Raised in the lanes of Dharavi, Suman Sharma, Savita Soni and Ansuja Madivala are in their 20s, and are amongst the first of the many young girls who learnt to code, and ultimately built a mobile App.
It was their everyday life in Dharavi, one of the most densely populated areas in the world with extremely poor living conditions that inspired these girls to find their way out through technology.
Founded by filmmaker Nawneet Ranjan, Dharavi Diary is a storytelling and technology programme which is run for first generation school goers and mostly girls and women who never get a chance to get digital framework because they don’t have resources or someone to mentor them on how to navigate the digital space.
“Sir asked us about the problems we face in our regular life. I told him about the garbage-dumping area that I had to cross on my way to school. He asked me if I wanted to build an application to help make things better. I had no idea what an application was but I definitely wanted to know more about it. He told me that he teach me how to build it,” says Savita, who has enrolled herself for a nursing course.
Ansuja, who is pursuing her master’s degree today, describes her journey of building an app ‘tiring but satisfying’. “Coding is exciting and equally tough. We had to make sure that it functioned properly. We were happy to see the final product, but the process was very tiring,” she recalls.
These 20-year-olds are now striving for a good education, so that they can build a bright future for themselves and their family.