Government celebrates 8 years of Nari Shakti, highlights important schemes

Recognising the importance of #NariShakti as the harbinger of a bright future, the Indian government is celebrating Ghar ki Laxmi – Betiyaan, ensuring women-led development during the Amrit Kaal.

In the 2022 Budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, declared, "Nari Shakti is the harbinger of our bright future," putting women into focus.

She elaborated, “Recognising the importance of Naari Shakti as the harbinger of our bright future and for women-led development, our government has comprehensively revamped the schemes of the Ministry of Women and Child Development. Three schemes — Mission Shakti, Mission Vatsalya, and Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0 — were launched recently to provide integrated benefits to women and children."

A series of tweets highlighted #8YearsofWomenEmpowerment of the Narendra Modi Government, highlighting various schemes and initiatives to benefit women and children.

According to GovIndia, the Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao programme has seen gross enrolment of girls in higher education increase by 18 percent from 2015 to 2020.

And, for the first time, there are 1,020 women to every 1,000 men. There is a 15 percent increase in the percentage of women with 10 years of schooling. There is a 48 percent in the percentage of women having a bank/savings account.

The website also shared numbers on the skilling of women, where under the PM’s Kaushal Vikas Yojana, nearly 40 percent of candidates are women. Women industrial training institutes are ensuring economic independence through skill development and vocational training.

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Under the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana, with a minimum deposit of Rs 250, citizens can open an account in the name of a girl child till she turns 10. Around 2.9 crore accounts were opened and Rs 1.3 lakh crore was deposited.

The Ujwala Yojana has also benefited millions of women in the country. Besides ensuring smoke-free homes and the well-being of women, it has distributed free LPG connections to women of BPL households and bridged gender inequality with respect to rights, access, and economic empowerment.

The Swachh Bharat Mission, with the provision of functional toilets, has mitigated the hardships of women, and women SHGs have found additional livelihood options by taking on the responsibility of running community toilets. Over six lakh villages have been declared open-defecation free.

For years, a large number of rural women have had to travel miles to have access to potable water. Under the government’s Jal Jeevan Mission, 50 percent of rural households have safe drinking water in their homes and are given time and opportunity for education, especially for young girls, who otherwise have to trudge miles to get water.

The government also introduced the world’s largest financial inclusion programme – the PM Jan Dhan Yojana – in which, over 55 percent of accounts are held by women. The programme provided Rs 500 per month to over 20 crore women account holders from April-June 2020.

The Deendayal Antodaya Yojana provides support to diversify livelihoods and improve incomes for rural poor women through self-help groups. So far, over eight crore women have been mobilised into 75 lakh SHGs.

The government e-marketplace launched the Womaniya programme for women entrepreneurs and women-led SGHs, where they can directly sell handicrafts, handlooms, and accessories to ministries and other departments. It also enables the training of women entrepreneurs by various national and state organisations.

During the past years, women have also broken the ceiling by occupying positions of power and responsibility in the Armed Forces. For the first time, combat roles were introduced for three women fighter pilots in the Indian Air Force. An all-women SWAT team is set up for anti-terror operations.

Moreover, rifle women have been deployed along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir on national security duty. In fact, the all-women crew of INSV Tarini circumnavigated the globe in a 254-day expedition.

Besides these, key reforms for women’s safety and the new labour reforms were also highlighted in the series of tweets.