The girl watched as her older sister left the village, headed for the city. She was not quite a teen, the youngest of three girls. Before long, the man who took her sister returned. She too could work in Kolkata - wouldn’t she go with him? ...
Kundola’s story begins in Murshidabad, a district of West Bengal, and a high-risk area for human trafficking. She followed a sadly well-worn path that led to a brothel in Kolkata, but by a series of twists has now returned home to help other women like...
Jas recently spent three months volunteering with Freeset, starting with the Freedom Encounter and staying on to work with our production and education teams. She shares here about the profound effect the trip had on her....
It’s 9 am and the sun is already high in the sky, stirring up life in the alleyways, releasing the many odours of the earth. Outside the front gate at number 172, a woman crouches over a bamboo stick, curved blade in hand, shaving off impossibly...
From his corner desk in the narrow, shared office, Avishek Majumdar struggles for a moment to take his eyes off the computer screen. “Actually, we’re really busy right now. So many orders, but I’m happy, it’s really good for Freeset.”...
Mina is the boss. It’s a joke that flies around the Freeset workplace, and like many jokes, holds a grain of truth. Mina has been here since the beginning, a powerful and vital voice and a true champion for the women she loves and understands....
In Kolkata, everyone drinks ‘cha’, a delicious blend of tea, milk, sugar and spices that is sold from numerous roadside stalls....
The communities we operate in are marked by extreme poverty & social stigma. Freeset’s goal in going into business was to break the cycle of poverty and exploitation, and create opportunities for our community to live full and healthy lives....
Freeset is about seeing communities transformed, and we define communities as a group of people belonging to a place. So, when we talk about transformation, it means more that just seeing people’s lives changed. We also want to see the places they inhabit transformed and...
Freeset has some dreamers! And they dream BIG. Mina (one of the founding ladies) and Kerry (Director) cast a dream to see 10 000 women across West Bengal employed in freedom businesses. We believe in this dream, and know it will require highly...