She began with 1,000 taka and a needle. Now 400 women work with her

Runa Begum’s business began with 1,000 taka, some cloth and thread, and a skill she had learned from her mother as a girl.

There was no shop and no business plan. There was, instead, a household struggling to pay its bills.

Runa had been unable to continue her secondary education because her family could not afford it. She was married young, in 2005, to Abdullah, a tiles worker. Marriage did not bring the financial security she had hoped for.

Work for Abdullah was irregular. On some days there were tiles to lay and money to earn. On many others, there was nothing. He would stay home, waiting for the next job.

Runa began thinking about what she could do herself.

The answer came from childhood: nakshi kantha, the traditional embroidered quilts that generations of Bangladeshi women have stitched by hand, often using old cloth and elaborate patterns to turn an everyday household object into folk art.

In 2008, Runa borrowed 1,000 taka from an uncle. She bought cloth and thread and began stitching. She sold her first kantha for 450 taka.

It was not much. But it was enough to convince her that her needle could become a source of income.

Nearly two decades later, Runa, now 37 and living with her husband in Sylhet city’s Shahi Eidgah area, runs a business involving around 400 women.

Her products are sold in Sylhet and online to customers in Bangladesh and abroad. What began with embroidered quilts has expanded to include bedsheets and clothing for women and children.

The transformation mirrors a much older economic role played by nakshi kantha in Bangladesh.

The craft has traditionally been the domain of women, with embroidery skills passed informally from mothers and grandmothers to daughters for centuries, according to UNESCO.

Although practiced across Bangladesh, the tradition has particularly strong roots in several districts and has evolved from a domestic craft into a source of income for many women.

For Runa, that evolution happened one quilt at a time.

Talking with Daily Waadaa, Runa said, at first, she worked on a small scale. "As I produced more kanthas, I began taking them to shops in Chowhatta” she said referring one of Sylhet city’s busy commercial areas, and selling them wholesale.

Demand increased and the she expanded to other parts of the city. More orders meant more stitching, and more stitching meant she could no longer do everything herself.

“So, I started to bring other women into the work,” she said.

Many came from poor households much like the one from which Runa had started. The business gave them something Runa herself had desperately needed in 2008. “This was a way of earning money using a skill that could be practised from home,” she told Waadaa.

The network eventually grew to around 400 women.

The operational model, said Runa, is well suited to a craft like nakshi kantha. Unlike factory production, "embroidery can be distributed among women working from their homes and fitted around domestic responsibilities,” she added.

UNESCO has noted that the craft has increasingly become both a form of artistic expression and a source of income for practitioners.

Runa’s wholesale prices now range widely depending on the size and intricacy of the work. A nakshi kantha sells for between 1,000 and 8,000 taka. Embroidered bedsheets are priced at around 1,300 to 2,000 taka, while clothing for women and children generally sells for between 1,000 and 2,000 taka.

The figures are modest by conventional business standards. But Runa’s enterprise operates in a part of the economy where relatively small amounts of money can carry considerable weight...particularly for women earning from their homes.

The business also changed the fortunes of her own family.

Around eight years ago, Runa used earnings from the enterprise to open a grocery shop for Abdullah in the Hazaribagh area of Sylhet. The couple have also built a house on four decimals of land using profits from their businesses.

“It has not only changed my life,” said Runa, “It has helped me to change other people’s lives as well."

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