"Nai Roshni" The Scheme for Leadership Development of Minority Women

Background

The status of women in the country, particularly those from the disadvantaged sections of the society, is unfavourable. A girl child suffers from discrimination even before birth and also after birth in the allocation of household resources such as food, education, access to health care and at puberty, sometimes coerced into early marriage. Most women in the rural areas suffer from double burden of carrying out less quantifiable work like cooking, fetching water, sending children to school along with agriculture labour, feeding cattle, milking cows, etc., while the men folk perform defined activities like selling milk and grains produced by the household. Women in the minority communities fare badly too. They are not just a minority, but the 'marginalized majority' and are sidelined in decision making in the family, and usually cut off from full involvement in the workings of the community and form an equal share in the rewards from social institutions.

Empowerment of women per se is not only essential for equity, but also constitutes a critical element in our fight for poverty reduction, economic growth and strengthening of civil society. Women and children are always the worst sufferers in a poverty stricken family and need support. Empowering women, especially mothers, is even more important as it is in homes that she nourishes, nurture and moulds the character of her offspring.

A report of the High Level Committee on the social, economic and educational status of the Muslim community of India (popularly known as the Sachar Committee Report) had highlighted the fact that India‟s largest minority group, the Muslim numbering 13.83 Crore, have been left out of the development trajectory and within this group Muslim women are doubly disadvantaged.

Keeping this in view, the Ministry of Minority Affairs reformulated the scheme in 2011-12 and renamed it as Nai Roshni- The Scheme for Leadership Development of Minority Women‟. The implementation of the Scheme started in 2012-13.

Based on experience in the first year of implementation, it was felt to bring in certain modifications to ensure its reach to the target groups and effective implementation at ground level, and therefore an appraisal was made by the Standing Finance Committee in on 6th March 2013 and the scheme was implemented during 12th 4 Five Year Plan. Now the scheme is to be implemented during the balance period of 14th Finance Commission i.e. from 2017-18 to 2019-20.

Objective

The objective of the scheme is to empower and instill confidence among minority women, including their neighbours from other communities living in the same village/locality, by providing knowledge, tools and techniques for interacting with Government systems, banks and other institutions at all levels.

Empowerment of women from the minority communities and emboldening them to move out of the confines of their home and community and assume leadership roles and assert their rights, collectively or individually, in accessing services, facilities, skills and opportunities besides claiming their due share of development benefits of the Government for improving their lives and living conditions. This includes economic empowerment of the trainee women so that they ultimately become independent and confident members of the society.

Target Group and Distribution

Target Group includes women belonging to all minorities notified under Section 2 (c) of the National Commission for Minorities Act, 1992 viz. Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Buddhist, Zoroastrian (Parsis) and Jain. However, to further strengthen the mosaic of plurality in the society and bring about solidarity and unity through their own efforts to improve their lot, the scheme permits a mix of women from non-minority communities not exceeding 25% of a project proposal. Efforts should be made by the Organization for having a representative mix of women from SCs/STs/OBCs, women with disabilities and other communities under within this 25% group.

Efforts shall also be made to persuade Elected Women Representatives (EWRs), from any community, under the Panchayati Raj institutions to be included as a trainee.

Leadership Development Training Modules

The leadership training modules would cover issues relating to:

  • Leadership of women
  • Advocacy for Social & Behavioural Change
  • Swachh Bharat
  • Legal rights of women
  • Life Skills
  • Health & Hygiene
  • Educational empowerment
  • Nutrition & Food Safety
  • Right to Information
  • Economic Empowerment of Women
  • Digital India
  • Gender & Women
  • Women & Drudgery
  • Violence against Women & Girls
  • Introduction to Govt. Mechanisms

These modules provide a basic framework to develop training programmes. However, specific training modules based on local issues / needs in the locality of Tiruvannamalai District has been developed by The Saraswathi Shanmugam Public Charitable Trust within the given Module-framework in local language and are as follows:

  • Leadership of women
  • Life Skills
  • Health & Hygiene
  • 4.Digital Literacy and
  • 5.Financial Literacy

The training modules has been structured in such a manner that training inputs are given in short phases.

The training module will also use audio-visual aids and case studies for making it more interesting and comprehensible. Qualities of leadership like organizational capacity, communication skill, self-development and articulation, communication and public speaking, organizing capabilities, negotiation and conflict resolutions, etc. will form integral part of this training. Group exercises and discussions was incorporated in the training modules to encourage active participation and make the scheme more lively and interactive. Experts were invited to speak on relevant issues as per the training programme.

Various Activities carried out by the Trust:

Selection of villages / urban localities: Villages / urban localities in rural / urban areas having a substantial percentage of minority population was selected by the Trust for conducting the leadership development training programmes. A list of villages where the village / urban locality trainings are proposed to be conducted was submitted to the Ministry along with the percentage of minority population.

