Anjali Singh is a first-generation entrepreneur. She was born is Bhopal and brought up in Lucknow. She went to Carmel Convent, IT College and finally did her MBA from Lucknow University. After her MBA, Anjali took up various private jobs. In 2009, frustrated of her private job, and a strong social desire to help empower and employ women, she quit her job and formed an association for Jute Artisans. Women were trained on jute projects with the help of National Jute Board and were felicitated with a certificate from the government of India.
It wasn’t an easy task. She faced several hardships which included convincing women from rural area to work with her and getting raw material to manufacture the products. Her deep-rooted intolerance to poverty, and problems faced by women and children of underprivileged society, kept her motivated even in the hardest of times. She started this with only one woman ready to join her but by her constant efforts, today she has more that 500 women employed.
When these women could not come out of the village, she took the workspace to the village. There was no stopping her. She has been responsible for uplifting and improving the life of all of these women. Other than adding value to the lives of numerous women, she has also helped the environment by spreading the use of jute bags and eliminating plastic. Her jute bags are customisable and made with utmost care. She firmly believes in the Chinese proverb “Don’t give the Bread but Give the art of earning Bread” and today she is one of those because of whom 500+ families earn their livelihood or add to their family income.
Her organization now gets mentoring support from Netherlands-based organization “Women on Wings”.Recently Anjali launched a brand for jute products by the name of JUTE FOR LIFE.
After 9 years of dedicated efforts, Anjali has received several awards including VijayaLaxmi Das Award for best Entrepreneur 2022 on 8th March 2022, SIDBI ET India MSE Award 2019 – Best Employment Generating MSE, JCI Young Person of India 2019, Women Shine Award 2019 for Social Innovation by CWE, Gandhi Kutir Award 2019, Women of Excellence by All Ladies League, Anarkali Devi Rangbharti Samman by Honorable Governor, Techno Entrepreneur Award by Ministry of Science and Technology, FICCI Ladies Organization Woman Award for Social Entrepreneurship, Eastern Bhoomika Award 2017, Women Outstanding Achiever Award 2017 by Lucknow Management Association, Shan-e-Awadh Samman and many more.Recently signed MOU with University of Lucknow, Ramswaroop University, Lko and REVA University, Banglore to provide employment opportunities to resource poor women to supplement their family income and also to provide internships to students to have first hands on experience to work in the field of social entrepreneurship. Because of her successful entrepreneurial journey, she has been assigned the position of CHERIE BLAIR FOUNDATION MENTOR for giving her expertise to other struggling social entrepreneurs anywhere in the world.
Her work has been covered by almost all leading Newspapers and also documentaries made by Times Now, ETV, Green TV and Samachar Plus and Sonu Sood Show on GNT.
Through Social Media footprints, US Embassy Economic Officers identified and approached her for assessment and the report has been submitted to Washington DC Economic Empowerment Wing for study.
FICCI FLO has certified “Jute for Life” as “Preferred Work Place for Women”.
“Jute for Life” Case Study has been published in Serbian Journal and recently it was published in Emerald Publication, U.K.
Anjali’s latest achievement is that, she has received a government mega grant of for project SFURTI which will make the organisation the biggest in India in the Jute manufacturing sector where 1000+ women will get employment under one roof.
She believes that success can be achieved with dedication and devotion. Sources of her persistent energy are blessings and infinite support from her proud parents. Her father is her idol and her mom was the backbone. She feels privileged to be married to a supportive husband Mr. Shailendra Singh and has two kids Saanvi (8) and Adhiraj (5) studying in St. Francis School.
