20 Women Empowerment Schemes in India

1. Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao Scheme

Aim: To generate awareness and improve the efficiency of welfare services meant for girls

Launched on: 22 January 2015
Initial Funding: 100 crore
Objectives:

• To prevent sex-selective abortion 
• To ensure survival and protection of a girl child 
• To ensure education of the girl child 

 

2. One Stop Centre Scheme

Aim: To provide support and assistance to women affected by violence both in private and public spaces.
Funds: The Scheme will be funded through Nirbhaya Fund.

Objectives:

• To provide integrated support and assistance to women affected by violence, both in private and public spaces under one roof. 
• To facilitate immediate emergency and nonemergency access to a range of services including medical, legal, psychological and counselling support to fight against any forms of violence against women. 

3. Women helpline scheme

Aim: Scheme for Universalization of Women Helpline is meant to provide 24 hours immediate and emergency response to women affected by violence.
Launched on: 01 April 2015
Objectives: 

• To provide toll-free 24-hours telecom service to women affected by violence seeking support and information. 
• To help crisis and non-crisis intervention through referral to the appropriate agencies such as police/Hospitals/Ambulance services/District Legal Service Authority (DLSA)/Protection Officer (PO). 
• To provide information about the appropriate support services, government schemes available to the woman affected by violence 

Call to any of the following Women Helpline Nos.
Call to Women's Helpline: 181 Toll free
Call to 1091- Police Helpline, 102 (hospital/Ambulance) & 108 (Emergency Response Services)
Contact to One Stop Centre(OSC)

4 Working Women’s Hostel (WWH)

Aim: Scheme envisages provision of safe and affordable hostel for women.
Objective:

• The main objective of the scheme is to promote availability of safe and conveniently located accommodation for working women with day care facility for their children wherever possible in urban, semi urban or even rural areas where employment opportunity for women exist. 

5. Support to Training and Employment Programme (STEP) for Women

Aim: To make a significant impact on women by upgrading skills. The target group includes the marginalised asset less rural women and urban poor. This also includes wage labourers, unpaid daily workers, women headed households and families below poverty line. 

Objectives

• To mobilise women in small viable groups and make facilities available through training and access to credits 
• To provide training for skill upgrading 
• To enable groups of women to take up employment-cum- income generation programs. 
• To provide support for further improving training and employment conditions of women. 

6. SWADHAR Greh Scheme

Aim: To provide temporary accommodation, maintenance and rehabilitative services to women and girls rendered homeless due to family discord, crime, violence, mental stress, social ostracism. Another scheme with similar objectives is Short Stay Home (SSH). 

Launched: 2001
Objectives:

• To cater to the primary need of shelter, food, clothing, medical treatment and care of the women in distress and who are without any social and economic support. 
• To enable them to regain their emotional strength that is affected due to their encounter with unfortunate circumstances. 
• To provide them with legal aid and guidance to take steps for their readjustment in family or society. To rehabilitate them economically and emotionally. 
• To enable them to start their life as fresh with dignity and conviction. 

7. Rajiv Gandhi National Creche Scheme

Aim: This scheme is for the children of working mothers to take care of the children.

Launched: launched in 2012. 

• It was revamped in 2016. T
• The present scheme will provide assistance to NGOs for running crèches. 

Objectives: 

• To providing a nursery where babies and young children are cared for during the working day. Employment of women has resulted in increased opportunities for their employment and more women are now working within or outside their homes. 
• Thus the children of these women, who were earlier getting support from relatives and friends while their mothers were working now in need of day care services which provide quality care and protection for the children. 

8. Pradhan Mantri Mantru Vandana Yojana

Aim: Scheme ensures safe delivery and good nutrition for mothers having their first child.
Launched: The scheme was launched in 2010 as Indira Gandhi Matritva Sahyog Yojana (IGMSY). It was renamed as Matritva Sahyog Yojana in 2014 and again as Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) in 2017.

Objective:
Providing partial compensation for the wage loss in terms of cash incentive s so that the woman can take adequate rest before and after delivery of the first living child.
The cash incentive provided would lead to improved health seeking behaviour amongst the Pregnant Women and Lactating Mothers (PW& LM).

9. Mahila e-Haat

Aim: To strengthen financial inclusion of Women Entrepreneurs in the economy by providing continues sustenance and support to their creativity.
Objectives:

• Mahila E-Haat is an initiative for meeting needs of women entrepreneurs. 
• This startup Rashtriya Mahila Kosh website leverages technology for showcasing products made/manufactured/sold by women entrepreneurs. 
• They can even show their services of their creative potential. This unique e-platform will strengthen the socioeconomic empowerment of women. 
• To act as a catalyst by providing a web-based marketing platform to the women entrepreneurs to directly sell their products. 
• To support 'Make in India' through online marketing platform. 

