Adding to basket
Notwithstanding her young age, Lhingkhoneng quite understands the hardships and problems of the family as they were orphaned at a very young age. Lhingkhoneng lives in a village in Manipur, in the northeastern state of India, with her brothers and sisters. Her parents died when she was very young. Her elder brothers and sisters got married so the responsibility to look after her younger siblings rests entirely upon her.
Initially, she did not have any source of income to manage the family. The only source to sustain the family was her father’s pension. She used the money to manage the family and for her younger brother’s education. To generate more income she engaged herself in doing quarry work near the river bank and earned daily wages. Unfortunately, the hard manual work took its toll on her health and she was forced to stop physical work on the doctor’s advice.
As she wanted to start her own income-generating business and needed financial assistant, she inquired among a few of her friends who are members of Kiva and they informed her that a loan could be accessed from WSDS, a partner with Kiva. She was delighted to know that there are generous people who could help her. With the first Kiva loan, she set up a small variety store near her house and in second and third loans she expanded and filled in more expensive items like sugar, rice, lentils etc in the store. Now, her store also deals in selling mobile recharge cards, too.
The ideas of saving money enthused her and she started saving some amount daily. Thus the money she saved was used in repaying the loan amount, bought two calves, a refrigerator and a computer.
Lhingkhoneng is very happy that she could help in maintaining the family in some ways and in repaying the loan without any default or even much difficulty. She said, “I am so happy and satisfied with WSDS/Kiva as it helped me in changing my life and my family's. Previously I had to do manual labor for income-generating but now, I am settled in my business. I will try to access loans in future as well and try to help others in changing their lives as much as I can.”
Like her the rest of the group members are engaged in ginger farming and variety stores.
In this group: Lhingneivah, Ngahneithem, Hatcha, Tingvei, Hatneng, Tingneilhai, Hatneikim, Domneng, Tingnei, Vahshi, Lhingkhoneng, Lamshi, Lamneihoi
