This site is designed to create awareness among women about the benefits of "selling life insurance" through a flexi-time career. Women could sell Birla Sun Life Insurance plans at their own convenience.

To promote www.bsliflexitimecareers.com, BSLI and sitagita will jointly organise workshops on flexi-time careers in various cities in India. The Aditya Birla group's (www.adityabirla.com) Rajashree Birla inaugurated the launch of this initiative.

Says Birla: "I believe, these kinds of projects are indeed more than welcome, as they give women the leeway to carve out a meaningful career and at the same time balance their home, and help raise the family's standard of living. In today's day and age, when uncertainties abound, it is very essential for women also to be financially independent as it is a kind of insurance, a kind of security for the family.

"My desire is to see a similar project taking route in the villages. That will help us bridge the divide between the rural and urban, albeit to a small extent. I have always believed that a journey of 1,000 miles begins with a single step. I would encourage our joint venture partner, Birla Sun Life Insurance, to take this step sooner rather than later."

Says Birla Sun Life Insurance CEO Nani Javeri: "We pride ourselves on being an equal opportunity employer and endeavouring to empower women. This tie-up is a prime example of our desire to help women take charge of their own lives. In Birla Sun Life Insurance, some of our top performers are women."

Sitagita is the official women's channel on www.sify.com. It was started in April 2002 and receives about 1.3 million hits per month and these are growing at the rate of 20 per cent per month. Sitagita has a registered user database of 102,376.

Sitagita has, over the past year, captured the imagination of the Indian woman with the leitmotif: 'Entertain, Empower, Enable.' The site offers 21 content-rich channels with unique slants; e-consulting with over 95 top experts and a series of free online classes. Sitagita has also worked on maximising the use of technology tools in order to make the site innovative and interactive at all times.

Birla Sun Life Insurance has over 6,000 insurance advisors selling insurance, out of which 1,485 are women advisors. In fact, the women advisors have performed excellently through their hard work and dedication. One of the top three sellers of last year was Pooja Bagri. Birla Sun Life Insurance women advisors have regularly made it to "the million dollar round table (MDRT)" and other prestigious club memberships within the company.

The first workshop will be held on 31 July 2003. Several successful BSLI women advisors will share their experiences in selling life insurance policies with the workshop delegates. Kiran Ramnani, a trainer in personality development from Chennai and an expert on the panel of TASS, India's premier online academy of soft skills, will address invited guests on 'How to enhance your personal skills for flexi-time careers.' The workshop will be conducted at Hotel Rang Sharda, KC Marg, Bandra Reclamation, Behind Spastics Society, Bandra West, Mumbai, between 3.15 pm and 5.30 pm.

The Aditya Birla group has a turnover exceeding Rs 27,000 crore and is one of the largest business houses in India. It enjoys a leadership position in all the sectors in which it operates. With over 75 business units, spanning the South East Asian belt, the Africa, Canada, the UK among others, it is reckoned as India's first multinational corporation. The group is anchored by 72,000 employees and has 7 lakh shareholders, with an asset base of over Rs 20,000 crore.

Sun Life Financial Inc is a leading international financial services organisation providing a diverse range of wealth accumulation and protection products and services to individuals and corporate customers. Tracing its roots back to 1865, Sun Life Financial and its partners today have operations in key markets worldwide, including Canada, the US, the UK, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Japan, Indonesia, India, China and Bermuda. As of 31 March 2003, the Sun Life Financial group of companies has total assets under management of $229 billion.