Self Help Groups are the backbone of women empowerment in India, however the potential of SHGs are not fully tapped. Critically analyse the role of SHG in women empowerment and suggest some measures to make the SHGs effective on this front.
Introduction
Self Help Groups (SHGs) are small informal groups, whose members face similar problems, who help each other to solve them
The features of SHG, resulting in Women Empowerment are:
SHG are a small group of women, mainly belonging to BPL Category
Geographical and Socio-Economic Similarities exist among Women Participants in an SHG
Pooling in resources and then supplying to the needy, enhances the Women’s opportunities
They do not work in Isolation, rather they collaborate with NGOs to fight the social issues
The SHG in our country has become a source of inspiration for women’s welfare formation and is a viable alternative to achieve the objectives of rural development and to get community participation in all rural development programmes
Now women in India are mobilized to protest against domestic violence, rising prices, legal discrimination, rape, child marriage, domestic violence etc. In this way, SHGs aims to empower women with various forms of power
SHG are enabled on organised set up to disburse micro credit to the rural women and encourage them to take up to Entrepreneurial activities
The Micro-finance provisions, along with credit management at the Village level have alleviated the women out of poverty and empowered them
Examples of SHGs empowering Women:
Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) is a trade union based in Ahmedabad, has a membership of 700,000 women, has had a clear impact on the empowerment of poor self-employed women by improving their access to employment opportunities, markets, services, and assets
Kudumbashree in Kerala has visualised the mobilisation of poor families under network of community based organisation which encompasses all sections of poor women
Shortcoming of SHGs: leading to not tapping the potential of SHG
- Ignorance of SHG members, leading to lack of awareness of the opportunities available for them in form of schemes, provisions etc Inadequate training facilities, making them incompetent with other units in the market
- Problems of marketing of their produce
- Family responsibilities causing lack of stability and unity Weak financial management and lack of managerial skills hampering their efficiency
Measures to make the SHGs effective:
- Impart the necessary skill training for basic management of SHGs to improve their efficiency
- Provide them with adequate financial assistance from the government in form of schemes and grants
- Information about locally available materials and their varied uses should be disseminated to SHGs. Proper encouragement and training should be given to them to make innovative products by using these materials
- In order to solve the various problems relating to marketing of SHGs, the state level organisations should extend the activities throughout the state instead of limiting its operations in a particular area
- Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) can play a significant role in empowering women entrepreneurs by providing basic education, motivation training, and financial help and so on Frequent awareness camps can be organised by the Rural Development department authorities to create awareness about the different schemes of assistance available to the participants in the SHGs
Conclusion
Hence, the SHGs need to undergo a process of self-fulfilment of each member to achieve the objective of true Women Empowerment