After facing harassment allegedly at the hands of her in-laws for not giving birth to a male child, Moksha Jetley, a single mother who broke stereotypes to become an entrepreneur, will now take a journey of over 4,500 km to promote the ‘Save Girl Child’ campaign.

‘Daughter is Precious’ campaign holds special significance for Moksha (55) as she had weathered many storms in her journey to become self reliant.

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She had started her career as chauffer in Chandigarh in 1985 after she fled in-laws house as her mother-in-law allegedly tried to hurt her newborn daughter.

“It is a solo ride with a theme ‘Daughters are Precious’. I will start ride from Leh on 2 October and will reach Kanyakumari on 18 October to raise Rs 3 lakh for Nanhi Kali Foundation to support education of 100 girls,” Mokha Jaitley told The Statesman.

Jaitley will travel via Leh (Kashmir) to Srinagar-Pathankot-Chandigarh-Jaipur-Udaipur-Baroda-Thane-Pune-Goa-Udupi-Allpy-Kanyakumari and cover distance of over 4,500 km in 17 days.

Moksha leads by example and the two things that are close to her heart are women’s empowerment and saving the girl child. These twin causes have become an integral part of her life as she herself is a single mother and role model.

“In North India, I have observed that the people still prefer male child over girl. It pains to learn that we are still bound by age old stereotypes despite several example, including myself, where girls had achieved several milestones,” she said.

Moksha had earlier made to the Limca Book of Records for completing the journey from Leh-Manali in record time, i.e. in 20 hours and 20 minutes.

A native of Hoshiarpur in Punjab, she had got married in 1984 when she was quiet young and had a daughter a year later.

Though the motherhood came to her with new challenges as she had to protect her child from her mother-in-law, who was upset at the birth of daughter.

She left her in-laws house after her mother-in-law tried to her harm her daughter and her husband chose to support her mother.

She came to Chandigarh and started working as chauffeur and later in a hotel.

It was tough task to stand on her feet in the 90s as people were not comfortable with the idea of single mother working in a hotel.

Later she moved on to become a warden in school where her daughter was studying in 2004, she moved to Kathmandu.

But it was in 2007 she decided to move to Manali (where her father had an apple orchard) to start her own tour and travel business.

In 2008, she decided to pursue her her dream of becoming a professional bike rider as her daughter Prachi (now 32 years of age) became old enough take care of herself.

She will start her solo journey on 2^nd October which is her daughter’s birthday and end it on 18^th October, her own birthday.