A women's group in India is stitching cotton bags following the plastic bag ban.

A women's group in India is seeking its own solutions to the country's recent plastic bag ban.

Rajani Kulkami and Anita Wagle, members of the University Women's Association (UWA) and convenors of the Chhand Rang Sucharita projects, are now running the Pishwi scheme to help slum residents earn a better living, The Indian Express reports.

Following the prohibition of single-use plastic bags, under the project women are learning to create cotton bags out of donated cloth, which they can then sell on.

Ms Wagle said: "We really wanted to do something post the ban."

"I wanted to ensure that through this, women from low-income groups could help support their families. Along with that, we even decided to impart English coaching and computer education to them so that they would become more independent," she explained.

The project initially took off after a priest donated cloth, which the women used to stitch simple bags from, with the proceeds given to the workers and also reinvested to buy more material.

As well as bags, the women also make mobile pouches, diary covers, sling bags and air travel bags, each of which is designed to be affordable to a wide audience from slum-dwellers to business professionals.

Ms Wagle went on to explain that empowering the female workforce "is a very steep challenge because we have to first instil the very idea of discipline and micro-entrepreneurship in them, but that is where the fun also lies.

"These challenges help us understand more about their world and the problems that they face."

Delhi approved a ban on the use, storage, manufacture and sale of plastic bags in early September, after three years of campaigning.

The blanket ban is designed to be stricter than earlier propositions and will see an increase in paper bags, reusable carrier bags and cotton bags.

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