Mission Shakti

Mission Shakti is an umbrella scheme integrating various other sub-schemes. Read here to know about it in detail.

Ministry of Women and Child Development issued Detailed Guidelines for ‘Mission Shakti’ aimed at Strengthening Interventions for Women’s Safety, Security and Empowerment.

The Government of India has launched ‘Mission Shakti’ – an integrated women empowerment programme as an umbrella scheme for the safety, security, and empowerment of women for implementation during the 15th  Finance Commission period 202l-22 to 2025-26.

The norms of ‘Mission Shakti’ will be applicable with effect from 1^st April 2022.

Mission Shakti

‘Mission Shakti’ is a scheme in mission mode aimed at strengthening interventions for women’s safety, security, and empowerment.

It seeks to realize the Government’s commitment to women-led development by addressing issues affecting women on a life-cycle continuum basis and by making them equal partners in nation-building through convergence and citizen-ownership.

Aim:

• The scheme seeks to make women economically empowered, exercising free choice over their minds and bodies in an atmosphere free from violence and threat.
• It also seeks to reduce the care burden on women and increase female labor force participation by promoting skill development, capacity building, financial literacy, access to micro-credit, etc.

Sub schemes of Mission Shakti

‘Mission Shakti’ has two sub-schemes – ‘Sambal’ and ‘Samarthya’.

While the Sambal sub-scheme is for the safety and security of women, the Samarthya sub-scheme is for the empowerment of women.

Sambal

The objective of the sub-scheme is to:

• Improve accessibility and integrate all efforts and various government initiatives towards the safety and protection of women.
• It is also for securing women’s rights and entitlements to a comprehensive continuous care
• Support women affected by violence and in distress and assist them in re-emerging as integrated partners in nation-building.

The components of the ‘Sambal’ sub-scheme consist of erstwhile schemes of:

• One Stop Centre (OSC)
• Women Helpline (WHL)
• Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP)

It has a new component of Nari Adalats – women’s collectives to promote and facilitate alternative dispute resolution and gender justice in society and within families.

• Nari Adalat a new component for providing women with an alternate Grievance Redressal Mechanism for resolving cases of petty nature (harassment, subversion, curtailment of rights or entitlements) faced by women at the Gram Panchayat level will be implemented in a phased manner.
• Nari Adalats or women collectives will be formed of committed and socially respected women chosen for that purpose.
• This platform will also be utilized for engaging with the public for awareness generation and getting feedback for improvement in the schemes and effective public delivery of services.
• These will be provided logistic support through Gram Panchayats in convergence with the Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Ministry of Rural Development, and Common Service Centres (CSCs) run by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

Samarthya

The objective of the scheme is to:

• Improve accessibility to various government services available for women at various levels through reinforcement.
• Convergence for development and empowerment of women.
• The scheme aims toward social, cultural, political, and economic development and empowerment of women.

The components of the ‘Samarthya’ sub-scheme consist of erstwhile schemes of:

• Ujjwala
• Swadhar Greh
• Working Women Hostel has been included with modifications
• National Creche Scheme for children of working mothers
• Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) under the umbrella of ICDS

A new component of Gap Funding for Economic Empowerment has also been added to the Samarthya Scheme.

Under the Samarthya component, Gender Budgeting, Research, Publication & Monitoring schemes have been included under the Hub for Empowerment of Women (HEW).

• The goal of Gender Budgeting is to enable government stakeholders at the central, state, and district levels to undertake gender budgeting through enhanced capacities, knowledge, and skills.

Objectives of Mission Shakti

The objective of Mission Shakti is to provide to all women and girls including differently-abled, socially and economically marginalized, and vulnerable groups, in need of care and protection, with short-term and long-term services and information for their holistic development and empowerment.

The components under Mission Shakti have the broad objectives of either protecting or assisting women who are victims of violence or in difficult circumstances or empowering women:

1. Provide immediate and comprehensive continuous care, support, and assistance to women affected by violence and for those in distress;
2. To put in place quality mechanisms for rescue, protection, and rehabilitation of women in need of assistance and victims of crime and violence;
3. To improve accessibility to various government services available for women at various levels;
4. Making people aware of Government schemes and programs as well as legal provisions to fight social evils like dowry, domestic violence, Sexual Harassment at Workplace, promoting gender equality, etc.
5. Capacity building and training of functionaries/ duty bearers under various schemes/ Legislations;
6. Collaboration with partner Ministries/ Departments/ States/ UTs for convergence of policies, programs/ schemes and to create an enabling environment for public-private partnership for safety and empowerment of women across sectors.
7. Create awareness among the masses for inducing positive behavioral change toward women and girls.
8. To prevent gender-biased sex selective elimination; to ensure survival, protection, education, and development of the girl child.

The scheme will provide financial support for service delivery and the hiring of technical/ other required manpower for the initiatives for immediate and long-term care and support to the targeted women.

Conclusion

The Central Government has enacted several legislations and implemented various schemes for safety, security, and improving the status of women including their economic empowerment. However, despite various affirmative steps, various parameters indicated that the status of women in society still needed improvement.

Hence a concerted effort in a mission mode to ensure gender equality and women’s empowerment gave rise to Mission Shakti.

Mission Shakti aims at strengthening interventions that not only improve women’s safety and empowerment but also tackle pervasive gender biases and discriminations.

The Mission Shakti is inspired by the Constitutional commitment to Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles of State Policy (particularly the Right to Equality and Right against Exploitation), India’s commitment to international treaties and conventions as well as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), it seeks to make women economically empowered, exercising free choice over their minds and bodies in an atmosphere free from violence and threat.

It also seeks to reduce the care burden on women and increase female labor force participation by promoting skill development, capacity building, financial literacy, access to micro-credit, etc.