Government scheme aims to boost women self-help groups
July 10th, 2009 - 5:33 pm ICT by IANS
New Delhi, July 10 (IANS) Aiming to encourage self-reliance among women across the country, the government Friday said it would allocate Rs.20 crore for extending women self help groups (SHGs) to every block in the country.
The Women and Child Development Ministry’s Swayamsidha Scheme for holistic empowerment of women through SHG formation has its presence in 650 blocks of the country, catering to 930,000 women in 53,000 such groups.
“The WCD Ministry has proposed to cover all the remaining blocks in the country and to ensure the larger coverage in the states lagging behind in woman development indices. A budget provision of Rs.20 crore has been made in the annual budget of 2009-10 for providing grant to the self-help groups under the scheme,” a ministry statement issued here Friday said.
The grant provided by the ministry would be seed money to set up the SHGs while the groups would also be given access to micro-credit from various financial institutions for taking up projects - earnings from which would in turn add to economic resources of the groups, the release said.
The Swayamsidha Scheme aims at developing strong pressure groups for women’s rights, strengthening and institutionalising saving among rural women and their control over economic resources, improving access to micro-credit and involvement of women in local planning and convergence of different agencies for women’s empowerment and integrated projects.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, while presenting the budget Monday, said that at least 50 percent of all rural women in the country would be enrolled in SHGs over the next five years and these in turn would be linked to banks.
- Nabard's Rs.15 bn fund to help women's self-help groups - Apr 14, 2012
- Empowering lives, transforming villages - the self-help way (March 8 is International Women's Day) - Mar 07, 2012
- Andhra proposes non-banking finance body for self-help groups - Jun 21, 2011
- Self-help groups to get loans at lower rates: Jairam Ramesh - Jun 21, 2011
- Budget gives boost to women, child development schemes - Jul 06, 2009
- India targets village women as HIV infections increase - Sep 25, 2009
- Rs.6.53 Cr released for Tripura under Swarnjayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana - Jun 07, 2010
- Mamata urges banks to hike agriculture, SME credit in Bengal - Dec 11, 2011
- Finance Minister promises to strengthen regional rural banks - Feb 28, 2011
- India's biggest women's grassroots chain connects to Africa - Jul 09, 2012
- National livelihood mission to rural raise workers's skills - Jun 03, 2011
- Sonia to launch rural livelihood mission - Jun 01, 2011
- Sonia launches livelihood mission for rural poor - Jun 03, 2011
- ICDS to be extended to every child under six by March 2012 - Jul 06, 2009
- Ramesh offers Rs.900 crore for village coordinators - Aug 18, 2012
Tags: budget provision, child development, convergence, crore, development ministry, economic resources, empowerment, finance minister, financial institutions, government scheme, micro credit, ministry statement, next five years, pranab mukherjee, pressure groups, rural women, seed money, self help groups, self reliance, wcd