VIJAYAWADA: Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on Friday released Rs 1,109 crore to 1.02 crore women members of 9.34 lakh Self Help Groups in the state under the YSR Sunna Vaddi scheme. Addressing beneficiaries through a video conference on the occasion, Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy said yet another step was taken towards empowerment of women in the state.
Jagan said he believes that only when women are happy and prosper, the State will achieve growth on all fronts. “For the last 23 months, our government has been striving in that direction,” he said and reiterated that women empowerment is not just a slogan, but a policy for them. “We strive for giving the women their due in social, economic, politics and education spheres. We are standing true to our promise to empower women in the state,” he said.
Unlike the previous TDP regime, the YSRC government had provided Rs 1,400 crore to members of over 87 lakh SHGs, who took loans from banks, under the YSR Sunna Vaddi scheme in 2019-20. In 2020-21, Rs 1,109 crore was paid. The number of SHGs under the scheme has increased to 9.34 lakh from 8.71 lakh this year because of their trust in the YSRC government, he said.
The Chief Minister stated that his government had convinced the banks to slash interest rate from 12.5 to 9.5 per cent, thus reducing the financial burden on the women to the tune of Rs 590 crore. Low interest rate facilitates many SHGs to avail bank loans to attain stable livelihood. “To make SHGs sustain, our government is bearing the interest component of bank loans of women members,” he explained.
“During the previous regime, failure of keeping the promise to waive loans, many better performing SHGs were pushed into a debt trap. After we came to power, we have cleared old dues under zero interest scheme, which was scrapped by the previous government in 2016, and as promised, first instalment of the bank loan dues were paid through the YSR Aasara scheme,” he said.
Explaining how his government has been striving for women empowerment in the last 23 months, the Chief Minister listed out various schemes and the number of beneficiaries along with the amount spent. “We have rolled out schemes like Sunna Vaddi, Aasara, Cheyutha, Jeva Kranthi to strengthen women in all aspects. As promised earlier, the registration for the houses was also done in the name of women, which created an asset of Rs 5-8 lakh each. Under YSR Cheyutha, Rs 18,750 financial assistance was given to BC,SC,ST and minority women over the age of 45 years every year at an expenditure of Rs 4,604 crore. We signed MoUs with multinational companies to help our women empower themselves,” he said.
Jagan also explained how the Jeeva Kranthi and Amul Pala Velluava schemes are benefiting the women and how a large number of retail shops got established in the state. The Chief Minister said Andhra Pradesh became the first State to bring in a legislation to provide fifty per cent reservations for women in nominated posts and works.