For the past three years, the Govindpura branch of Lifeline has been helping women obtain capital to run their business as well as even smaller loans to help with meeting daily needs such as food, clothing, and school fees.
Moreover, every Ramadan, these ladies are also given some Zakah money in the form of cash. Unlike previous years, this time around money wasn’t given to each and every member of the branch. Instead the most needy candidates were chosen on the following criteria:
Ladies who are raising orphans
Widows with young kids
Old widows who have no one to take care of them
Divorced or deserted with young kids
Ladies with handicapped or incapacitated husbands and young kids
Ladies with illnesses and young or handicapped children and ambivalent husbands
Besides the above criteria, a lot of input was taken from our branch employees and volunteers, who understood the ground reality better.
The total number of ladies who were given money was forty.