THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: It was just four years ago that Shari started to run her own beauty salon in Vallikavu, Kollam, which she set up after pawning her gold and receiving financial support from relatives.
The business helped her continue earning for the family even after her husband, an electrician who was employed abroad, lost his job due to the Covid-induced lockdown.
Her husband had come home just a few days before the first lockdown was imposed, and was unable to go back. Soon enough, Shari had to shut down her salon as well. The lockdown thus cut off every source of income to the family, which survived using the loan of `2 lakh that she had availed.
After the first lockdown was lifted, Shari could open the salon for a few months. But then the second wave of Covid hit, and she had to shut shop again. “Even if the salon is closed, I have to continue paying the rent, electricity charges, water bills and so on. The government has allowed most service sector shops to function now, but there is no clear update on salons yet. This business is my family’s only source of income right now,” she says.
Shari is just one among the thousands of women in the state who have taken loans to start a salon, but got stuck in a limbo in the wake of the pandemic. Though these small-scale entrepreneurs were able to open up their businesses for a brief period after the first wave of Covid, none of them could tide through the crisis. “A lot of women start salons by taking loans in the hopes of being able to sustain themselves. If the government doesn’t allow reopening of salons, we will struggle to survive.
Even gyms have been allowed to open. We should be allowed to function like any other service or the government should come up with a support system for us. We have been surviving on the loan and the occasional jobs my husband finds. In addition to running my family, my kid’s school fees also have to be paid. I do not know how to go forward,” says Shari, as she breaks down.