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Meet Bhairavi, our new Field Partnerships Manager who brings to us close to 4 years of prior experience and a MBA from FMS Delhi. She will be looking into auditing the work our field partners do and also taking care of due diligence that we strictly follow with them to ensure maximum impact and 100% repayment.

Instead of doing the usual Q&A with our new folks on board, we thought we should send her on a field trip to actually get a hang of being there  (since she would be among the lucky ones to spend most of her work on field). This was Bhairavi's first field trip and she was super excited. Here's her experience that she shares  - 

Lack of education limits a child’s prospects. Every parent knows so and the farmers of Sullibele village, off Hoskote town in Karnataka, are not an exception. They too send their children to school to learn alphabets, numbers and rhymes.

                                                                    



Just that the school has well-ventilated white-washed class-rooms, white-boards, water facility, toilets and teachers who are present! The school, Rishikul Vidyapeeta, is a low-cost private school and a beneficiary of a loan from Milaap. The money was used to build an additional class room.
 

In India, the public sector has not been entirely able to meet the demand for schooling. Private players did step in to provide alternatives. Sadly, however, this was confined largely to cities and to bigger towns. Fortunately, things are changing for the better now. Entrepreneurs see business potential in building and running schools in rural India.  Helping these entrepreneurs find funds are organization such as Milaap.
 

As for the tiny tots in bright yellow t-shirts tottering about in Rishikul Vidyapeeta, one hopes that such sights soon become common enough to stall all kinds of gaping!

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Meet our new intern Pritam who comes all the way from IIT kanpur to helps us out on a project this summer. In his second year itself, he decided he wanted to do something that can have an impact and that's when he came across Milaap. He applied for an internship and looking at this young one's enthusiasm it was hard to reject his application. We spoke to him to know more about him and this is what he had to say: 

Q) Tell us about yourself & your prior experience before joining Milaap?

 I am from Kolkata and doing my Engineering from IIT Kanpur. I am an avid reader of social, political and business news. I am very passionate about blogging and analysing stuffs relevant to the Indian society. My hobbies are watching movies, TV series (I do that a lot!) and reading books but the thing I like the most is hanging out with my friends.

I have been involved in many co-curricular activities in my college including the cultural festivals, organizing Orientation for freshers, being a part of Alumni Cell, Anti-ragging Committee etc. After my 2^nd year summer I did an internship in a marketing start-up company and from then I developed great interest in learning about start-ups. The best thing is it gives you lot of freedom and you responsibility as well. It gives you a scope to make a huge difference to the company which won’t be much visible in a large corporate firm.

                                                           
 

Q) So how did you hear about Milaap?
 

 I know an alumnus of my college who is working in social sector. I wanted to utilise my summer to work in an NGO or a company in social field. He told me about Milaap and after some googling, I sent my resume to Mayukh, who is the co-founder of Milaap. Fortunately, he liked my CV and I got the internship.
 

Q) What was your motivation in joining Milaap?

 The primary motivation was to do something worthwhile for the people and contribute to the society in whatever way I can. I understood that Milaap is driven by a vision to provide financial help to those people who form the majority of India’s population. It also aims to make the lenders aware of the conditions of the underprivileged communities in urban and rural areas. Getting involved in Milaap is actually a win-win situation for both the borrowers and lenders where everybody is benefited. I want to make use of my social and professional skills to benefit the livelihood of the lower strata of the society.

                                                                    
Q) What is your expectation from Milaap?

 I am very excited to work with people who share the common objective of uplifting the position of the people in the society. At the end of this internship I want to prepare a better loan structure for vocational training courses and make a small contribution to the goal of skilling India’s young workforce. 

 

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