At present Tapuriaghatta Nari Unayan Kendra can be contacted for supply of following products

Hand embroidered items

(Bags, File folders, Ladies dresses, sofa back covers, table covers etc.)

Tapuriaghatta is a fishing village within the city limits of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. The city of Kolkata is the capital of the state West Bengal. The village has a youth club and a community hall. There is a temple near the village. Community water taps are present. There is a primary school but no health checkup facility is there. One fishery co-operative is also present. Only few women members are there in fishery co-operative who have been included on comapssionate grounds.

A research project entitled "Conceptual framework of a working model of a women fisher group at a selected village in West Bengal" is under progress by Central Institute of Fisheries Education, (CIFE), Kolkata Centre, (Deemed University), Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). Principal Investigator of this project is Ms. Arpita Sharma, Scientist, Central Institute of Fisheries Education. (arpita_sharma@yahoo.com), This village was selected for the purpose of the study due to the reasons like manageability and expressed local interests.

Sensitisation of women fishers towards working in groups, formation and registration of society formed:

During village visits, home visits, various meetings, focused group discussions women have been sensitized to form groups and work in groups. (See photo gallery). A ‘Women Fisher Group’ was formed with Board of Directors elected by women fishers themselves. After the group was formed and Index of cohesiveness was determined after three months of its formation by asking if they would like to stay in the group. This value was found to be 0.95.

Women have named the group as ‘Tapuriaghatta Nari Unyan Kendra’. The word 'Nari' means woman, 'Unyan' means upliftment and 'Kendra' means centre. This society is functioning very well with most of the members belong to schedule castes and schedule tribe section. After applying for the registration, it is a great achievement that ‘Tapuriaghatta Nari Unyan Kendra’ has been registered on 10.01.02 by the Certificate of Registration of Societies, West Bengal Act XXVI of 1961. Its registration number is S / IL / 7367.

In most of the families head of the family is a male (husband or father). Age at the time of marriage was 19 years and age at the time of I child was 22.5 years. (Figure 2)

A total of 61.6% did not have a desire of male child during pregnancy. Only 26.66% of the male members of the family did not habits of smoking/alcohol. Most of the male members are involved in fishing related activities.

Though, table 2 presents the income information but it was reported by the women that 40% of the head (male) were contributing full income to the family. (Figure 5)

As clear from table 5, the component ‘Infrastructure’ is assigned an average score of 50. In the component namely ‘Infrastructure’ a total of 12 subcomponents have been identified by them and each have been assigned scores so that the total is 50. The 12 subcomponents with the assigned scores are given in table 6.

Table 6: Subcomponents of the problem component ‘Infrastructure’ with the assigned scores by women fishers

‘Financial component’ has been assigned a score of 20, Personal component was assigned a score of 20 and had two subcomponents namely, ‘family and child care’ and ‘alcoholism habit of men folk’. The component ‘unemployment’ was assigned the score of 10.

Training needs of women

Trainings imparted by CIFE Kolkata Centre:

• Preparation of Jute File Folders, embroidery, stitching
• Carp Breeding and Nursery Management
• Preparation of Value Added Products

Trainings organised by other organizations and attended by women:

Women have been sensitized to attend training programmes organised by other organisations to earn knowledge and skills. Like they have participated in ‘candle making’, çhalk making’ training programmes.

Utilization of training for economic activities:

The president along with the women of this kendra are also actively participating in social welfare related activities like

* Participation in aids awareness programmes

The project is having a significant positive effect on the women of the community.

With this model of women fishers society being a successful venture a conceptual framework of a working model for a women fishers society is being presented as follows:

For more information you can refer to following publications;

• Sharma A. and Radha. C. Das (2001) ‘Functional Training for women in fisheries’ AQUACULT, Vol: 2, No.2, Page:159-162.
• Sharma A. and Radha. C. Das (2001) ‘Small Scale Business Potentials of Value Added Products for Women Fishers for Economic Development’ for International symposium on ‘Fish for nutritional security in the 21^st century’, Published in the contributed abstracts CA 108 Page: 224.
• Sharma A., Radha C. Das, U.K. Maheshwari, S.N. Ojha, P.S. Pandey, Madhumita Mukherjee and S.A. Quasim (2001) ‘Successful case study of co-operation of scheduled castes and scheduled tribe women fishers resulting in socio-economic empowerment’ for ‘International conference on Women in Fisheries’ (Abstract)
• Sharma A. (2001) ‘Participation of women fishers in fishery co-operatives’ published in the seminar on Indian Fisheries: Status & Prospects in Relation to Environmental Dynamics’ on 3^rd to 5^th March 2001, at Dept of Zoology, University of Jammu, Jammu. (Abstract)
• Sharma A. (2001) Gender in fisheries – A Perspective, Indian Society of Fisheries Professionals, Vol: 3 No. 4, Page:14-17
• Sharma A. (2001) Gender bias in fishery literature, Fishing Chimes Vol: 21 No. 3 Page: 35-36.
• Sharma A. (2001) Sahakarita, Unnat Krishi,
• Sharma A. and S.K. Sharma (2001) ‘Working Model of a Women Fisheries Co-operative’ – Pamphlet