Details of the total number of women who have benefited from the Lakhpati Didi and Namo Didi initiatives, State-wise and category-wise

Newdelhi:3/12/24:The Deendayal Antodaya Yojana – National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM) is a centrally sponsored scheme of the Ministry of Rural Development. This is being implemented across the country (except Delhi & Chandigarh) to alleviate rural poverty inter-alia, through organizing the rural poor women into Self Help Groups (SHGs) and continuously nurturing and supporting them till they attain appreciable increase in income over some time, improving their quality of life and come out of abject poverty. Lakhpati Didi initiative is one of the outcomes of DAY-NRLM. A structured approach has been adopted to make the Self-Help Group (SHG) members Lakhpati, i.e. they earn a minimum income of Rupees one lakh per year on a sustainable basis. The State/UT-wise number of Lakhpati Didis is placed in Annexure-I. The category-wise data is not being maintained in the Ministry.

The NAMO drone Didi Scheme of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare aims to provide drones to 15,000 SHG members under the DAY-NRLM from 2023-24 to 2025-26. During the year 2023-24, the fertilizer companies through their resources have distributed 503 drones to SHG Members. State-wise details are placed in Annexure II.

Under DAY-NRLM, 10.05 crore women have been mobilized into 90.87 lakh SHGs till October 2024. The DAY NRLM is a process-driven program where various benefits, e.g., Revolving Fund, Community Investment Fund, Bank Linkage, etc. are extended to the SHGs as per their eligibility and their demands.

The Ministry has commissioned impact evaluation studies to understand the implications on the financial independence of SHG women through the interventions under the DAY-NRLM. An impact evaluation study of DAY-NRLM was conducted during 2019-20 by the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie) with the support of the World Bank. The evaluation indicates the following major findings:

1. Increase in income by 19% over the base amount.
2. The decline in share of informal loans by 20%
3. Increase in savings by 28%
4. Improved labor force participation – pthe roportion of females reporting secondary occupation is higher (4%) in treatment areas.
5. Improved access to other Schemes – Significant increase in a number of social schemes availed by treatment households (6.5% higher over the base value of 2.8 schemes).

This information was given by the Minister of State for Rural Development, Dr. Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani in a written reply in Lok Sabha today.

Annexure – I

Annexure – II