Mrinmoy_Kolkata Life Map Between 1958 and 1990
I was born in 1958 in a remote village, District of Nadia, within the state of West Bengal, eastern part of India and since then I enjoyed to live there till 1994. My village Nagarukhra (mentioned in The Ain-I Akbari by Abu'l-Fazl Allami) has situated by the side of dead river Yamuna and about sixty kilometers from the state capital Kolkata. In rainy season there were huge muddy road across the village, but village people with simple living, lots of giant trees with folks of birds and colorful insects to attract my childhood and gave me the opportunity to make a journey for a giant complex world. Here I would relate to a storyteller within me. Where I can identify myself that how love is not the only ingredient that is essential for a relationship to survive and how trust when added to love makes relationship beautiful and sublime across society. And here history comes to my rescue, in picking up characters even from the nature and then creating living people in my stories. A storyteller must tell stories because there is a story to be told and to be heard and exchange it is giving me inspiration in to tell stories. It was too hard for me to learn my choice of subject like science in a lower middle class family and nobody had to teach science at my locality in 1963. At that time no science book was published in native language. England imposed imperialism upon India with the help of creamy layer of the society and that was a burden of two hundred years English legacy even with some good gesture for the country like data collection to retain their power. As a result of unethical relationship a growing gap continued between small group of upper class and with rest of the population of the country. Since then English is a need based foreign language adapted in our education system, but for the creamy layer only. After sixty five years of Indian independence our leaders failed to build an effective education policy for all. I realized through in-depth study of various UN, OECD and other evidence based documents that India have progressed only a little about to achieve MDG-2 of UN (Achieve universal primary education by 2015). I have passed 10th standard in 1974 with a poor financial condition. After completion of my 11th standard education and vocational training on commercial beekeeping, I have started my career as a migratory beekeeper in 1978 with only 25 indigenous bee colonies to support my family and further study on for 11th standard and afterwards for three year degree course at Calcutta University. Though I did complete Part I (two years) only due to my hard work at that time. I am not sorry for that rather I have to work hard for learning on nature and able to exchange passionately. I have been truly curious about disciplined life of honey
bees language and network. Within a short time I was involved in building West Bengal Beekeepers Association of 3000 commercial beekeepers and raised fund for the same. At that time, I didn’t know even the meaning of entrepreneur. My journey had been going on as rural small business status and a networker till 1988. Since my business sold out in 2011, I had been working as a dedicated human networker, motivator and capacity builder for entrepreneurs till date. My aspiration for continued employment generation within a sustainable environment I have been working painstakingly with the support of small business development tools. I think I am a born enviropreneur, media manager and fund raiser to build networks for young entrepreneurs thus to generate more green employment and even through micro enterprise cluster development program to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger in India. Between 1991 to 2013 My only son Milton was born in 1990 and graduated in 2012 and recently assigned as a comic book colorist with a French Story Writer in the field of digital art. He has a strong base in English and good friend of mine to interact with emerging local issues, though he is an introvert one and dedicated to Concept Art. I feel pity comfortable, and don’t feel there is any generation gap. We are duly engage in discussing about abstract art, surrealism, global folk song, world literature and global oneness almost every night. Milton is my guide and reviewer of my writeups and inspiration for Rhetoric storytelling for change. At the age of fifty five, my feeling is not good enough as a storyteller of comfort zone without deep and deliberate practice in compelling Short Story Writing. I didn’t recognize my speaking and writing skill, whether it was standard or not in school, college and even in my university study. Since 2011, need based English drafting has been evident for my working area on and on in a global specialized field like Intellectual Property (IP) is on board. In 2011 and 2012 I have participated in three international training programs in different countries like South Korea, Sweden and Philippines on “IP in Global Economy” as WIPO-KIPA-SPRO fellow. When I had visited a Small Enterprise (SE) like ‘Jolly Bee’ in Philippines, focused with an employment centric business model, I was overwhelmed that SE is working with an innovation and intellectual property assets included thus compete in global market. This had motivated me and
my colleagues to work for the SEs of our own state to enable them to adopt such model for prosperity.
