This Woman Is Helping Indian Rural Women Build Their Own Online Business

Picture Credit: Reuters

Highlights:

“I always wanted to make a difference in the community and not just be a passive member. When I was approached to be part of eSamudaay, it was almost instinctive that I had to do it.

“However, she revealed that when they ran campaigns to get entrepreneurs to join, none of them were women, which forced her to look at a special women-centric campaign to get them on board.

A lot of women from the smallest of cities and towns are already doing a lot of entrepreneurial work and have a good understanding of the needs of the city/town/locality.

There is a high awareness of digital platforms and how one can leverage it. They have an innate desire to help their community and the underprivileged.

The onset of COVID-19 pandemic has made businesses of all sizes and shape realise that if they’re not online, they’ll cease to exist. 

This has led to a massive rise in the number of businesses looking to grab a larger chunk of the market, and one company dubbed eSamudaay with its local e-commerce platform dubbed LCommerce, has been enabling entrepreneurs and businesses from small towns of India to do exactly this — come online quickly to survive and eventually flourish. 

Promoting Indian rural women’s businesses

However, most of these applicants showing interest in expanding their business are men. In order to encourage and train more women entrepreneurs, the company has introduced ‘Kamaal ke 10’ — A unique entrepreneurial program for women entrepreneurs who will receive special training and access to software to set up their own e-commerce marketplace.

We got to interact with Medarisha Lyngdoh, Chief of Core Operations at eSamudaay, who is the brains behind ‘Kamaal Ke 10’ initiative and how she’s trying to upskill women from less-urban parts of the nation to take control of their business. 

Coming from a matrilineal community

Medarisha Lyngdoh revealed how she was raised in a large family with seven siblings in the town of Shillong, Meghalaya. She shared how her tough childhood helped her be more independent, “It has made me a strong, independent and enterprising person. Toys and pocket money were very rare. I had to figure out ways to get what I wanted. For instance, as a child, I would collect maggie packets in exchange for board games. Other ways were to participate in multiple competitions to get prizes. I did my first summer job when I was 16. I wanted to grow beyond this small town and to do that I knew I had to dream bigger and find ways to achieve it.”

Being part of the matrilineal community, she saw what women are truly capable of, “I come from a matrilineal community where women are empowered much more than most societies. I have seen the tenacity of women who have built empires from abject poverty. We need to tap on this tenacity of women all over India, to take control and do something that will not only enrich them but their whole community as well. Women by nature are nurturers and who better than a woman to nurture the community, retain and bring out the best of it.”

Discovering the scarcity of women entrepreneurs

A Master’s Degree holder in Computer Applications from Benaras Hindu University, Lyngdoh revealed how she decided to join eSamudaay after working for tech conglomerates like Tata Consultancy Services, Fintellix Solutions, “I always wanted to make a difference in the community and not just be a passive member. When I was approached to be part of eSamudaay, it was almost instinctive that I had to do it.”

“eSamudaay provides an opportunity to impact the community positively. It is a revolutionary movement that strives to enable people to take control of their markets and not be taken over by a monopoly. People in tier 3 and tier 4 cities are losing out on so many things because of a lack of digital tools and awareness on how to use them to further improve their local economy. I was personally excited to be part of a movement to impact our community and country at large.”

However, she revealed that when they ran campaigns to get entrepreneurs to join, none of them were women, which forced her to look at a special women-centric campaign to get them on board, “When we ran the campaign to get entrepreneurs, we received thousands of applicants and none of them women. We knew that to empower a community one crucial aspect is to empower women. Therefore, we decided to encourage women to take up the challenge to be an entrepreneur via this program.”

She added, “The constraints women face are different from men and via this program, we want to help mitigate the constraint and empower them to be able to set up a business and become revenue generators not only for themselves but for the community they belong to. With the ‘Kamaal ke 10’ campaign our objective is having at least 30percent (hopefully 50 percent) of the LCommerce entities on eSamudaay to be woman-operated.

What does eSamudaay as a platform do?

Lyngdoh explained how eSamudaay provides a customisable platform, “As a consumer, I would love to be able to buy stuff online from local neighbourhood sellers/producers I know and trust. eSamudaay provides the ability to shop online from my local sellers/producers and still preserve the relationship and communication channel with these sellers. I know what I am getting and I know who and where to go if there is any problem.”

For a seller, producer, Lyngdoh added, “The eSamudaay’s technology platform provides the local entrepreneurs, producers, sellers, delivery agents with all the digital tools necessary to be able to run multi-seller, multi-category digital marketplaces in their community.”

A positive response from women entrepreneurs

We wanted to hear about the response that ‘Kamaal ke 10’ has received since its announcement. Medarisha Lyngdoh said, “We just launched the ‘Kamaal ke 10’ campaign a few days ago but the kind of response we are getting from women across India has come as a pleasant surprise and has validated our theory in many ways.”

“A lot of women from the smallest of cities and towns are already doing a lot of entrepreneurial work and have a good understanding of the needs of the city/town/locality. There is a high awareness of digital platforms and how one can leverage it. They have an innate desire to help their community and the underprivileged. They not only are looking for a business opportunity for themselves but are very keen to impact society,” concluded Lyngdoh.

This is undoubtedly an inspiring story from a woman who has achieved success to give back and enable other women business owners and women entrepreneurs to write their online success stories. More power to them all!

Article Credit: indiatimes