Surat civic body involves women from SHGs to make face masks

On Thursday, a truck load of woven cloth from a factory in Ankleshwar reached SMC headquarters. The teams formed by the SMC for the job made kits containing cloth and strings and distributed them among the women. These 400 women have been trained by the SMC on how to make masks. They have also been given a video clip with instructions in Hindi.

On Thursday afternoon, the kits were supplied to around 400 women in the afternoon, and at night SMC officials will collect the day’s products from them.
SMC Deputy Commissioner Gayetri Jariwala said, “There are around 30,000 registered SHGs in the city. We identified 400 women from these groups and provide them with raw material every morning. At night, our teams collect the masks from them. We plan to hire 9,600 more women from SHGs who have sewing machines at homes.”

“Initially these women take around 10 to 15 minutes to make one mask. With practice, the time will come down to five minutes. Thus, 10,000 women will be able to make lakhs of masks per day.”
She further added, “These women will also be able to earn some money. Depending on the availability of raw material, production will be increased. The aim is to make around 50 lakh masks by the end of the month. The cost of the project will be borne by some companies under their Corporate Social Responsi-bility and even SMC. We will sell these masks for Rs 4. These are available at all our health centres, zonal and ward offices.”

Shilpa Rathod (30), an SHG in Surat, said, “After the lockdown was announced, we didn’t have any work. I have two small children. We have already used up our savings and have been surviving on the food kits given to us by SMC and other social organisations. This mask-making job will give me some money.”