Anand Kumar, Chartered FCSI, set up the Kusum Foundation to help lift students out of poverty by teaching them vocational skills
by Lora Benson MCIPR, CISI head of media
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“During lockdown the training was suspended. Now classes have resumed around government guidelines – sanitiser, mask and social distancing,” says Anand, of the Covid-19 measures put in place at the vocational education and training establishment he founded in 2008 in Bihar, eastern India: the Kusum Foundation.
The Foundation, which The Review first covered in February 2011, has, like many educational establishments, had to deal with the fallout of the pandemic. But Bihar, India’s third largest state by population, is facing greater challenges than most during this time, with an unemployment rate of 12.7% – greater than the national unemployment rate of 9.1%. Given these challenging demographics, the Foundation’s work is even more crucial now.
Read our February 2011 piece on the Foundation
Through education, the Foundation focuses on empowering underprivileged students aged 18–30 who live within a 20-mile radius of the rural epicentre of Bihar, the village of Katesar. It offers heavily subsidised vocational skills in ICT, sewing, embroidery and art. “The poorest of the poor come and learn skills,” says Anand.
Back in 2011, the Foundation had 6 local people on its staff, 13 computers, 15 sewing machines and one embroidery machine. Fast forward to 2021 and these numbers have risen to 9, 30, 25 and 4 respectively. Since its inception in 2008, over 5,000 students have attended its courses, 60% of whom are girls. “Girls are encouraged by government, society and family to study to acquire skills to become independent,” says Anand. “The government of Bihar has provided bicycles to all school-going girls and there is a new desire and optimism among girls to excel and be self-reliant. Girl students cycle to the Foundation, often covering distances of six to seven kilometres.”
"The poorest of the poor come and learn skills"Anand was inspired to set up the Foundation after an encounter in Bihar in 2007: “I learnt that the primary school I had attended in Katesar was struggling to accommodate the growing number of pupils. I became involved in constructing an extra building for the school, accommodating an additional 600 pupils. I started to get to know the students and discovered their IT literacy skills were extremely low. I asked one student to forward me his CV and discovered that he didn’t know how to write an email address. This was the moment I knew I had to set up the Foundation.”
Its website is a positive showcase for the NGO’s work and, Anand says, is in the final stage of three upgrades. It includes a 13-minute mini-documentary video, featuring a journey through the Foundation, interviews with young men and women in the IT suite and those working with sewing machines producing exquisite fabrics and embroidery.
Anand is a non-executive director and board member of Union Bank of India (UK) and First Microfinance Bank, Afghanistan. His career in financial services has taken him around the world, but he has lived in Harrow, London for the past 17 years.
He tries to visit the Foundation two or three times a year: “I am in continual contact with teachers, particularly two senior teachers, through an app installed on my phone connected to the cameras at the Foundation. This allows me to access classrooms on an ongoing basis and see the work of the teachers and students in action.” His enthusiasm and dedication to the Foundation is further evidenced by the fact that his personal contact details are featured on the website, for anyone looking for further information or to engage in supporting the Foundation.
Apart from the recent adaptations required to ensure the safety of students and staff during the pandemic, the main challenges the Foundation faces include “finding more ways and means to connect our students to employment” and operating with a “frustrating” lack of internet bandwidth.
But these challengers are inconsequential compared to the satisfaction Anand feels from enabling students “from the bottom of the pyramid” to attain vocational skills and gain employment or even start their own businesses. “Ladies from the Foundation often start their own boutiques, gaining independence and working with well-earned respect and dignity. Seeing those students succeed is a good feeling.”
This article is published in the January 2021 flipbook edition of The Review magazine.