerdquoldquoMajhi gharache arthik paristhiti khup kamakuvat aherdquo My familyrsquos financial condition is very weak We stay in a small house with no electricity I like to go to school and make decorative items watching videos on my mobile phonerdquo said Gita speaking to MiDDAY from Latur When asked how much she earned from selling her decorative pieces Gita said ldquoI earned a few hundred rupees and even after buying a few more decorative materials I could save Rs 100 I want to buy a mobile phone Android phone cost Rs 9000 and I know I have to earn Rs 8900 more which will take a few more years But I will surely buy one phone so that I can continue watching videos and learningrdquoBut when informed that she doesnrsquot have electricity at home to charge the mobile phone she quickly replied ldquoMy grandmothers house has electricity She stays close to our village I will go to her to charge her phonerdquoIf it hadnt been for the lockdown I wouldnt have known I had the talent to create something like this I aim to become a teacher but want to continue developing my skills watching mobile videordquo said GitaHer parents say We are very proud of our daughter We never thought that she would earn money using her own merits We always thought that she would earn a living by working like us But now that our worries are gone our daughter is capable of standing on her own two feetrdquo said the mother YamunabhaildquoWe are very happy that at such a young age she is helping us by sitting at home without going to work in anyones fieldrdquo said an emotional fatherAt present Gita is going to school regularly as well as studying Gita says she wants to pursue higher education in the future and try for a government job as a teacher and if she doesnt get a job she wants to pursue the same business and use the money to pursue business management