SE of Philippines Part of my job fixed that interacting with my colleagues and SME network members for their online course of WIPO, “DL-101-General Course on IP” to develop skills in the field. With my support, 15 participants are already passed the examination and working with SMEs. Thus also leads me a little more interested in compelling storytelling. I have received Certificate of Merit on behalf of Federation of Indian Micro and Small & Medium Enterprises (FISME) & British High Commission, India for contributing a research paper on “Identification and Valuation of IPRs in SMEs” in the National Competition (2012-2013). Now I strongly acknowledge that my English Composition had no rhetoric approach for the same. Referring from an anonymous blog post “Magic realism in Marrakech City” writer cites “It is my way to see the world.” and “I should avoid vague expressions in my writing. We continue walking and in every word he said I discovered how much he has a deep
insight to the world.” With these quotes writer leads me towards language learning and storytelling with deep insight. Heidi Ruckriegel’s “The Metamorphosis” posted on Assignment-1, deserves due respect of readers for her painstaking learning journey to make her a good teacher. As because I am working with Local, National and International Organizations, I have a thrust to participate in English Writing II: Rhetorical Composing with The Ohio State University to develop my skill. Heidi’s sound articulation on learning and teaching “It seemed daunting but not impossible” able to inspire me further in my own way of rhetorical writing to enjoy and exchange which would find ground to gain audience for my work like storytelling for change. Twenty years of my hand holding experiences with small businesses (food processing unit) and eight years working knowledge as a capacity builder of first generation entrepreneurs till date leads me to rethink some crucial policy issues. Indian national policy is always in favor of multinational company not for Small and Medium Enterprise (SME). And it is a challenge for me to build a green entrepreneurial community and influence our national policy to achieve inclusive green growth.
Self-help group working in a gauge-bandage SE
Self-help group working in a gauge-bandage SE
My prime objectives to date are, to earn knowledge from hand holding experience and sharing with entrepreneurs and SME professionals, aspire to motivate Indian entrepreneurs those who care climate change that affect today’s competitive fair business. We need a human globe to live and share with others and act on accordingly, rather bias enough to interact with so-called elected leaders those who only talk about lifeless development without controlling arms-ammunition and corruption. They don’t bother on critical thinking about environment, child mortality, povertypopulation and jobless people round the globe. It is really a shameful phenomenon that after seven thousand years of so-called civilization is all about happening due to nonsense governance which we bound to rethink critically. I am living in polluted Kolkata since 1998, though I prefer to live in countryside. India is a land of rich diversity and resources like culture, human capital and values. As I talk about the present scenario of India, it is losing its charm not only for environment friendly industrialization which was once considered as leading Industrial hub with valuable resources like physical and intellectual. The most urgent problem the land is facing that is undoubtedly inflation, unemployment and negative growth, which has eaten up the roots of our society as a whole. Environmental law is there; on the other hand implementation part is very low. Entrepreneurial attitude is going downward since liberalization policy implemented in 1991 without understanding of pros and cons of globalization.
Addressing in a District Level Workshop About 70% population of India lives in villages. Due to lack of employment opportunities in villages the cities are overcrowded. Everyday thousands of villagers board boat, bus and train and move from rural home to cities in search of jobs. So we need to rethink in such a way so that there should be limited or no migration from villages to cities and the employment opportunities will be balanced in both the areas. It can be done only through enviropreneurial attitude building across the society and I have to start from this point of view. I should work with the novel opportunity to exchange with various global initiatives to eradicate poverty through skill development of SEs.
Trained entrepreneur working in their SE laboratory
Nearly 50 percent of the world's hungry people live in India, a low-income, fooddeficit country. Around 35 percent of India's population - 420 million - is considered food-insecure, consuming less than 80 percent of minimum energy requirements.
Aspiring entrepreneurs undertaking Skill Development Program
Since my childhood I had always been worried that how will disadvantaged people enjoy decent human living. With my long journey as a capacity builder for aspiring entrepreneur, I feel as a social entrepreneur there left an only option is innovative enviropreneur to face the challenge. As a word “enviropreneur� contains love, passion, social and conservation to act as a catalyst that develops green economy growth and sustainable development as a whole. Innovative enviropreneur, those who work with a green mindset, exercise with conservation and generate green economy growth which is truly inclusive, I think they will design and care for future generation to come and capable to deliver sustainable future for all. It was quite confusing that whether I was a good storyteller or not in recent past.
After going through the Acumen’s “Storytelling for change� its content and its learning method, I am quite confident that would create an environment where simple storytelling can be a great tool for social change. I thought my skill in speaking and writing English is not good enough to communicate with my target audience at least in a standard level. My experiences are helping me to use my positive attitude and negative undergone which I have earned in last 35 years, able to recall and share coherently for change. As a strong believer of lifelong learning and exchanging for a better world, I love to enjoy hard work, in depth reading, efficient writing and tell stories cohesively for change till my life goes on.