A common critique of microfinance has always been that it fails to reach all demographic groups equally and those at the bottom of the income ladder. Vivaan Garg, a 16 year old student studying in Delhi’s Vasant Valley School has always been passionate about using public policy and economics as a tool for solving societal problems.
First taking note of this problem while coming across a piece of research he delved deeper and found out the prevalence of this problem in low income areas near his neighbourhood talking to different marginalised women. “I spoke to several very low income women who ran small enterprises like a fruit or a tea stall and got to know that getting credit to expand or finance current needs was like a mere fantasy” says Vivaan.
Using his organisation Ignite India which he founded when he was just a young adolescent of 14 to help underrepresented NGOs create an online presence he enlisted the help of 50+ volunteers across Delhi NCR to identify low income women in multiple slums. The first set of volunteers started work from the beginning of 2023 in January. “Working in the slums was an eye-opening experience living a very sheltered life away from the pressing problems of society” says Vedansh, a volunteer at Ignite India. Till now, Ignite India has managed to identify 850+ women and even managed to secure loans for more than 300 by partnering with an NGO already doing work in the field. They categorise the identified women as marginalised within the marginalised: women who are from underrepresented demographic groups like scheduled castes and face the dual burden of being low income and facing discrimination”. The beneficiaries range from women starting their business for the first time to some using the funds for working capital needs for existing businesses.
Ignite India has plans to expand their reach even further and are currently developing a curriculum for microloan beneficiaries to teach them about things ranging from insurance claim filing to cash flow management. “We plan to use technology that is accessible to all loan beneficiaries: we have tried several mediums but we believe sending their curriculum through regular text messages which may be categorised as simplistic has the potential to reach the maximum number of people. Ignite India is targeting a minimum of 3000 women through this medium very soon and has plans to expand this reach even further within the next few months.
