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Profiles of Single Women and their Struggles |
| SUTRA has collated svereal case studies on the struggles single women face in pursuit of security and sustenance in Himachal Pradesh |
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Chameli Devi
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 Hemlata Devi
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Jai Devi |
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Lata Devi
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Radha Devi
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Savitri Devi
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Vidya Devi
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Vinay Mittal
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 Vidya Devi
Vidya Devi is 49 years old, from Bagwani in the district of Bilaspur. When she was 18 years old her marriage was arranged. 20 days before the wedding her brother died unexpectedly, so the wedding had to be postponed.
When she went to her in-law's house, they started to harass her. Her husband used to work in Shimla, so most of the time he was out of home and she was left alone with his relatives, so she decided to go back to her parent's place until her husband took her to live with him in Shimla, but since he was away so often, they decided that she should go back to her parent's place again. There Vidya Devi had to take care of her aged parents and her kids, so she was homebound. Around that time she started making shawls.
Back at her home, she did not hear from her husband for three months, she later found out that he was missing. Her son was two and a half years and her daughter was nine months old when her husband disappeared 28 years ago. Until this day, nobody exactly knows how her husband had disappeared, even though his parents tried to find out more. Vidya Devi says that since she had two small children, she could not invest a lot of time and energy in the search of her husband, even today she hopes she will be happy to know that he is alive and fine.
Today, she successfully runs her shawl business with the help of her daughter-in-law. When she bought the first weaving machine, she got a loan from the government but she eventually paid it all back. She hopes that she will get the chance to teach other women also how to make shawls, but to realise this idea, Vidya Devi would need more machines and thus again some support from an organisation or the government to start up, but eventually she is determined to be independent from any financial support to help herself and others. To date, Vidya Devi simply sells shawls directly from her home where she manufactures them or does some repairing work on clothes and bed sheets.
Her neighbours harassed her earlier, criticising her for being alone and in her mother's place instead of staying with the in-laws. She says that some people do not give her work because of her personal life rather than because of concern about quality.
Her immediate neighbours are not too happy with her being in her parent's place either, but for a different reason: Since Vidya's parents are quite old, the neighbours might have had a good opportunity to take over the property after the parent's death, but now that Vidya Devi personally lives there, and it is in her control, it is different.
Overall Vidya Devi says, the amount of shawls she sells shows that many people support what she is doing.
Apart from being in the ENSS, which she came to know about through Chameli Devi, she is also a member of a health organisation.
Vidya Devi just hopes that she will soon be able to start teaching other women about making shawls, since she feels she could make a difference for some women and help them to generate income.
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