Empowered youth involved in Social work.

Venkateshwara Rao , a quiet youngster from Gowribindanur would easily pass  off for a normal young boy on the road with no one bothering to give him a  second glance. His father sold beedis to earn a livelihood. Being a drunkard  he was unable to fend for his family and did not bring home any cash.10  years back, when Venkateshwara was in his PUC, his father passed away.

His mother had to work as a coolie thereafter, to maintain the family.  Fortunately, his sister had been married earlier, but Venkateshwara had to  drop out of college when he was doing his 2nd Year BBM due to the financial  constraints.

He then came to Bangalore and worked for 5 years making silver articles  earning rupees Rs.3000 per month. He knew very little english and was very  conscious of the fact that he didn’t possess any abilities to be gainfully  employed and live with dignity. This pained him a lot. It was this time that  a friend told him about Unnati and its training program. He lost no time in  coming to Unnati and was exited at being chosen to train in the BPO stream.

Venkateshwara observed keenly and learnt all that was taught to him. His  self confidence grew by leaps and bounds as he learnt to speak in english  and was initiated in communication skills as well as life skills etc. On  completing the 3 month program, he joined ‘Samstha’— a micro finance  company,as a data entry operator, for a salary of Rupees 6000/- a month. At  present he sends Rs. 4000/-every month to his mother and has ensured that  she need not go out to work. He visits her once a week to ensure that all is  well back home.

Venkateshwara continues his quiet journey towards making a difference to  society by contributing to the extent possible by him to Samstha( for which  he works) which also gives loans to women to start small shops, beauty  parlors, small eateries etc. He also continues to help other young people by  recommending Unnati to them.

Training at Unnati has not only helped Venkateshwara to learn, earn and  stand tall, but also help others like him to do the same. He is one among  many youngsters trained at Unnati, going through his life with self esteem  and dignity.