The Hindu Business Line : SKS Microfinance plans to double women clients

Hyderabad, April 9 SKS Microfinance is planning to double its number of women clients from six lakh at present to 12 lakh by the end of the current financial year.

The Hyderabad-based non-banking finance company, set up in 1998, has crossed the six lakh mark in extending loans to poor women in the last one decade of its operations.

“In Andhra Pradesh, the BPL population has been estimated at 92 lakh households with a loan requirement of Rs 19,367 crore. We at SKS have made a small impact by reaching out to 6 lakh women in Andhra Pradesh. We plan to reach out to 12 lakh clients by March 2009,” Mr K.V. Rao, Vice-President, Member Services, SKS Microfinance, said in a release.

Branch network

It had disbursed Rs 922 crore as loans (with an outstanding of Rs 275 crore) from its 183 branch offices across19 districts of the State. In Hyderabad, SKS operates through 18 urban branches which had disbursed loans worth Rs 36 crore among 41,000 members.

Visakhapatnam, where operations were set up in July 2007, was the fastest-growing district for SKS in the country with disbursal of Rs 65 crore loans to over one lakh members.

On the individual loans front, SKS had provided them to 18,300 members worth Rs 50 crore. Over 1,60,000 lives are covered under health insurance in Khammam and Karimnagar districts.

As a pilot project, loans for mobile handsets have been introduced in Nalgonda since November 2007. Over 10,000 handsets had been sold at competitive rates to members across 25 branches in Nalgonda district, the release added.

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