Vanitha Sadana is an institution dedicated to the development of women and children, for close to seven decades. It was established in 1937 by a group of residents in Mysore City (Karnataka) who were inspired by the ideals of Mahatma Gandhi and ably led by a distinguished and devoted Gandhian couple – Smt. Susheela Bai and Prof. Nagesha Rao. The founders foresaw the imperative of women's development at a time when gender issues were still far away from main stream discourse, and pioneered a local revolution in educating and training women and children in general, and destitute women in particular. Starting off with Hindi and Charkha (Spinning wheel) classes, Vanitha Sadana entered into the fields of adult literacy, vocational education, sports, Arts, Children's library and leadership development.