VIA Lady Entrepreneurs’ Wing (LEW) organized a session on “Women Empowerment” by Jayshree Gawai, Deputy Director of DGGI on 12th Aug 2022 at VIA Auditorium, on the occasion of Installation of VIA LEW Team for the year 2022-23.
Gawai in her address stated that the essence of women empowerment is growing and learning together, having freedom to raise a voice, freedom to make choices, freedom in decision making and having financial independence. She discussed about many hurdles faced mind-set on the path of success such as a pathetic mind- set, lack of confidence and courage, safety at home, workplace and everywhere in her surroundings. Gawai took forward the discussion with the solutions to overcome them. She said that women must support each other and stand by each other. Education plays a vital role in women empowerment. She also said that women must try to break gender bias, and that she should never stop learning, utilize the opportunities before her and most importantly upskill herself so that she can overcome dependency on others.
VIA LEW Chairperson, Poonam Lala shared a brief roundup of the past events of the year and applauded her team for the educative and entrepreneurship activities undertaken by them. She also narrated the success story of annual flagship event Udyojika – An All Eves Exhibition, and the immense benefit derived for the participants. She also spoke about the vialewudyogika.com e-portal which was set up to facilitate vendors and members to do business and promote their products. She requested all to take maximum benefit of this portal. She praised the women entrepreneurs for their business acumen.
Vishal Agrawal, President of VIA in his address complimented the entire team by saying that their resembles dynamism, direction, decision and delivery for the kind of work they have done with absolute dedication. However, he expressed concern about recent statistics by the International Labour Organization (ILO) which shows a significant fall in the percentage of women in our workforce, thus causing gender disparity. He said that organizations like VIA LEW must come forward to address such issues and also take up the matter with authorities and try to find a solution.
Vishal Agrawal announced the new team of VIA LEW. Poonam Lala continues as Chairperson of VIA LEW. The other members are –
Founder Chairperson – Sarla Kamdar,
Advisory Committee – Prafullata Rode, Sarita Pawar & Madhubala Singh
Past Chairpersons – Chitra Parate, Y Ramani, Neelam Bowade, Anjali Gupta, Dr Anita Rao, Vandana Sharma, Shachi Mallick & Reeta Lanjewar
Immd Past Chairperson – Manisha Bawankar
Secretary – Rashmi Kulkarni
Vice Presidents – Indu Kshirsagar, Shikha Khare & Yogita Deshmukh
PRO – Poonam Gupta
EC Member – Saniya Ramchandani
At the outset, Chairperson Poonam Lala welcomed the Guest Speaker Jayshree Gawai. Neelam Bowade, Past President & Project Director conducted the program and Yogita Deshmukh, co-host & Treasure briefly introduced the chief guest.
Vishal Agrawal was also accorded a warm floral welcome by Chairperson Poonam Lala. Shikha Khare, Vice Chairperson LEW, summed up the session and formally proposed a vote of thanks.
Prominently present on the occasion were Founder Chairperson Sarla Kamdar, Advisory Committee Members – Madhubala Singh & Sarita Pawar, Past Chairpersons – Anjali Gupta, Neelam Bowade, Dr Anita Rao, Reeta Lanjewar, Shachi Mallick & IPP Manisha Bawankar, Vice Chairpersons – Shikha Khare & Yogita Deshmukh and many VIA members, budding entrepreneurs and students attended the session in large numbers on Facebook & Zoom.
