Govt to provide Rs 90,000-crore loan to women self-help groups

The government is planning to provide loans worth Rs 90,000 crore in the next couple of years to women Self-Help Groups (SHGs) for non-farm economic activities.

Addressing a National Workshop on Best Practices in National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), Secretary, Rural Development Amarjeet Sinha said that at present three crore women are linked to Aajeevika Mission and they have availed about Rs 30,000 crore bank loans for economic activities.

NRLM is an innovative flagship programme designed to alleviate rural poverty in a time-bound manner. Launched in 2011, the mission aims to mobilise all rural poor households into self-managed SHGs and federations which, in turn, promote the livelihoods of the poor.

“The centrally sponsored mission is currently being implemented in 3,157 blocks across 462 districts by all states and union territories in a phased but intensive manner. As of July, 2016, 324 lakh rural poor households stood mobilised into 26.94 lakh SHGs, which are in turn, federated into 1.45 village organisations, said the Ministry of Rural Development.

The states have set-up dedicated implementation structures at the state, district, and block levels, and have engaged more than 20,000 dedicated professionals and about 1 lakh community professionals to implement the mission. The mission is designed to saturate social mobilisation and SHGs promotion in all blocks of the country during the next 3-4 years.

The mission has provided a capital grant of about Rs 3,170 crores to the SHGs and federations in the form of revolving fund, community investment fund and interest subsidy to support the livelihoods of the poor. The cumulative savings of SHGs facilitated by the mission in intensive blocks alone account for over Rs 10,665 crores (up to July, 2016). More significantly, the SHGs have leveraged Rs 83,153 crores of bank credit since FY 2013-14.

As part of NRLM, 34 lakh Mahila Kisans are being supported under Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana component. In addition, about 19.70 lakh rural youth have been trained in self-employment skills through a network of 583 Rural Self Employment Training Institutes (RSESTIs), of whom 12.13 lakh have been settled in gainful self-employment, the Ministry of Rural Development said.