Embroidery artisan Akasa Cooperative
Kajal didn’t always see herself this way—someone who takes risks, speaks up, and encourages others to keep going. When she first moved to Mumbai after her marriage, life was centered around her home and a large joint family. Today, she and her husband are building a life of their own, raising their two daughters with a very different sense of possibility.
What changed is not just where she lives—but how she sees herself.
At the cooperative, Kajal found more than work. “I found a rhythm, a discipline, and a kind of shared energy that pushed me forward. When you are with strong people, you also become strong,” she says and you can see that belief shaping the way she moves through the world now. She talks about learning to value time, to take risks, and to carry an “I can do it” mindset into everything she does.
That shift doesn’t stay at work - it travels home with her.
Her husband is supportive, but by her own account, more cautious. Where he hesitates, Kajal steps in with encouragement. She encourages him to try, to take chances, to move forward. It’s a quiet reversal of roles, especially in India, that speaks volumes about how earning her own income has changed the balance in their home. Confidence, for Kajal, is not loud—but it is steady, and it’s influencing everyone around her.
She sees the biggest impact in her daughters.
Kajal is determined that their lives will unfold differently. She speaks clearly about wanting them to be independent, to make their own decisions, and not be rushed into early marriage. She teaches them to value time, to stand on their own feet, to believe, as she has come to believe, that they are capable. In many ways, the future she imagines for them is rooted in the transformation she’s experienced herself.
There’s also a lighter side to it all. Kajal describes the cooperative as feeling “like home”—a place filled with laughter, shared work, and a sense that no one is alone in what they’re building. And there are disagreements like in any family. She’s proud of how far she’s come—not just in skill, but in spirit. Today, she’s often the one encouraging others not to give up before they’ve even begun.
“I like taking risks,” she says simply. “Whatever comes, I face it.”
Her dreams are straightforward: to move ahead, to be free from debt, to travel, to enjoy life. But behind that simplicity is a quiet determination. Kajal is not waiting for change—she’s creating it, one decision at a time, for herself and for her family.
