The ESSS department for women self help groups and empowerment deals with capacity building of marginalized women by inculcating knowledge, skill, education and enabling participation for their social, economical, political, emotional and spiritual development. For this ESSS is promoting a right based approach, community based organizations of women and linkages with various schemes of government and non-governmental organizations irrespective of their cast and creed.
Self Help Groups (SHGs) are progressively becoming a key method for arranging women to make a move and change their condition. SHG is the association of 10-20 members of the same socio-economic background working collectively to solve problems on the principles of self-help, harmony and mutual coordination. 928 Self Help Groups functional at ESSS emerged as a powerful tool to alleviate poverty, empower rural women to increase their potential, identity and gender parity, bring personal, social and economic changes, facilitate their managerial abilities, and to develop community value. Weekly meeting, collective learning, acquisition of skills, perspective building, activity planning, pooling of small thrift and transacting it as micro credit etc. are the activities of SHGs.
- Promotes women’s leadership and women are encouraged to contest in elections of Local Self Governments.
- Women take up varied social and community action programmes.
- Women SHGs are linked to Kudumbasree, Panchayat Raj Institutions, Banks and other financial institutions.
- 928 SHG comprising of 16370 members are already in function and it federated into 78 regional units.
