New Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented Budget 2019 today in Parliament and made certain specific announcements just for women. Sitharaman said that one woman in every SHG shall be made eligible for a loan of 1 lakh rupees under MUDRA scheme. An overdraft facility of Rs 5,000 rupees will also be allowed to every verified woman SHG member. While to further encourage women entrepreneurship in the country, the FM has also proposed a Women SHG Interest Subvention Programme, that is to be expanded to all districts in India. In the 2018 Budget also, Former FM Arun Jaitley had increased the scope of the Prime Minister’s Ujjwala Scheme to provide free connection to 8 crore poor women from an earlier target of 5 crore.  While the ruling BJP has earlier promised to provide collateral-free loans to entrepreneurs for upto Rs 50 lakh and 50% of the loan amount will be guaranteed towards women entrepreneurs in the country. 

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“As a woman entrepreneur, I welcome the Modi 2.0 government’s budget with open arms as a lot of focus was laid on the achievements of women in various fields. Nirmala Sitaraman, in her maiden budget announcement, proposed a committee to evaluate and suggest measure to improve women's welfare and this move would be beneficial to empower the fairer sex in the society. I am elated how the government has celebrated the efforts made by the women in their day-to-day life and gave them their due credit of being the main propellant for the welfare of the world. Even the announcement of a Rs 1,00,000 loan for women under the Mudra scheme will boost more women entrepreneurs to come forward and spread their wings,” said Savitha Kuttan, Founder & CEO, Omnicuris.    

As far as the previous budget is concerned, Piyush Goyal's interim budget lacked any specific announcements for women, other than the announcement that over 70% of MUDRA beneficiaries were women and that maternity leave of 26 weeks and Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana for pregnant women were helping beneficiaries.

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Nirmala Sitharaman, India's first full-time woman Finance Minister, was applauded by the gathering even as she made some significant announcements concerning women in Budget 2019.  The decisions clearly shed light on the vision of the government on women empowerment in the nation. Sitharaman also said there was no segment where the contribution of women was not significant. The govt has proposed a high-level working committee to work on these decisions.