Gandhinagar: Tribal women in Chhotaudepur district of Gujarat can be seen smiling more frequently than ever nowadays. In the afternoon, having finished their household chores, farming and dairy activities, they don’t take rest, but get ready for another mission. They walk together confidently on an endeavor to become financially independent, all confident, excited and joyous.

Chhotaudepur, a tribal dominated district with most of its area covered under forest, is home to a large dairy industry. Most of the people are engaged in agriculture and dairy farming. On being posted as DC Chhotaudepur, Stuti Charan, IAS, noticed that the women in the district, despite being hardworking and being involved in all major activities, have little or no financial independence. They have to be independent of their male counterparts for any kind of transactions.

This was when the idea of SWATAH came to the District Administration. SWATAH, which stands for Smart Women Adopting and Harnessing Technology, is an initiative to empower tribal women with financial literacy and make them self-independent.

Started on February 17, 2023, the initiative aims to provide all sorts of practical knowledge and hand on training to women on all aspects of financial and banking skills. They are trained to open bank accounts, write cheques, do ATM transactions and avail other services, use online banking applications, withdraw money, make digital payments, use debit cards, among other services. They are also taught the importance of cyber security.

“Two to three camps are organized every week in which women from all age groups participate. Each batch accommodates 35 women, to avoid overcrowding and pay individual attention to each woman. We also conduct two types of tests, a pre test to check their basic knowledge about banking, and a post test after training, to see how much they have learned. Tests are taken on both computers and android phones.The responses to these camps have been really good, with over 700 trained women in a month,” Stuti Charan, District Collector, Chhotaudepur, told Bureaucrats India.

The project has been initiated with no such capital investment. The district administration takes help of various concerned departments for outreach and organizing camps. There are correspondents in the banks which contribute immensely by giving practical training to women. Bank managers have also come forward to support the initiative towards financial inclusion. 

Also some of the trainees become volunteers to share the knowledge further by training other women. 

“What’s heartening is to see the excitement on their faces. The women from all age groups participate. Elderly women also encourage their daughter-in-laws and daughters to participate in camps. This is what we were looking for. We have taken up this project with minimum resources in a tribal district. We just want to create a knowledge base and leverage it further to educate all women in the district. When women express their happiness saying that they have always waited for this opportunity to learn, it gives us immense pleasure. This is just a beginning, we have a lot to do,” Stuti Charan informed further. /BI/