It was difficult to bear all expenses for a eleven-member family of Amina following her father’s death as she was only six and the income of her service-holder elder sister and grocery shop owner brother’s was not well enough.
When she was just HSC level student, Amina started tailoring house in 2007 with a cost of Taka 1,50,000 at Feni district town to bring solvency to her family.
The initial investment came from her family members and near and dear ones. And it was Jatiyo Mohila Sangstha, a government financed project that gave her loan for expansion of the business.
Initially, it was a challenge for Amina to make profit for lack of machineries and raw materials. Besides, the people around used to either raise their brows, or make faces, or even taunted as she was at her adolescent age. But she had her firm determination in mind to move forward to achieve her desired success.
Now, she has been able to bring happiness to the face of all of her family members as her small tailoring shop has started paying good returns. Though she had so many obstacles, she continued her study and completed Master’s level in social work from Feni Government College.
“At that time, it was difficult for me to continue business and study at the same time. But I had no other options to go ahead. Now, I think, I could do. Now my monthly average income is Taka 30,000 and capital of my business is now over Taka 4,00,000,” said Bibi Amina Sharmin, who is the owner of Sharmin Dress House at Ukil Para.
“But, I will have to go a long way for my family as well as for other needy women. I want to do something for other women like me,” she added.
She expressed her gratitude to the government for providing supports to the women entrepreneurs through adopting various women friendly policies.
“Jatiyo Mohila Sangstha helped me expand my business. In 2008, I took Taka 45,000 as loan for purchasing raw materials. Later, I took loan several times. Now, I have also Taka 60,000 loan with it,” she said.
The loan amount is very low since the people has experienced big amount of loan which become classified in several banks. But the tiny amount of loan has brought solvency in many families like Amina. Besides, recovery rate of the tiny amount of loan is better than big amount of loan.
Another young lady-Nayma Sultana Bobi has already became success in her business in the same town by taking financial supports from the Jatiyo Mohila Sangstha.
“From my childhood, I wanted to do something myself. So, I opened the boutiques house about eight years ago for contributing to my family income. At that time my investment was only Taka 10,000 to Taka 12,000,” said Bobi, who is the owner of Doraemon Boutiques House.
