“Conventionally, people think that man should be the earning agent of each family. By bringing myself out of the conventional thought, I am contributing for my family wellbeing as an active earning member”-said Santona Khatun, 21 years of age, who is a participant of Garments Research Project which was being funded by Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) & International Development Research Centre (IDRC). This was an Experimental intervention, carried out by Dr. Abu Shonchoy, Dr. Selim Raihan & Dr.Tomoki Fujji. The intervention was aimed to explain the labor market dynamics and the associated growth and poverty-reduction linkages in Bangladesh. Santona Khatun is the eldest child of her parents who lives with her family at Uttar Bekatari the village, the village of Gaibandha district. Her father is a small trader who sales vegetables and other goods in different areas of the community. Before joining herself into the job, her father was only the earning member of the family who earned around five thousand BDT monthly. She is also a degree final year student is studying at Sundargonj Degree College. She witnessed herself with abject poverty since her father was in trouble to support an eight-member' family in a proper way by his insufficient income. She wanted to be demonstrative but had to keep herself withdrawn from participating in social events. The family also felt the hesitation to participate in social events. Desperately, she was looking for a job but wanted to continue her study also. In the meantime, she passed the SSC and admitted herself into a college. Due to poverty, She had to stop her study in the midst of 1st year of the college. But she couldn’t lose her hope to continue the study. Passionately, she was looking for something that could assist her to introduce with somewhat like skill training and all of a sudden she got a chance to be trained on sewing by Gana Unnayan Kendra (GUK) under the Garments Research Project. She was randomly selected for the 4th treatment group; a group provided training, stipend and a month-long paid internship in a factory. As per the study principle, she was taken to Dhaka immediately after the completion of 22 days of residential training on sewing and was given an internship opportunity in an apparel factory. After satisfactory performance during the internship, she was promoted later as a sewing machine operator in the same factory. She earned some money during the probation period and returned back to the village after six months of working. She resumed her study and passed the HSC. She got admission into the college for higher education. She was drawing down her savings. She bought a sewing machine from her deposited money and started tailoring in the village. She stayed almost one and a half years in the village but all the effort to get rid of poverty seemed ineffectual.
She went to Dhaka again using a referral and joined as Quality Inspector in another apparel factory. Since 2015, she has been working as a Quality Inspector and is earning around 12,000 BDT each month. Now she is making a financial contribution to her family by remitting monthly 6,000 BDT. She is happy now and feels honored to be part of the income-generating members of the family. Her family has already over-come the initial sufferings from poverty. She is also making her educational expense by own and has a cherished aspiration to see her family in higher status. She wants to get married after the completion of her graduation by family choices.
0 Comments