Published Paper Details:

Existence of Chronic poverty is the major concern for the country and mitigating it has been the core of all developmental efforts. Post independence, several poverty alleviation programmes initiated by the government have resulted in the overall development of the poor but these programmes were not able to achieve the targeted success. Lack of capital and inaccessibility to credit is the serious constraint to the development and inhibits poor from responding to the opportunities created by the process of development. Empowerment of women is the most important means of poverty eradication. Despite considerable improvement in the status of women post independence, they still constitute the largest section of deprived population. Certain problems such as poverty, illiteracy, lack of skills, availability of proper health care facilities, ignorance etc., which are persistent in rural economy, cannot be tackled individually but could be effectively solved through group efforts. It reminds of a childhood story, where few birds are caught in a net and could not escape one by one. They thought of an idea and decided to fly together in a group and similarly one stick is easily breakable but bundle of sticks is difficult to break. These stories narrate the same moral � �Unity is strength�, �Self help is the best help� and �United we stand and divided we fall�. Hence attacking the problem through collective efforts yields better results. Today such collective group efforts are called as �Self Help Groups�, which has become a powerful tool in initiating the change and transforming the lives of crores of poor and marginalized women across the country.