One of the core missions of TBP is to develop underprivileged youth around the world and make them self-sufficient as they grow. TBP has partnered with several organizations worldwide for this purpose. TBP Youth Leader Ishani Sengupta organized a few entrepreneurship workshops over the summer of 2019 to help underprivileged students get exposure to entrepreneurship and help budding entrepreneurs expand their business. The most notable of those was a workshop at Prithwish Chandra Biswas Kanya Mahavidyalaya, A girl’s college in rural Bengal, and one in the famous city of Kolkata.

Later on, Chairman of TBP, Mr. Partha Ghosh made an additional trip to help the students learn international arts and crafts which they could then manufacture and sell. TBP Volunteer Jaya and Komla Jalwapuram helped develop certificates for the entrepreneurship workshop, which Mr Ghosh distributed to the participants.

Below is an excerpt of Ishani’s experience, in her own words

TBP has been conducting entrepreneurship workshops for two decades now. I have been privileged to lead a few. Dasghara has been one of my many workshops, but it was a very special one because it was the first that serves women’s empowerment.

This summer, I conducted a workshop at Dasghara, West Bengal. The road to Dasghara from Habra was picturesque, overlapping seamlessly with my imagination that I developed listening to the childhood stories of rural Bengal from my dad. The college building was unique, almost like a hidden treasure through the winding rural road that leads to its humble entrance. Thanks to Ms. Sudarshana, the Principal and the staff at PCBKMV, we had a great lunch and a memorable tour of the facility that eventually led to a room full of eager students; many did not have much exposure to business and entrepreneurship, but curious to understand what it is all about. Some were not as conversant with English language, so we conducted the workshop mostly in Bengali. That did not deter the inquisitive minds from asking many insightful questions. The richness of business ideas they developed within a couple of hours ranged from starting a dance academy to designing and marketing paper ornaments. Growing up in US, my business ideas have been largely influenced by technology and finance, but here I learnt how simple ideas could create as powerful business models.

The facility at MCCI Kolkata offered a different experience – it was more businesslike. Thanks to the effort of our TBP colleagues Ms. Mukherjee and Mr Sanyal, we were offered a comfortable air-conditioned conference room with individual microphones, and a very different audience mostly consisting of budding entrepreneurs and senior representatives from MCCI.

I felt a bit nervous at the beginning, being part of such a distinguished table, but the experience at Dasghara and the presence of experts like Mr. Sanyal and Ms. Mukherjee helped.. I learned a lot from discussions like revenue stream, when to diversify and when not to etc., as well as the challenges they are facing in their journey to take their business to the next level. We provided some feedback and promised to help them in their journey forward. We also discussed the TBP digital Platform and how it can connect the entrepreneurs in the region with the expertise and resources they need.

The 2019 ESP workshops achieved far more than what I thought it would; but for many of these participants, it is a journey that is just starting and we have an opportunity to help them in that process in the coming days. I will work with our TBP USA and TBP Asia colleagues on the next steps and action items that follows. But till then, let’s pause for a second and celebrate the phenomenal 2019 ESP Workshops! Thanks everyone for your help and let’s work on the journey together…