How a Saree Collection Became a Catalyst for Change
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It was 2020 when we were suddenly hit with a pandemic of unseen dimensions.
While in lockdown, I was happy to work from home as a Delivery Manager on the Solutions Validation Services team. With this remote work culture, I could delve into my passion for collecting sarees, beautiful garments traditionally worn by women of Indian and other South Asian cultures.
I grew up seeing my mother and other women I adored wearing sarees, and I fell in love with them!
During the pandemic, saree weavers saw a drop in sales because stores lacked customers. So they relied on selling their creations to people like me, who could reach out to them.
My collection grew, but I still had many newer sarees in my wardrobe that I was not reaching for at all!
This made me think there must be many more people like me with such sarees lying in their closets.
In India, it is easy to donate sarees to those in need, but in the U.S., it’s no easy task.
I came up with an idea to collect pre-owned sarees from donors from my local community in Raleigh, North Carolina, sell them, and then use the proceeds to help charities that empower women in India.
This initiative was born from two of my passions: Reuse and helping those in need! I wanted to give back to the community where most of my saree donors hail from.
As things started returning to normal, 2022 was the first year I started the initiative where my local Indian community in Research Triangle Park donated their pre-owned sarees.
With the help from my family and friends, we created flyers and distributed them on social media and email. Word spread, and I received sarees from as far as Pennsylvania and New Mexico. Being a remote worker for Cisco helped me easily coordinate donation drop-offs!
My goal was to raise $1,500, but I ended up raising $5,200 from the sale of donated sarees.
All the money was donated to Swayam, a grassroots charity in Chhattisgarh, India, one of the poorest states in the country. Swayam works towards empowering women to become self-reliant by teaching them to sew, providing them with sewing machines, and helping them to make their goods marketable.
After this success, in 2023, I organized the donation drive again. This time, donations came from as far as Connecticut and New Jersey!
I received a lot of inquiries from people who wanted to replicate this effort in California, Florida, Arizona, New Jersey, and Connecticut. That year, we raised $6,300, benefitting Antarjyoti Balika Vidyalaya, a residential school in Patna, Bihar, for young women who are visually impaired.
This success also inspired many similar fundraisers in our community for other types of Indian ethnic wear too.
I plan to actively organize one such fundraiser every year. To help me with all the event efforts, I lean on my husband, Manoj Pandey, who is also a Cisco employee, as well as my kids, friends, and community.
The amount of support I get keeps me going to plan the next event.
While this way of giving back has been a very fulfilling experience, it has also been a great learning experience! I’m looking forward to what’s next in 2024, and I encourage you to tap into your passions.
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