They are no more quintessential hapless abla nari. They don’t remain silent in face of domestic violence. They are not only increasingly reporting it to the police but are also getting economically empowered by starting their own business. The magic potion is property ownership granted to them by Pune Zila Parishad CEO Ayush Prasad, under a scheme aptly titled Gruhswamini.
This schemes aims inclusion of at least one woman’s name in every household as a co-owner of the family property records. When the scheme was launched only 16% of the properties were owned by the women. However, now 89% of the properties co-owned by women. “8.17 lakh properties out of 9.27 lakh households in Pune district have the name of at least one woman as a co-owner,” Mr Ayush Prasad IAS told Indian Masterminds.
THE DRIVE
The administration took the help of Gram Sabha’s initially to encourage women for the registration of the properties. In the first round, the property registration reached 41%, after which property cards were distributed to these 41% women co-owners during the women’s day celebration on 8th of march.
This drive encouraged other women, spouses, in-laws and others to register names of the women in the household. After a massive drive, the property ownership went up to 58% immediate after women’s day.
“This is a good initiative. I don’t have any any objection if women in my family made legal owner,” says Ramdas Sopan Wadkar
The officer and his team followed up again where SHG women went home to home and conducted counselling. Some people added their daughters name, while most of them added their daughter-in-law’s name.
“An old woman shared with me that her maternal side paid dowry back in the days to get her married. She further informed that because of this drive, her parents-in-law has now made her the owner of the household,” Mr. Prasad shared.
POSITIVE FALLOUT
With so many women’s name on the property, the administration is trying to help women to monetize the property. While taking SHG loans to start small or big business, they have been encouraging them to mortgage the property so that they can get higher loans on lesser interest rate.
“We feel secure now after all the houses in Sasewadi are registered on women’s names. Now we can borrow loans against these properties through Self Help Groups,” says beneficiary Sadhanatai Gogavale
With this, instead of doing smaller businesses they will be able to do bigger businesses. The administration is looking forward to mobilize this kind of self-employment opportunities. “We are hoping that children would be able to access their dreams through better education loans. On the other hand, we are trying to run a financial inclusion drive as well,” the officer added.
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE REPORTS UP
The administration has further recorded that women are now more confident about reporting domestic violence. In the domestic violence act of 2005, women earlier if reported was shifted out to shelter home. The fear of loosing shelter from her head prevented many women from reporting domestic violence.
“FIR registration in the district on the domestic violence has now gone up three times,” Mr. Prasad said.
The administration has created an entire voluntary force of 21,000 women present in each gram panchayat ward who go door-to-door, gather social intelligence on what is happening in a household. They are running the campaigns like ring the bell campaign, provide counselling, intervene when a woman is being beaten.
SURVEY
Akanksha Vardani, an Economist PhD candidate from Columbia University, is conducting a survey to understand how the house ownership by a woman can impact on improving women empowerment. “So far, we have found that the awareness percent is low for women in compared to men. Many women were unaware that their named were added as a co-owner. However, once they learned about the co-ownership, they were quite happy with this.”
