What's Your Money Worth? A series from the front lines of the cost-of-living crisis in which hard-hit people share their monthly expenses.
name: Manisha Santosh Kadam
Year: 42
to be born: Manchar, Maharashtra, India
Profession: Cook
Live with: Husband Santosh (48 years old), daughter Rituja (21 years old), and son Sujal (17 years old).
live: A 37-square-meter (400-square-foot) home in Diva in the Thane district of Maharashtra, about an hour's drive from India's financial capital, Mumbai.
The house, located on a busy street, has two small rooms. One is a medium-sized hall where everyone sleeps together, and the other is the kitchen. They have no gardens or open spaces.
monthly income: Manisha earns a monthly salary of 17,000 rupees ($203.64) working eight hours a day as a cook at a home in south Mumbai's Byculla district. India's minimum daily wage is currently 176 rupees ($2.11).
Manisha's husband works as an electrician and earns an unstable monthly income of 3,000 to 4,000 rupees ($35.94 to $47.92).
Total expenses for the month: 16,673 rupees ($199.72) for family living expenses. At the end of March, Manisha had only 327 rupees ($3.92) left in her bank account.
She also paid 90,000 rupees ($1,078) to repay a loan she took out from the government to cover the running costs of her family's farm near Mansha's hometown of Manchar. She borrowed money from her friends and relatives to repay the loan.
