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PM to hold direct ‘Samvad’ with self-help groups

The interaction, through a video conference, will provide Modi an opportunity to know directly from the SHG members.

PM to hold direct ‘Samvad’ with self-help groups

Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (Photo: AFP/File)

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on Thursday morning have a direct ‘samvad’ (dialogue) with members of Self-Help Groups under Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana – National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM), and beneficiaries of other rural employment-cum-training schemes.

The interaction, through a video conference, will provide Modi an opportunity to know directly from the SHG members, the various activities undertaken by them, and how these had impacted their lives.

The dialogue will be telecast live by Doordarshan. The National Informatics Centre (NIC) will webcast it through its network.

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The DAY-NRLM has emerged as the largest institutional platform for women’s empowerment. The PM’s ‘Samvad’ will include beneficiaries of Deendayal Upadhyay- Grameen Kaushalaya Yojana (DDU-GKY) and Rural Self Employment Training Institutes (RSETIs) also.

Among the beneficiaries selected for the dialogue are Self Help Groups working on anti-alcohol movement; maize value chain and marketing from Bihar; brick-making unit from Chhattisgarh; Business Correspondent Sakhi and tamarind value chain and marketing; and one beneficiary from Jharkhand, Manufacturing and marketing of sanitary napkins; besides DDU-GKY beneficiaries from Madhya Pradesh.

DAY-NRLM is one of the flagship programmes of the Ministry of Rural Development to alleviate rural poverty. The centrally sponsored programme seeks to mobilize about nine crore households into SHGs and link them to sustainable livelihoods opportunities by building their skills and enabling them to access formal sources of finance, entitlements and services from both public and private sectors.

DAY-NRLM has been implemented in 4884 blocks spread across 600 districts in 29 States and five Union Territories.

As of 18 May, more than five crore women have been mobilized into 45 lakh Self-Help Groups (SHGs). In addition, 2.48 lakh Village Organizations and 20,000 Cluster Level Federations have also been promoted. The Mission has created dedicated sensitive-support structures in all states.

Every state now has a State Rural Livelihoods Mission manned by over 20000 professionals at various levels for providing training and capacity building and long term hand holding support to the Women’s organisations.

However, the cornerstone of the Mission’s implementation strategy is the community driven approach adopted under the programme. More than 1.8 lakh community members have been trained and deployed to provide support to the community institutions in a variety of themes, such as book-keeping, training and capacity building, financial services etc.

The Mission, with the support of Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Department of Financial Services (DFS) and the Indian Bankers Association (IBA) has been successful in achieving a quantum jump in the amount of bank credit accessed by SHGs.

More than Rs. 1.64 lakh crore of bank credi t has been accessed by the SHGs in the last five years. The quality of the portfolio has also shown a marked improvement with the NPA reducing to 2.3 per cent.

DDU-GKY and RSETI are sub-schemes of DAYNRLM that focus on supporting rural youth in accessing wage-employment and self-employment respectively.

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