From Darkness to Light...

An NGO in Chennai, by the name Nethrodaya, is giving a new lease of life to visually impaired women by helping them to earn a living and become independent. One such beneficiary is forty-six-year-old Kasthoori, a mother of two who sells needles, nail cutters and stationery items on trains. With the finance obtained from the NGO, she is able to purchase her products that she sells in trains to earn a living. She makes around Rs 600-700 a day. Kasthoori who is able to see only shadows lost her eyesight at the age of six. Yet she is a determined woman who works hard for a living and supports her two daughters- one is doing her MBA and the other is in Class 11. C Govindakrishnan, founder of Nethrodaya said that there are more than 300 such visually impaired women across the state. These women desire to be self-reliant, but when they approach banks for loans, they get discouraged by the various procedural issues. Nethrodaya helps such women by providing them with the necessary finance with which they can buy and sell products so that such helpless women do not resort to begging. They conduct interviews and provide help to the deserving women so that they become self-employed.