South African women head for IT training in India

Monday, 10 November 2003, 20:30 IST
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DURBAN: Six South African Indian women have left for India to attend a six-week training course in IT sponsored by New Delhi. Ranging in age from 24 to 45, they are all employees of the University of Durban-Westville here. They will benefit from the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) programme started by India nearly five decades ago to share its technical experience and skills with other developing countries. The University of Durban-Westville was originally started in the late 1960s as the only one for South African Indians under apartheid-era segregation laws that prohibited them from attending other universities. Each university was reserved for a particular race group. Two of the trainees have been working as personal assistants for more than two decades without formal training, having taught themselves computer literacy. Shama Ramsaran said she was looking forward to receiving training for the first time in her 25-year service. Her colleague Julie Reddy, who has been working at the university for 20 years, said she was excited about learning about the latest technology in India. Meena Paramunand and Vasie Govender will join them to study office technology in New Delhi. The four are accompanied by two young lecturers in IT from the university, Ravina Sewlal and Ivana Sewchuran, who will study advanced networking courses. The six women are the latest of 60 South Africans annually sent to India for various courses in areas as diverse as engineering and rural aid programmes for women under the ITEC scheme, which has been operating here since 1995.
Source: IANS