Results are presented from a study on a microcredit program with self-help groups implemented for widowed and abandoned women in Tamil Nadu shortly after the Indian Ocean Tsunami. Data were collected from 109 participants measuring the women's investment patterns, loan amounts, demographics, and overall well-being (psychological, economic, communal, and familial). Results indicate that loan amounts and investment patterns were not significantly related to the women's well-being. Length of group participation and having children were negatively related to the women's well-being. These findings are discussed in relation to social and cultural contexts. Suggestions for programs for this population of vulnerable women and other marginalized groups are proposed.The devastating Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004 left thousands of people without housing or their livelihoods. The effort undertaken to provide relief revealed the inequalities that exist in Indian society; certain groups of people, based on caste, gender, or age, were excluded from receiving aid. A survey of women's rights violations in the aftermath of the tsunami confirms that women were more vulnerable than men during the disaster (Asia Pacific Forum on Women Law and Development [APWLD], 2006). Their marginalized and disempowered status placed them at greater risk than men because financial and other forms of aid were not equitably distributed.The South Indian state of Tamil Nadu was among the regions severely affected by the tsunami because of its large coastal area and numerous fishing communities. Besides the loss of more than 8,000 lives, the livelihoods of most of the people in this area were affected because thousands of boats and fishing nets were destroyed. People who lived in the surrounding rural area were also affected by the tsunami. 12
Microcredit Self-Help Groups for Women in South India
13Because the saline water from the ocean flooded the land and made it unfit for farming, rural inhabitants could not work. Dalits ("untouchables" or outcastes) and people from scheduled castes, who provided labor to the fishermen through cleaning and selling fish, also lost their jobs.A needs assessment conducted by the local nongovernmental organization (NGO) Kalangarai 1 during the weeks after the tsunami revealed that there were 1,700 widowed or abandoned women in the rural or coastal areas of Tamil Nadu who were particularly at risk because of the lack of access to resources, their extreme level of poverty before the tsunami, and the discrimination they experienced in their communities. Kalangarai found that these women were not being supported by relief efforts and that they faced progressively worse economic conditions because of the loss of their livelihoods. In response, Kalangarai developed selfhelp groups for widowed or abandoned women throughout the area and provided financial assistance in the form of microcredit loans.The overall purpose of this study was to determine what impact the post-tsunami microcredit program implemented by Kalangarai had on ...