“For my daughter’s future, I had to change my own.”

I didn’t have much learning till later in life, but it was not too late to change my life!

I come from a poor family in Bhirani, Jodhpur. My father worked as an electrician and we never had enough. Like a lot of girls from families like mine, I couldn’t study much and I was married early. My husband is a farmer and when it came to our income, history repeated itself. We couldn’t afford to educate our 3 daughters and son. Every day was a struggle and I was worried that our future would be more of the same.

Then a day came when my daughter’s future hung in the balance. The time had come to get her married, and we simply could not afford to make that happen. That’s when I decided I was going to do something to give my daughter a better future.

“I saw that the true value of learning is much more than how much you earn.”

Since I had done goat farming and had a farming background, I decided to enroll in ICICI Academy for the free Dairy Farming course. It seemed like the right course for me. I learnt the basics of dairy farming – how to choose the right cattle, increase their productivity, vaccinate, feed and house them.

To tell you the truth, before I started the course I was not sure how much I would learn from it. But once I had completed it and seen the difference it made in my life and work, I understood its true value. The training I got at the ICICI Academy helped me immensely.

The cattle my family owned were always sick and had low yield. But when I applied my new skills that I learned at the ICICI Academy, their productivity and health improved. I was able to look beyond goat farming and got into cattle rearing, as well to start a new business of selling milk. Further, when I started making ghee, my profits increased and my business grew. Thanks to the Academy, soon, I was confident enough to buy more cattle and move ahead.

“My skill didn’t just give me a better life – my family and village got a better future too.”

I never forgot why I had taken this course – to improve my children’s chances of a brighter future. I got two of my daughters married, enrolled my younger daughter and son to a school provided them the gift of education.

While I may have joined the course for my daughters, it wasn’t only their future that benefited. My life has taken a new path too. My family’s income and status in our village has improved. I have become the person the villagers come to when they have questions about cattle farming. I tell as many people as I can about the courses at the ICICI Academy. After all, I have seen how learning a skill has changed my life. Wouldn’t it be good to see it change other lives too?