I had a chance to interact with two members of Maa Gayatri Self Help Group of Gulmi village of Titilagarh, Orissa on 18th November. The village is around 10 kilometers from the town and has approximately 600 inhabitants. Sandhyarani is the leader of the SHG. The members of the group are involved in varied activities to make a living such as making leaf plates, tailoring, running small shops and working on paddy fields. Most of the members of this group are literate and have basic school education. The village has the basic facilities like electricity and water pumps. Since the village is deep in the forests the telecommunication signals do not reach there as the villagers find it difficult to use mobile phones. All the children who are in the school going age now go to school. Due to frequent power cuts it is difficult to do the household work in the night and children also find it difficult to study at home. To mitigate this problem the group had taken solar energy loan almost two months back from Milaap for buying the solar lanterns. They had very good experience with Milaap and the field partner, Mahashakti Foundation is quite happy with the loan. The group expects that in future based on their timely repayment record they would be able to avail loans of more amounts.xfvgdfjh
Maa Gayatri SHG
