Life after Budget: Jaitley gives more to women, but execution is key

The Union Budget has hiked allocation for women welfare schemes across ministries to Rs 1.13 lakh crore from Rs 90,770 crore last year, but experts say execution needs to be stepped up.

The announcement to give Rs. 500 crore for setting up Mahila Shakti Kendras in 14 lakh anganwadi centres is a welcome step. The kendras are meant to empower rural women with skill development, employment, digital literacy, health and nutrition. But Anganwadi supervisors are over burned and experts say that most are need of a helper or additional supervisor.

"We'll need separate personnel for the kendras and the scheme's success will depend on how well-trained they are and timely resource-allocation," says Chenta Gala Sinha, founder of Man Deshi Mahila Sahakari Bank.

She also suggests linking of MSKs to weekly haats saying, "They have maximum potential for generating employment through enterprise. As for the digitalisation, after demonetisation people want to adopt it, but there's shortage of hardware such as swiping machines".

Though Jaitley said that women’s involvement in MNREGA rose from 48% in the past to 55%, Sinha finds that district collectors face labour-shortage. “Labourers refuse NREGA employment as they live hand-to-mouth and can’t afford fortnightly or monthly payments. Like in the previous scheme, payment should be weekly.”

The Rs 2.44 lakh crore allocation to Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana – that provides micro loans at reasonable rates – has been made with a promise to prioritise dalits, tribals, backward classes and women. This can be a boost for women entrepreneurs. But Sinha says, "There's very little awareness and banks aren't tailoring their products to meet micro business needs. Their business models are more suited to a cash-credit approach, where you keep repaying as you earn and withdraw as per need, than EMIs".

On the education front for the girl child, secondary education has been prioritised over primary education.

The National Scheme for Incentive to Girl Child for Secondary Education got a jump from last years' Rs. 45 crore and 2015's Rs. 154 crore to Rs. 320 crore this year, whereas the Scheme for Adolescent Girls remains at Rs. 460 crore.

But this doesn't seem like a bad idea. Farida Lambay, co-founder of NGO Pratham that focuses on quality education of underprivileged children in over 20 states.

Even ASER reports show that the drop out rate is higher at the secondary school level, when girls hit puberty due to paucity of government schools around the neighbourhood. "This is true especially in tribal and marginalised blocks. Therefore, rather than generic disbursement of funds, the government should prioritise areas that backward, have a low sex ratio or where crimes against women are high – based on census data, It will have a ripple effect of upliftment of women and overall development of such places," shares Lambay.

Regarding healthcare, direct transfer of Rs. 6,000 each to pregnant women for institutional deliveries and children's vaccination is laudable. "But to avoid deprivation of women without bank accounts cash provisions must be made," says public health expert Raj Bhandari, who is technical advisor to the government and UNICEF.

The Rs. 2,700 crore for Maternity Benefit Programme is huge leap – 11 times up from 2015 and 4 times higher than last year. But it's once place where the system of execution has historically been chronically ill. "There's a huge problem of un-utilised and underutilised funds in such programmes. Stakeholders holders don't receive funds till the last quarter. So what we really need is optimal utilisation of funds," laments Bhandari.

Seems like the government could learn a thing or two from Indian housewives about making the most of its resources.

He adds, to improve things, "At least 3 – 4% of the fund should be invested in frequent, efficient, impact-monitoring and external examination. Our statistics are generally skewed. We also need convergence of various departments to overcome social and other gender inequities for the success of the programme".

Other allotments to women include Rs. 22,095 crore to Ministry of Women and Child Development and Rs. 1,089 crore to Mission for Empowerment and Protection for Women.