Not for nothing has the Kottukal community development society (CDS) of Kudumbashree earned a good name for itself.
The CDS which has been adjudged one of the best Kudumbashree CDSs has succeeded in making one woman of each below-the-poverty line family in Kottukal panchayat a member of the Kudumbashree, says Kottukal CDS chairperson Prasanna Kumari S.
When she took over as chairperson in January 2018, they had been bagging the award for best CDS in the district since 2010.
With her two-decade-long experience in the Kudumbashree network, Ms. Prasanna Kumari kept up the good work. She was not disappointed, and says they will bag the award for the third time on the trot in 2021 too.
With Kottukal largely an agricultural village, the CDS has formed the members into farming joint liability groups and made available to them bank loans, interest subsidy, seeds and so on, so as to retain at least 90% of farmer families in the agricultural sector.
The coastal areas too have witnessed a change. From the days when the women had no idea of what how to start a venture or the technical knowledge required to launching microenterprises such as fish processing, dry fish, fish pickle, curry powder, and even beauty parlours, things have come a long way. The coastal wards alone have 127 neighbourhood groups. All of them have been provided a revolving fund of ₹15,000, she says.
An amount of ₹5 lakh received as part of the ‘Ini Njangal Parayaam’ reality show in 2015 has been utilised for purchasing utensils and table chairs.
Twenty-one of 36 Haritha Karma Sena members have been registered as a microenterprise unit to make paper bag and cloth bags for sale. They also provide food catering services in uniform.
Besides 89 Balasabhas, the CDS has formed 42 elderly neighbourhood groups for the protection of senior citizens.
Community kitchen during the early days of the pandemic, Janakeeya Hotel, awareness programmes, medicine delivery, food for those in home quarantine in containment zones were some of the COVID-19 related activities undertaken.
Campaign launched
On Sunday, the CDS launched Karuthal, a product-marketing campaign to support microentrepreneurs and farming groups who faced losses during the pandemic.
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