A Visit to reCharkha, The EcoSocial Tribe
Small steps for big impact
Since I started understanding life’s values, I found my inspiration in a few personalities, one being Bapu ji -Mahatma Gandhi ji. He was a person who fought to bring necessary shifts for the society at large by non-violent means, by being a change he wished to bring. I have this slogan by Gandhi Bapu placed around me- “Be the Change you wish to bring” – written and kept on my bullet board, written aesthetically on a shell kept on my balcony. This slogan and his life have been my inspiration all through.
I never knew I would get to have a hands-on experience with something that became a tool to bring forth one of Bapu’s life missions – Charkha. And, I am going to take you all through this journey where I got to use traditional Charkha, traditional manual weaving loom and whatnot, again for a mission, again for society at large.
By the way, reCharkha is an NGO as well as an enterprise founded by Amita Deshpande. More about this you will know as we move further.
I met Amita in the BSP (Bhavspandana) meditation retreat at the Coimbatore Isha Foundation, way back in 2016, and we became friends. And then I met her during some exhibition in Mumbai where I felt thrilled to know about her work and I brought her products. And in 2025 April, I could finally make it to visit her journey. How? let me walk you through…
On the last Weekend of April 2025, I took my daughter, and her friend to the Manufacturing unit of reCharkha at Bhor near Pune. I was excited as we were to experience the Passion to Vision to Actions alive. The idea was to connect my teen youth with something substantial and promising for the Environment, contributing to society at large too. (This tour was also a part of their curricular requirement for an internship with an NGO)
As we arrived, after a yummy Puneri Poha breakfast, Amita took us through her life journey, sharing how a little thought that got nurtured in her teenage culminates into ReCharkha.
While learning about education on Adolescence and Teens in Steiner’s education, I learned how the chaotic inner life of Teens can become a fertile ground for a potent seed that may sprout and blossom in their adulthood, if nurtured well. Amita and ReChrkha become live examples of this fact laid by Rudolf Steiner!
We were left awe-inspired listening to her!! An engineer by profession and a Master in MBA from Chicago, Amita’s journey to ReCharkha is truly inspirational. In her teens, she was disturbed looking at plastic waste being thrown everywhere and she felt something needed to be done. However, as she grew, she got occupied with pursuing a formal education. But, not finding fulfillment in her job in USA, she questioned herself, is this what I wish to do in my life? And the answer that she heard from her heart was NO.
Well, I will not go great length to describe everything as that may ruin you experiencing this as you make yourself this visit. I would just summarize that she wanted to find a sustainable solution for Plastic wastes that ended polluting the environment, in a way that can bring difference to the society and help keeping alive our rich traditions and cultures of economy management. And that is how ReCharkha was born.
If you find this enchanting or mysterious, let me tell you, you have to go for this tour to actualize it yourself.
reCharkha takes care of four social causes in a single go:
- Plastic waste management by upcycling the plastic wrappers into beautiful merchandizes
- Environment health by reducing plastic landing in landfills
- Job opportunities for Rural people and women’s empowerment
- Reviving back traditional craftsmanship, and culture
Her Manufacturing unit at Bhor is a testimony to sustainable construction, sustainable living, wastewater management, and revival of indigenous species of plants and trees.
Amita walked us through
1. Hands-on UPCYCLING Experience using a Charkha and Handloom.
2. Learning the Origami Basketry Process of Upcycling
3. Understanding Sustainable Architecture and Construction Techniques
4. Plantation of Native Trees and learning interesting facts and uses
5. Understanding our Eco-Friendly Waste Water Treatment Plant.
6. Tour of her Tiny Home that nurtured a thought of small space for Humans allows space for other species ( plants, birds, insects, etc)
7. Interaction with Village Artisans
It was an experience to witness and create Tana Bana (a traditional technique of weaving) between the threads made of plastic bottles and plastic wrappers to upcycle their image, giving meaningful worth to their existence (designer plastic fabrics). All these are done over a manual weaving loom that needs no electricity! We realized to create synchronous Tana Bana on the loom, we had to learn synchronous Tana Bana between our hands and feet! And, we came to acknowledge the value of traditional craftsmanship!
As I saw the beautiful fabrics getting made over the manual loom, I realized what a single potent thought can do to something being considered waste and thrown away. If not landed in looms of ReCharkha (and like places), these plastics would be getting rotten in any landfill polluting the groundwater, air, and mother Earth.
Everything on the land we walked there was nurtured by thoughtful actions to bring necessary healthy shifts to the environment, to society and that glued me with this cause ReCharkha.
Here is a glimpse of our tour there: https://youtube.com/shorts/F6SRW47va-w
I recommend this tour to one and all who feel aligned with the idea of Plastic upcycle, and sustainable solutions, and who wish to expose their youth to this thought.
You can reach out to reCharkha team https://www.recharkha.org to book yourself a visit and follow them on their insta handle (Recharkha_socioeconomic)
You can also support the cause, add value to women and rural empowerment, and support the idea of keeping alive traditional craftsmanship by
- Buying their merchandise from Puna/ Mumbai/ online shops
- Opting for their products for bulk corporate gifting
- Sending your Plastic wrappers to them (all kinds of plastic wrappers-like plastics that are used for packaging Snacks, groceries, maggies, biscuits, food, etc, plus plastic bags, plastic gift wraps, plastic Zabala bags, Amazon plastic bags, etc)
- Donating them (they are building space on the Bhor unit to facilitate larger group visits, specifically schools and college kids, to spread awareness among youth)
- My takeaway from touring the heart and soul of ReCharka is that a journey of a thousand miles begins with small steps, to make a big impact. ReCharkha is an example.
While most of us take up (or wish our kids to pursue) careers such as product design, Fianace analytics, MBA, or AI expert, or maybe more traditional ones like a Doctor or an engineer or CA -so forth and so on (list can go so big!!). There are some people born as Changemakers so to call them – and that is what I saw in Amita Deshpande through her work reCharkha.
All I can say is more power to reCharkha and the Team.
Contribute to the health of Mother Earth: https://drurvi.com/giving-back-to-the-mother-nature/