10. Mahila police volunteers

Aim: The Role of Police is pivotal in ensuring the safety and security of citizens in general and women in particular. 

• To increase the number of women in the police force. 

Objectives:

• An MPV will serve as a public-police interface in order to fight crime against women. 
• The broad mandate of MPVs is to report incidences of violence against women such as domestic violence, child marriage, dowry and violence faced by women in public spaces. 
• She will act as a role model for the community. 

11. National Mission for Empowerment of Women (NMEW)

Aim: It is an initiative of the Government of India for empowering women holistically. 

Launched: 15 August 2011

Objective:
To strengthen the conceptual and programmatic basis of women-centric schemes implemented. Training & Capacity Building to enhance and strengthen understanding of gender issues, build a Resource Pool (trainers) at the National and State level to bridge gaps between knowledge and practice will be the other focus area of NMEW

12. Pradhan Mantri Mahila Shakti Kendra scheme

Aim: To promote community participation through involvement of Student Volunteers for empowerment of rural women.
Launched: 2017

Objective: The main purpose of this scheme is to enhance women’s quality of life. Starting from saving and surviving of girl child, their primary as well as secondary education and overall quality of life will be improved through the implementation of this scheme.

13. Rastriya Mahila Kosh (RMK)

Aim: To provide micro-credit to poor women for various livelihood support and income generating activities at concessional terms in a client-friendly procedure to bring about their socio-economic development.
Launched: In March 1993
Objective:

• To demonstrate and replicate participatory approaches in the organization of women’s groups for effective utilization of credit resources leading to self-reliance.
• To promote and support the expansion of entrepreneurship skills among women.
• To do all such lawful acts & things as may be necessary or conducive for furthering the objects of the Kosh.

14. NAND-GHAR YOJANA

Aim: To enhance the learning environment through an e-learning module and skill enhancement programme for women.
Launched: 24th June 2015
Objective:

• To make Anganwadis as a community center for children and mothers.
• To provide solar-power system to make them stand-alone and television for teaching purpose.
• To provide supplementary nutrition to children in the age group of 0-6 years and to pregnant/lactating mothers with main objective to fight the problem of malnutrition.

15. Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana

Aim: To provide clean fuel to women who are below poverty line who generally use unclean cooking fuels that does more harm than good and replace the same with LPG.
Launched: In March 2016
Objective:

• Protecting the health of women and empowering them
• Curbing health issues that result from using fossil fuels and other fuels for cooking
• Reducing casualties that occur as a result of unclean fuels used for cooking
• Controlling respiratory issues that occur due to indoor pollution as a result of using fossil fuel that does not burn cleanly.

16. Maternity Benefit Program

Aim: To provide partial compensation for wage loss to women during their pregnancy and offers a cash incentive of Rs 6,000 to mothers for the birth of their first child, has so far reached 4.8 million beneficiaries.
Launched: 2017
Objective:

• Promoting appropriate practice, care and institutional service utilization during pregnancy, delivery and lactation
• Encouraging the women to follow (optimal) nutrition and feeding practices, including early and Exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months
• Providing cash incentives for improved health and nutrition to pregnant and lactating mothers.

17. Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana

Aim: To encourage parents of a girl child order to create a fund for the future education and marriage expenses for their child.
Launched: In January 2015
Objective: To ensure the financial independence of women by encouraging them to invest in a savings scheme that would enable them to fulfil their long-term life goals and dreams like higher education, marriage, etc. and ensure financial stability.      

18. eSamvad portal

Aim: To provide a platform for NGOs and civil society to interact with the Ministry on relevant subjects.
Launched: 2018
Objective: It acts as an interactive portal allowing NGOs to contact the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development and share their feedback, suggestions, grievances and their best practices.

19. Nari Web Portal

Aim: The portal aims to spread information about schemes and benefits provided by the Government to women.
Launched: 2018
Objective:

• To access information on different programmes offered by various state governments as well as the Centre
• The portal carries details on 350 different schemes for women and will be updated from time to time.

20. She-Box Portal

Aim: It aims to provide speedier remedy to women facing sexual harassment at workplace
Launched: 2018
Objective:

• To report complaints of Sexual Harassment at Workplace
• For prompt disposal of complaints on SHe-Box, each case goes directly to the central/ state authority concerned having jurisdiction to take action in the matter.

21. New Draft National Policy

Aim: This Policy aims to make women able to participate as equal partners in all spheres of life.

Launched: 2019

Objective: The draft policy addresses the diverse needs of women through identified priority areas :

• Health including food security and nutrition, 
• Education, 
• Economy (including agriculture industry, labour, employment, NRI women, soft power, service sector, science and technology), Violence against women, 
• Governance and decision making 
• Violence Against Women
• Enabling environment (including housing, shelter and infrastructure, drinking water and sanitation, media and culture, sports and social security) 
• Environment and climate change.