BHUBANESWAR: Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi on Friday announced a new scheme, Lakhpati Didi Sahayika Yojana, for welfare of women working as the community support staff at the panchayat level.
Making a statement in the Assembly, Majhi said, “I am introducing a new scheme called the Lakhpati Didi Sahayika Yojana. Under this initiative, the state government will temporarily bear the remuneration cost of the community support staff (CSS) and provide grants to gram panchayat-level federations (GPLFs).”
The chief minister said that the decision will benefit more than 62,000 CSS who have not been getting their remuneration for the last 10 months, since April, 2024. The CSS include positions such as community resource persons for community mobilisation (CRP-CM), master book-keepers, bank mitras and prani mitras.
“Our government is committed to making women self-reliant and building a prosperous Odisha. The women community support staff play a crucial role in this vision. To address their challenges, we have taken an important step by launching this scheme,” he said.
Majhi said the Odisha Livelihood Mission is functioning under the National Livelihood Mission since April 1, 2012. Under the scheme, rural self-help groups (SHG) are formed to provide livelihood opportunities to the womenfolk. The community support staff were appointed to strengthen and empower SHGs, cluster-level federations (CLFs) and GPLFs.
Stating that the GPLFs could not become self-sufficient because of lack will power of the previous government, the chief minister said as a result the CSS were not paid on time.
The CSS get remuneration of Rs 6,500 to Rs 10,500 as per their work. They also received travel and telephone allowances of Rs 350 and Rs 250 respectively.
Majhi said the state government is implementing the Lakhpati Didi Yojana for the economic growth of women in SHGs. The goal is to help as many women SHG members as possible to earn an income of Rs 1 lakh annually. A target has been fixed to create 25 lakh lakhpati didis by 2027. The support staff will now function to achieve the target.