Increased group capacity among the SHGs

Considerable training was undertaken to provide improvement and increased services.  This included :

• Further training given to 16 personnel from the federation who are themselves responsible for training.

• 330 SHG representatives attended courses for building up groups within the SHGs.

• 152 women were given training in the development and management of micro enterprises.

• 180 SHGs were given instruction on ways in which they might develop and make more effective their groups in areas of problem solving, micro planning and action.

• The Waste Land Programme was adopted by numerous villages resulting in the formation of 15 Village Development Forums, 32 user groups and the attachment of 52 SHGs.

• Participating in the empowerment processes were 240 existing and 150 new group leaders who dealt confidently and competently with issues connected to women.

• Documentation and account books relating to micro finance were inspected in 180 groups at, on average,  three meetings per group.

Increased awareness on poverty, gender inequity and local government services

• During the year, groups engaged in asset and wealth mapping, poverty analysis, gender analysis and institutional support analysis to determine the need for the facilitation of training members in the groups.

• It is noted that 94% of group members were aware of the government poverty alleviation and credit programmes.

• Within 75% of the newly formed groups, the members have demonstrated they are adequately aware of underlying causes of poverty, the bottlenecks blocking the process of development and the extent to which denial of their rights is operating.

• Poverty and entitlement are twin issues which have been vigorously pursued by all groups and the federation.  Granting micro credit to the poorest members of the groups were the subject of an important resolution at their respective group meetings.  The new law on Aright to property@ introduced during the year has now empowered many of the members for the first time to become property owners.

Civic engagement through SHGs and their federations

• 3,200 women engaged the regional federations in a civic action.  This included a big procession, campaigning activity and producing and distributing advocacy leaflets and pamphlets and wall posters to attract the attention of Government authorities (block and district levels) to issues of drought relief, drinking water and road and transport facilities.

• Many groups organised themselves into clusters to engage in bargaining with local government to obtain a separate building for SHG activities.  They also took issue when the local village panchayat employed workers from outside the villages to construct culverts across rivers and by their intervention got work for local labourers who then became identified with the work of drought relief.

• The groups also intervened for the rights of women and in one village the victim of molestation was helped and the offender was imprisoned as a result of the group's support.

Access to credit support in SGHs

The granting and use of bank loans is gathering momentum in many areas as indicated by the statistics given below:

• In Omalur area the groups have accessed micro loans from two main external sources, namely commercial banks and Central Governmentthrough Swarna Jayanthi Grama Swaragaris Yojana (Group capacity building).  The average loan was Rs. 5,000 (,80.00) and as many as 1350 new members have opened accounts with various banks.  In total, the loans sanctioned have amounted to Rs. 67,50,000 (,98,000.00) with the co-ordination of the District Rural Development Agency and Mahalir Thittam (Women's Empowerment Programme) of Tamilnadu Government for Income generation activities as well re-circulating the fund for the benefit of the members.

• External agencies have also been responsible for providing credit support.  500 people have benefitted from loans.  This is additional to the 900 (from 130 groups) who benefitted previously.

• Workshops for village blocks and clusters have been organised to address the many issues arising from operating small businesses, particularly agriculture and farming in remote areas.  These workshops are essentially for group leaders.  Attendance has been good attracting between 30 to 40% of leaders and is expected to increase in future.  In the Pappiredipatty area insurance cover for livestock totalled Rs. 6,14,000 (,10,233.00).  This covered 96 animals i.e. dairy animals, bullocks, sheep and goats.  Accident insurance with potential death due to accident claims totalling Rs. 1,00,000 (,1,300.00) and loss of limbs Rs. 50,000 (,700.00).