Shobha Murthy Interview – Part 01
So we had this opportunity to interview Ms Shobha Murthy of Aarambh NGO.
This was a part of our Idea Research initiaitve, under which we got a project on SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP. Our mentor is Gayatri Vivek. Ma’am told us to interview three of such personalities and write case studies on them. Hence we started of with Shobha who is a founder of Aarambh NGO. Aarambh caters to under privileged woman and children, and to up bring them using Education.
So on 9 August we got an appointment and all six of group members went to interview her. Following is a written form of the interview. We have two entities here Shobha amd SE. SE here refers to the group.
Q.1 : S.E : What was your education back ground ?
Shobha : Basically I am from Finance background, having qualified as a Chartered Accountan.
Q.2 : S.E : So after qualifying as a CA where did you work initially ?
Shobha : I worked for TATA and then for Lakme. But I always felt I am a miss fit for the job. I was not enjoying the corporate experience.
Q.3 : S.E : Ohk! But then why didn’t you tried some other company?
Shobha : Actually I was sure that I am not going to work in a professional organisation any more. So I joined USAid.
Q.4: S.E : What is USAid, we have heared it for the first time, is it some kind of NGO ?
Shobha: United States Agency for International Development is a the U.S. government organization responsible for most non-military foreign aid. It is during this time as an Auditor I visited many remote places of India like Uttaranchal and states like MP, Rajasthan and Gujurat. Then I even worked for CRY as a Finance Manager for 3 years.
Q.5: S.E : When was Aarambh esablished?
Shobha : It was after such varied experience i thought its high time to start something of my own. As I am a native of Vashi I was familiar with the slums of Turbhe. Also it is one of the biggest in this locality. Hence I started my first teaching centre in Turbhe and hence Aarambh was established. It was in year 1997. I took teaching because I understood that only education will empower the kids and women of the locality
Q.6 : S.E : A common question, how did you came about this name?
Shobha : Actually it is not me who named it. It is the community themselves agreed to this name. They were also very clear that they wanted the name registered in Devanagri Script.
Q.7 : S.E : What caste and creed do the locality belong to?
Shobha: People here are from all over the India. Basically they are migrants, settled in Mumbai for better job prospects.
Q.8 : S.E : What is the basic occupation here?
Shobha : They work either as construction workers or as rag pickers in the nearby APMC food grain market . They are untrained, unskilled and uneducated.
Innovative Castle 