Reward Partner Profile — Project Mishran
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Rajasthan— For families of India’s historically marginalized Sansi caste, who find their home in the desert region of Rajasthan, economic opportunities are scant. Even fewer are opportunities for women in this socio-economic group to make an income independent of their families. While many of the community’s men make a living as migrant workers moving to larger cities to find work in construction, as street cobblers, or similar low-paying occupations, just as many women are left in ancestral villages expected to simply maintain the home and family.
The Mishran Coop is a project aiming to change that. Through a twin-horned approach, Mishran is able to provide sustainable, independent income to Sansi women as well as funds to support the education of the children of this community. There is a vast discrepancy in quality between publicly and privately funded schools in the area where many Sansi families live. As a low-caste community they very often lack the financial resources to access private schooling, which results in the cyclical perpetuation of these socio-economic divisions.
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The crafting of Kantha quilts—colorful, thin, layered throw blankets with intricate stitching—originated in India’s eastern states as a way to reuse old saris and scraps of fabric. While these quilts have recently become a Pinterest sensation, their local origins run deep, and they have long been an important way for poor families to repurpose scrap into something both beautiful and useful.
The Sansi women that Mishran Coop works with have been making these quilts for generations, and it can take up to two weeks for a woman to produce a single product. Mishran works with these women to sell quilts in the U.S. and other countries. Half of the proceeds go directly to the women as income, while the other half goes to a community fund to pay for the children’s schooling.
Meet sisters Ruki and Sunita. Here, they are packing to move back to their home villages of Rajgarh and Churu to begin working with the Mishran Coop. Since there is little work in the villages, they had been living in a migrant camp in a city dump in Jaipur while begging for alms to sustain themselves.
Women of their caste traditionally beg for their income, but Ruki and Sunita are hoping to change that: they are making quilts and other textiles for the Coop so that their children can get an education and avoid a life of begging and migrant labor. You can learn more about the Mishran Coop on Facebook.
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At Via News, we’re thrilled to be able to partner with the Mishran Coop to offer Kantha quilts and other textiles as a reward tier in our ongoing fundraiser. If you make a contribution of $200 or more, you can choose to receive a textile product from the Coop, and support the women and children of this community.