Roshni’s Story

Roshni is a 26-year-old Self-Help Group (SHG) leader from Mirzapur, Uttar Pradesh. Having completed her higher secondary education, she is looked up to by the other women in the SHG for her management skills and decision-making, as she is more educated than many in the group.

Her husband, who works as a labourer, does not have much formal education. Roshni is a mother of three boys, aged 7, 5, and 1.5. She also shares her home with her mother-in-law, who works as a hired farm labourer and helps in managing the household.

Roshni's family primarily relies on the income from her husband and mother-in-law, who together earn about Rs. 15,000 per month. In addition to this, Roshni contributes by doing work connected with her Self-Help Group (SHG), from which she earns an additional Rs. 1,000 monthly. She also saves Rs. 10 weekly as part of her SHG's savings initiative, which amounts to approximately Rs. 500 to Rs. 600 per year. Collectively, the women in her SHG have saved an estimated Rs. 50,000 to Rs. 60,000 over time.

Roshni is the only one from her SHG who does any kind of digital banking. She is more digitally savvy than the other members - she even has a pair of bluetooth earphones, uses Whatsapp regularly and also uses the applications provided by her SHG to manage the everyday transactions of the SHG.

Roshni has had PhonePe for a year now. She mostly uses PhonePe to transfer money to her relatives in Calcutta who are sick. She also uses it to pay utility bills.

Sometimes, she recharges phones for other people through her UPI apps. She also helps them with paying electricity bills. They pay her in cash, which she does not digitise. This money directly goes to household expenses. She doesn’t know how to go about making money from these services she provides, but wants to figure it out.

Roshni is confident in her ability to help people open accounts on platforms like GPay and PhonePe. However, she is reluctant to onboard others in her SHG. She believes that many of the members lack the technical know-how and digital literacy required to use UPI apps safely. Most of them are not well-versed in such platforms and might struggle with secure usage, which concerns her. Additionally, she is wary of being held responsible if something goes wrong after she assists someone in getting started with these apps.

Roshni has also encountered scam messages in the past, but she was cautious from the outset. She recalled thinking, “One really can’t get money that easily.” Her scepticism led her to approach her bank directly, where they warned her not to engage with any suspicious messages. She has also received scam calls, but now, being more aware, she confidently refuses to engage with them, safeguarding herself against potential fraud.