Susmita Bhattacharjee - A Selco Incubatee

Susmita in the center

Susmita’s talk really touched one and all in the room. She started with "Until I was eight, I lived without electricity. And the strongest memory I carry of the time is of the fear of going to the toilet in the dark. It was away from the house as toilets in villages used to be (and to a large extent still are), and we used to carry a small kerosene lamp, which we couldn’t take inside the toilet as the water could put it out. So we had to leave the lamp outside and the only light was what came in through the bamboo shafts that the bathroom was made of. And it was an Indian style toilet, which you felt you could even fall into, or from which snakes and scorpions could come out, and that is a fear that was so deep, I have not forgotten it to this day. And I think it’s what made me come back to India" 

From there, she went on to complete her education, right upto a PhD in Germany, living in Amsterdam, Canada, and the US for 17 years. Until, and one fine day it struck her that there are still children who must be experiencing the same fear, and that was the defining moment of her decision. She decided to quit corporate, quit the American dream and come back to India. Come back and do something for those she could. She started to research online, and that's what led her to Selco. 

She also sat with the map of India to figure out which State she’d come back to, and she picked Madhya Pradesh.  Sixty percent of the state does not have proper access to electricity. She works in the Narmada Valley region which also has the dubious distinction of the lowest female literacy in India.

She started a venture called Pushan Renewable Energy

This was three years back and it’s been one big uphill task since then. She realizes the real tough challenge is not as much in selling the product as much as it is in letting people understand the need and benefit. For these low-income rural communities living in remote parts of the state electricity is not a necessity since they have lived generations in entire darkness.

She found that one motivating factor that worked best was TV.  Light was secondary. And after a few such sales, there was this one woman who came and asked her if it was possible to have light in the kitchen, and she told susmita not to tell her husband that she’d asked. It was like the woman's needs not only didn't matter, they weren't even to be acknowledged.  After that incident, Susmita makes sure she gets a light installed in the kitchen whichever household she electrifies. 

She is also having a really tough time building a team as nobody wants to work in such tough terrain, and the locals were just not working out. She had so many bad experiences with the hiring she did, that she says she’s gone through a personal crisis of sorts wondering where her judgment was going wrong. But in and through all that she has stuck it out.

Over the last two years, the impact she's achieved:

· 500 women have light in their kitchen
· 650 girls and boys getting to study at home
· 25 local businesses like poultry and dairy now work with solar power.
· 1500 children learning computers at solar powered schools.
· 5 local entrepreneurs trained with a new skill set
· 2  hamlets with 50 households have light for the first time

Tulsi Bai told her 'It’s so much fun to cook in the evening since we installed solar power '

Susmita, a real kudos to your grit and commitment !!