New Delhi, March 03: Ministry of Finance, in the past six years has launched various schemes which have special provisions for empowerment of women. These schemes have financially empowered women to lead a better life and chase their dreams of being an entrepreneur.
As we are celebrating International Women’s Day on 8th March 2020, we take a look at various schemes initiated by the Ministry of Finance which have benefitted the women in India.
Stand-Up India Scheme – Stand Up India Scheme was launched on 5 April 2016 to promote entrepreneurship at grass root level for economic empowerment and job creation. This scheme seeks to leverage the institutional credit structure to reach out to the underserved sector of people such as Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Women Entrepreneurs so as to enable them to participate in the economic growth of nation.
The objective of this scheme is to facilitate bank loans between Rs.10 lakh and Rs.1 crore to at least one Scheduled Caste (SC) or Scheduled Tribe (ST) borrower and at least one woman borrower per bank branch of SCBs for setting up a Greenfield enterprise.
As on 17.02.2020, more than 81% account holders under Stand Up India Scheme are women. 73,155 accounts have been opened for women. Rs. 16712.72 crore has been sanctioned for women account holders and Rs. 9106.13 crore has been disbursed for women account holders.
Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Yojana (PMMY) – PMMY was launched on April 8, 2015 for providing loans up to 10 lakh to the non-corporate, non-farm small/micro enterprises. These loans are classified as MUDRA loans under PMMY. These loans are given by Commercial Banks, RRBs, Small Finance Banks, MFIs and NBFCs.
Under the aegis of PMMY, MUDRA has created three products namely ‘Shishu’, ‘Kishore’ and ‘Tarun’ to signify the stage of growth / development and funding needs of the beneficiary micro unit / entrepreneur and also provide a reference point for the next phase of graduation / growth.
The Vision of MUDRA scheme is “To be an integrated financial and support services provider par excellence benchmarked with global best practices and standards for the bottom of the pyramid universe for their comprehensive economic and social development”
As on 31.01.2020, more than 22.53 crore loans have been sanctioned since launch of the scheme.Out of this, more than 15.75 crore loans extended to women , thereby 70% of the total loan borrowers are Women.
Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) – PMJDY was launched on 28th August, 2014. The scheme as extended and revised with effect from 14.08.2018 envisages universal access to banking facilities with at least one basic banking account for every adult, financial literacy, access to credit, insurance and pension.
