From a broken marriage to empowering lives

When Padala Bhudevi entered into a wedlock by force at the tender age of 11 years, little did she realise that she would be abandoned by her husband 12 years later, that too, after begetting three daughters.

With no other option left, she returned to her hometown to stay with her parents, making a resolve to rise from the ashes. "Two decades back, it was not an easy decision to make because what mattered the most was social honour and leaving the husband's house was looked down upon as it's considered not-so-normal," recalls Bhudevi, who belongs to the Savara community.

Irrespective of the mounting differences between a couple, walking out of a marriage was considered a taboo then and it took a lot of strength for Bhudevi to come to terms with the reality. "Those were times not many would prefer to rebuild their life from the scratch, especially women," she admits.

However, breaking the shackles, it did take quite a while for her to pick up the broken pieces of her life and move on. In the process, she has not only empowered herself and her three daughters but also transformed the lives of close to 4,500 tribal women, widows in particular, guiding them to lead an independent life. "My father was a social activist. He left a government job and preferred working hard to uplift the weaker sections. So, I decided to follow his footsteps," shares Bhudevi, who became the director of Chinnayya Adivasi Vikas Sangham (CAVS) after her father's demise in 1996.

Through the non-governmental organisation, Bhudevi reached out to hundreds of tribal women, helping the beneficiaries get Records of Forest Rights (RoFR) pattas, guiding them to cultivate millets, cashews and other indigenous crops, building awareness among communities and enhancing livelihood. "As a social activist, my father did all these things for the community. Now, I am taking the legacy forward," says Bhudevi with a tinge of pride.

For an army of tribal farmers and rural women, Bhudevi is a role model as she fights for their rights and ensures that they lead a dignified life by becoming self-reliant. Her remarkable contribution to the upliftment of tribal community eventually made her bag the much-coveted 'Nari Shakti Puraskar' in 2020.

Today, the director of CAVS has no regrets about her broken marriage. "I got married at an age when I didn't even know what the institution meant or had in store for me. By the time I realised it, I was already out of it. Having put up with years of physical and emotional abuse at my in-laws' place, I have no regrets as I was deprived of love all through my marriage. When I look back, I have more bitter experiences to count. Fortunately, my daughters are quite studious and they have set their own goals to achieve," says the proud mother.

After completing B.Tech, her elder daughter Mona got placement in Tata Consultancy Services, while the second daughter Lisha is pursuing B-Pharmacy and the last one Gouthami is studying at IIIT-Nuzvid and all of them are Prathibha Award winners.

Advocating organic farming practices and delivering lectures in organisations, Bhudevi, a native of Srikakulam, says women need to be emotionally strong and have to focus on different facets of life. On the occasion of the International Women's Day celebrated on March 8, she says, "So that if one facet fails to work, there is always something to fall back on."

Through farmer producer organisations, Bhudevi has initiated income-generating programmes for tribal farmers, seeking technical and financial support of the government departments. With a sense of pride, she says that her quest to contribute to the upliftment of the rural economy will continue.