CURRENT AFFAIRS

Detailed explanation-1: -Aside from being a noted women rights activist and lawyer, Ela Bhatt was also a Gandhian. Agencies Ela Bhatt was recipient of both the Padma Shri as well as the Padma Bhushan awards for her contribution in the field of women empowerment and enterpreneurship.

Detailed explanation-2: -Bhatt was a cofounder in 1979 of Women’s World Banking (WWB), a global network of microfinance organizations that assist poor women. She served as chairperson of WWB from 1984 to 1988.

Detailed explanation-3: -She founded the Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) in 1972.

Detailed explanation-4: -Ela Bhatt, Founder and Former Secretary General of Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), describes how growing up in the political and social atmosphere of India’s independence and the Gandhian movement led her to found an organization devoted to the advancement of poor, undocumented women in India in the 1970s.

Detailed explanation-5: -SEWA was founded in 1972 by labor lawyer and organiser Ela Bhatt. It emerged from the Women’s Wing of the Textile Labour Association (TLA), a labour union founded by Gandhi in 1918. The organisation grew very quickly, with 30,000 members in 1996, to 318,527 in 2000, to 1,919,676 in 2013., and nearly 2 million in 2023.