Identification of women for training and selection criteria: Organization selected for carrying out training for leadership development of minority women would have the responsibility to motivate, identify and select women to be trained in accordance with the criteria of the scheme from villages / localities having a substantial minority population. The Trust have involved the Head of Gram Panchayat / Municipal Body / Local Authority for identification / selection of women trainees. The details of the trainees are submitted by the Trust before start of training through the Online Application Management System (OAMS) for Nai Roshni.

Eligible Women Trainees: Although there will be no annual income bar, woman / parent or guardian of woman having annual income not exceeding Rs.2.50 lakh from all sources would be given preference in selection. The trainees are between the age group of 18 years to 65 years.

Aadhaar number was collected by the Trust wherever it has been issued and indicated against the name of the woman selected for training. The Trust also assisted the women trainees in obtaining their Aadhaar Number from the office of District Collectors / District Magistrate or any other institute / organization authorized for this purpose by the Central / State Government / UTs, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), etc.

The Trust collected the contact details / Mobile No. of the women selected for training along with the Bank Details i.e. Account No., IFSC Code.

Types of Trainings: Though there will be two types of leadership development trainings in the village / urban locality viz. Non-residential and Residential, the Trust selected the non-residential type of training.

And the criteria for selection of women for each type of trainings are as follows: (a) Non-residential Leadership Development Training: Up to 25 women in one batch from village / urban locality, who are dedicated, motivated and committed to work for the betterment of the welfare of women from the minority communities in particular and the society in general, would be imparted leadership training. At least 10% of the total women in a group of 25 women should have passed Class X or its equivalent. This may be relaxed to Class V level or its equivalent in case women who have passed Class X are not easily available.

The Trust had submitted a proposal for this training in sets of five batches of trainees. Under Non- residential Training programme after completion of training, the organization may provide these trained women short term skill training and they may be supported to obtain sustainable economic livelihood opportunities through suitable wage employment or Self-employment / micro enterprise to ensure that they are economically empowered at the end of the handholding (optional).

Conduct of the Trainings

Taking into consideration the fact that most women, especially in the rural areas are required to stay close to their home and are not able to venture far out and also the fact that there would still be some educated and young women who would like to dedicate themselves to work for the betterment of women folk in particular and the community in general.

It is envisaged that women imparted leadership development training would work towards achieving the objectives of the scheme. The economic empowerment will enable women to be self-sustainable and economically independent.

The Trust carried out nurturing and handholding for a period of one year under Non- Residential training to ensure that the empowered women folk become independent, economically self-sustainable and are able to act as a pressure group to take up their grievances / problems with the village /block / district / State authorities relating to availability of basic infrastructure and services identified during formulation of the project as requiring improvement or provisioning in the village / locality.

The Trust ensuring that facilitators engaged for nurturing / handholding service visit the village / urban locality as stipulated, carry out their assignments diligently and are assisted by the Trust whenever the need arises.

The training programmes were conducted in the manner given below:-
10 (A) Non-Residential Training in the Village / Urban Locality:

  • The training was conducted in the village / locality by using existing facilities or rented permanent structure.
  • The duration of the training was for six days and each day will be of six hours.
  • Each batch of 25 trainees trained separately.
  • Care was taken to ensure that the dates for training are fixed in order to avoid religious / festive occasions and demands of seasons.
  • Printed training material in local language was prepared by the Trust within the framework of training modules.
  • To incentivize the training course, allowance / stipend to partially compensate / offset the loss of income / was given to the selected women trainees along with a meal and crèche arrangement for their children while the training is ongoing during the day.
  • Selected eligible women were imparted leadership training and economic empowerment.
  • The Trust assisted the trainees to open the account in the banks for those women trainees who do not have their own accounts and transfer the stipend amount to their bank and honorarium of the Resource Person through Public Fund Management System (PFMS)/ DBT as per their norms.

Nurturing and Handholding under Non- Residential Training:

  • Nurturing and hand holding was a post-training service to be rendered by the Trust for a period not exceeding one year from the beginning of the training programme to women who have undergone leadership development training.
  • The facilitators of organization visiting the village/locality to assist the empowered women once a month during the project period and hold meetings with them.
  • Mahila Mandals / Mahila Sabhas / Self Help Groups, etc. from amongst the trainees were constituted. Regular meetings was held for these Mahila Mandals / Mahila Sabhas / Self Help Groups.
  • The Trust engaged the experts for hand holding and maintaining the records of meetings, attendance, photographs and the issues discussed and resolved during these meetings. This is considered critical for the success of the scheme in order to ensure that they are guided and assisted in placing their problems and grievances before the authorities concerned for remedial action as envisaged in the scheme