Development Marketplace: Neeraj and Amit Story

To highlight the work of social entrepreneurs, this animated video tells the story of a relationship between an Indian householder and a young social entrepreneur. In the story, the householder, Neeraj, is given the opportunity to pull himself out of poverty through the intervention of Amit, a social entrepreneur. The video tells of one man's journey from destitution, picking rags from a garbage heap, to owning a business of his own.

In the beginning we meet Neeraj (the householder) picking rags to sell for money to feed his family. By chance he tries to sell the rags to a rug making company called Tatasutra Rugs. The company is owned and run by Amit, a socially conscientious young entrepreneur, who works with the poor to train them on rug making and building rug franchises of their own. Throughout the story we witness Neeraj slowly build his franchise with his wife Parvathi so they can send their daughter Rubina to school.

As the story unfolds the viewer sees the family's quality of life progressively improve. Over time we see that the family can afford to send Rubina to school, purchase an improved stove to decrease indoor pollution; and buy an LED desk lamp so Rubina can do her homework in the evening. We also see the home itself go through variety of incremental improvements to make it safe, secure and less at risk from climate change related natural disaster.

This short tells the story of how the lives of the poor can be meaningfully changed by social entrepreneurs.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• World
• Bank
• Development
• Marketplace
• Social
• Entrepreneur