Chulala: A priceless broom
Sarvendriyanam
Nayanam Pradnam said.
There
are many ways to live with any handicap a person is born with.
But
without the nayanas (eyes) which are the main senses, life is dark.
It
is said that even if a person has a disability, the mind should not have a
disability. There are many people in our society who overcome the deficiency
and achieve amazing achievements despite having an organ deficiency. Blindness
was defeated by the willpower of such inspiring blind women. "Lakshmi
Menon" is the self-confidence that drives it forward. Moreover, they have
been given self-employment with skill training in working without worrying
about the feeling of inferiority complex of having no eyes. He continues to
live with self-confidence regardless of his blindness.
Lakshi
Menon hails from Cochin, Kerala. A designer and businessman by profession.
Lakshmi Menon runs a company called 'Pure Living' in Cochin. The main objective
of this organization is to spread awareness in the society about the importance
of green living and provide livelihood to the poor. Ammummathiri / Wixdom
Project by Lakshi Menon is crowdsourcing many women living in old age homes and
orphanages in the state of Kerala.
Lakshi
Menon created a project called "Pen with Love" with a brand new idea.
Pens made of paper with the sole purpose of reducing the use of plastic for
environmental protection. This project will provide livelihood to 30 women.
This program for environmental protection has been successful all over the
state of Kerala.
"Orange
Alert" warning system is designed to avoid road accidents.
Apart
from this, he took up many other programs and got a recognition for himself.
- · Amitabh Bachchan was felicitated by Amitabh Bachchan on Star Plus produced by BBC World on the show 'Aaj Ki Raat Hai Zindagi'.
- ·
Honored as an Earth Day Network Star in October 2018 by Earth
Day Network Global, an apex organization. Environment with special reference to
seed pen.
- ·
In 2018, he was selected as a member of the Governing Council
of the National Innovation Foundation.
- ·
She has won countless awards including the prestigious Vanita
Woman of the Year Award.
- ·
Included in the famous Marie Claire magazine's 'Genius' list.
- ·
In 2017, an online media outlet included her in their '10
Most Inspiring Indian Women Entrepreneur' list.
Chulala: A priceless broom:
One
day Lakshi Menon came to the Ayurvedic beach resort in Thrissur for a holiday
visit. She was impressed by the beautiful scenery of the resort and the coconut
trees in it. While she was enjoying the beauty of the nature, the gardener was
working to remove the dried coconuts. After seeing that incident Lakshmi got an
interesting idea. Making brooms from dry coconut leaves is a tradition in the
villages. Lakshmi started the process of making brooms from coconut leaf pulps,
remembering the incidents of making brooms with her grandmother and mother in
her childhood. She realized that she could easily make five brooms a day. But
instead of the plastic usually used for taping broomsticks, the tailor decided
to use pieces of scrap cloth from the shop. The reason is to reduce the use of
plastic and with the main objective of making the price accessible to the
common man. Moreover, it was determined that each broom can be sold for 250
rupees.
She
decorated the first two broomsticks beautifully and mounted them on the wall of
her house premises and shared the pictures of the broomsticks with her friends
and relatives through social media. When her friends and family members and
followers saw her pictures of broomsticks, she immediately received orders for
them. Then she came to know about the Kerala Federation of the Blind and
through her friend that there was not much work for the women in the
federation. Her friend told her not to think about an activity to help blind
women. The next day she visited the Federation of the Blind and explained to
them how to go about this idea. She was surprised to see a great response from
them after that.
The
brooms they make are called "Chulala".
'Chool'
means 'broom' in Malayalam.
Lakshmi
decided to keep broomsticks under the artisanal broom category.
Lakshmi
explained to them in detail the process of making broom bundles and their
cooperation gave her confidence that she could do this project. Noticing that
they could make 20 brooms each in a day, it took a lot of effort to bring
marketing facilities to match. Broom bundles have started selling online for
Rs.500 and offline for Rs.300.
Lakshmi
has also negotiated with airport authorities in Kerala to make brooms available
at all souvenir shops. Everyone was being promoted as "This is the best
souvenir you can get from our country".
In
fact, these priceless brooms are very artistically made by visually impaired
women. I heartily congratulate this team of women and creator Lakshmi Menon for
proving that disability is not for man but for man.
Pen with Love:
A project called Pen with Love was created
with the main objective of reducing the use of plastic and planting trees.
Using paper instead of plastic to make the pen, the pen has been designed with
seeds of Agastya trees embedded in the end of the pen. It can be said that this
generation does not know much about the Agastya tree. Lakshmi collected the
seeds after much searching.
Agastya
plants are rich in medicinal properties and their leaves and flowers are used
to treat diseases like thyroid. This pen, which has many features, is designed
with the intention that once it is used, the seeds in the pen will germinate
and grow into plants. A mature tree has enormous benefits for our health and
the environment. Many women are getting livelihood through this project.
Launched
by Megastar Mammootty on 5th June 2016 on World Environment Day. Although
Lakshmi had set a target of selling one lakh pens that year, all were sold
within four months.
Lakshmi,
today, is very visible on many global platforms for her "With Love" initiative.
It is great that she was selected as one of the 10 women from around the world.
Along with flood victims:
'Chekkutty'
dolls born in Chendamangalam, a handloom village affected by the 2018 floods,
have traveled to the United Nations to spread a message of love and compassion.
'Chekkutti' dolls made of handloom cloth spoiled by floods in Chendamangalam
sell for Rs 25 in India but fetch higher prices abroad. The collected amount
was distributed to the weavers who lost everything in the flood. Lakshi Menon
stood by the flood victims. Helping those in need is commendable
Congratulations to the rescuers:
The
insurance scheme she introduced for fishermen who became rescuers during floods
was a success. The annual premium amount is Rs. Anyone can sponsor a fisherman
by paying 24. To promote this, students from various campuses in Kerala have
made paper boats to convey messages of love to fishermen. The paper boats are
now on display at the NIFT campus in Kochi.
Many
women are getting livelihood through the projects created by Lakshi Menon. For
that, Kerala is a state that India can be proud of.
Written
By
Kota
Damodar
Mobile:
9391480475
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