This success story is of village Gopalpur in Mandsaur district of Madhya Pradesh. Vijay Fisheries Cooperative Society has 29 members, of which 14 are women.
They are fisher-folk deft in breeding and catching fish. Several generations of this village depended on fishing as their main source of livelihood. But in the changing times, methods of fishing also changed. They also wanted to adopt changes but could not do so due to lack of resources. They suffered losses due to small size of fish. Resigned to fate, most of them relinquished fishing and started selling blankets to eke out a living. They went far and wide, bought blankets and then embarked on long journeys to sell them to earn profit. This profession made them nomads. But even selling blankets was not much profitable. They were managing both ends meet anyhow. When they returned from journey, they used to catch small quality of fish also sell them.
2012 Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd