When Winter Park entrepreneur Debbie Farah traveled to India last spring to meet with the female villagers whose handmade jewelry and beaded clutches Farah was selling on HSN, the Home Shopping Network, she was greeted like a savior.

“In village after village, we heard, ‘If not for Debbie’s company, there would be no work,’” said Shelley Lauten, an Orlando consultant and recently appointed CEO of the Central Florida Commission on Homelessness who made the journey with her friend. “These were places that, before Debbie arrived, had to rely on begging in order to survive.”

Farah, 58, has built her reputation — and Bajalia, her brand — on the idea of empowering women, particularly those in places where women have few opportunities to become financially independent.

But last week, a Tampa Bay Times story accused Farah’s company of having a “history of short-changing its craftswomen,” alleging that Farah owes tens of thousands of dollars for unpaid merchandise — accusations that prompted HSN, based in St. Petersburg, to pull all Bajalia jewelry from its website and programming and put a hold on product sales. A company spokesman said HSN is doing an internal investigation, but would not say how long that might take.

“We believe in a culture of generosity. We are committed to empowering women and helping families in need … this is not only the mission of our company; it is also a personal passion of mine,” HSN CEO Mindy Grossman wrote in a statement released by the network. “That is why we have stopped selling Bajalia jewelry.”

Farah declined to comment personally, but she and her company, Bajalia International Group, have hired prominent Orlando attorney Mark NeJame, who is seeking a retraction from the Times.

“In the years her company has been with HSN, of the dozens and dozens of businesses that she has dealt with, [there is] not one complaint,” NeJame said. “We’ve gotten tons of testimonials from people that have dealt with her, and all will tell you she is stellar.”

According to the Times article, there is a complaint from Bakht Nazira, who employed more than 50 women in her hometown in Afghanistan to make necklaces and bracelets. Nazira — whom the Sentinel could not reach for comment — is quoted in the Times story saying Farah owes her $70,000 for an order filled in 2014.

NeJame said his client hasn’t paid for the merchandise because it’s “just a bunch of garbage” — with missing stones and rough edges — and that Farah tried to return it because she can’t sell it. The goods are sitting in a warehouse for now, with shipping labels that indicate Bajalia did attempt to return them in 2015.

The two depictions of Farah could not be more at odds.

To her well-connected circle of business women, leaders and social entrepreneurs, both in Winter Park and beyond, Farah is a hero. Her website describes her as a first-generation American whose mother and grandmother in Palestine were married off in their teens, and she writes of her “passion” for addressing human trafficking, domestic violence and a lack of educational and financial opportunities for women through her work.

“We get to create beautiful products, while at the same time empowering beautiful women,” she writes.

In 2004, after mission trips with her church, Farah launched a nonprofit organization, Bajalia Trading Company — Bajalia being a family name. For years it purchased jewelry and housewares from women in developing countries and sold them online and, later, through its Park Avenue storefront. The store closed in 2012, and NeJame said the organization ran into financial difficulties during the recession.

Public records indicate the nonprofit is largely abandoned, with a net loss of over $35,000 in 2014, the most recent year available.

Ingrid Chen, director of Hearts and Hands, which describes itself as a “social business” employing disabled tradespeople in China, told the Sentinel that Bajalia Trading still owes $19,000 for an $84,000 order placed through an intermediary after Chen met Farah in 2008. Chen said her people worked on the order for two years and that payments initially came on time — until they stopped.

“At first Debbie said that she had under-budgeted for the account, and we know there were some shipping issues from our end, but nothing more than $1,000,” Chen wrote in an email last week. “Debbie kept promising to pay us for about a year and then just stopped answering emails. Once, we received an email in return asking for donations to Bajalia.”

Two additional organizations that worked with Farah during the same time period also claimed she fell behind on payments and owed them money, according to the Times story. But they could not be reached for comment. 

NeJame said those debts are irrelevant.

“So she had a different business that between seven and 10 years ago got stuck in the economic downturn, like a lot of businesses did,” he said. “That has nothing to do with HSN.”

In 2010, Farah launched her for-profit venture, which began selling fair-trade jewelry from developing countries on HSN a year later. It’s not clear whether it had a substantially different objective than the nonprofit. Farah writes on her website, debbiefarah.com, that the organizations work “in collaboration.”

In 2011, she was named one of “150 Women Who Shake the World” by Newsweek magazine and The Daily Beast, and the accolades have continued. Last year, Farah was a featured speaker at the Winter Park Chamber of Commerce — which declined several requests for a comment — and named one of the 2016 “Women Who Mean Business” Owners of the Year by the Orlando Business Journal.

Her Bajalia International Group now has its office on Webster Avenue in Winter Park. Farah’s website says she travels extensively — including to Afghanistan, India, Swaziland, Africa, Pakistan, Thailand, China and Jamaica — and last year she claimed Bajalia International Group had 11 local employees and 280,000 contract workers around the globe.

Farah’s business looked to be thriving in more recent times. Bajalia jewelry has been seen publicly on A-list actresses and fashion models and was often used in magazine fashion shoots.

Calls to board members of Bajalia Trading weren’t returned.

Lauten, who met Farah about three years ago through a women’s business network, said she can’t speak to Farah’s financial dealings. But she feels confident in her friend’s motives.

“She is one of the most spiritual people I’ve ever met,” Lauten said, “and she believes she is doing God’s work.”

ksantich@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5503. Follow Kate at @katesantich.

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