In not too distant past, women in states like Haryana went through a lot of discrimination in terms of getting the same opportunities and upbringing like that of boys. At places, they don’t even get to decide their future. Countering this trend, a noble initiative is being taken in the Karnal district of Haryana where the district administration is creating employment for thousands of women Self Help Groups (SHG) in the district.
Karnal, which caters to the highest number of women SHGs in the state, has started an initiative where these women SHGs will run canteens in all government offices in the district. This is the brainchild of Deputy Commissioner of Karnal, Mr. Nishant Yadav.
CREATING EMPLOYMENT FOR WOMEN
The Ministry of Rural Development in 2011 launched a poverty alleviation project by the name of National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM). This scheme is focused on promoting self-employment and organization of rural poor. The basic idea behind this programme is to organize the poor into SHG (Self Help Groups) groups and make them capable of self-employment.
While speaking with Indian Masterminds, Mr. Nishant Yadav said “Under this mission, we started an initiative in which we gave authority to these groups of women SHGs to run all the government office’s canteens in the district. As a particular group will be running a canteen, every woman SHG will be having their own work which she will be responsible for. Currently, Karnal caters to around 4,000 SHG groups which include around 40,000 women in total.”
On 12th July 2021, the initiative was rolled out in the district with Mr. Yadav inaugurating 10 such offices where these women SHGs will start running the canteens. Mr. Yadav said, “Initially this initiative has been started in 10 government offices, but will soon be expanded in all of the government offices in the district.”
The officer, while inaugurating a canteen in the office of Block Development and Panchayat Officer Gharaunda, asked to increase the sale of food items and also indicated that he will link it with the market so that more profits can be earned. He also asked SDM Dr. Pooja Bharti to issue a government order for this.
EXPANDING IT TO THE COOPERATIVE DEPARTMENT
Not only the canteens but the initiative is also being expanded to the co-operative department of Haryana named HAFED. HAFED is the largest Apex Cooperative Federation in the state of Haryana. It came into existence in November 1966 with formation of Haryana as a separate state.
Mr. Yadav said, “HAFED is a cooperative department which deals in various products. It basically rents out its outlets to the general public and provides them with its products. The people running the outlet will sell their products and earn an income out of it. So, under this initiative, we have started eight such outlets in the district which will now be run by these SHGs.”
According to him, this initiative will not only help these women in creating self-employment and earnings but it will also create empowerment among them as they will move out of their houses and work in these canteens and outlets. They will also learn a lot of things while running these small businesses, which will indeed help them in making other important decisions.
