Women Entrepreneurship and Government Support

Author- Priya Yadav

Research scholar, in commerce department, Mahatma Gandhi Kashi Vidyapeeth University,

VNS

Abstract: Women entrepreneurship was a neglected domain during the past, but with the
spread of education and awareness among the women the picture has been changed and the
women have emerged as today’s most memorable and inspirational entrepreneur. Women-
owned businesses enterprises are playing a prominent role in society inspiring others and
generating more employment opportunities in the country. Women entrepreneurship is
synonymous with women empowerment. Female entrepreneurs are catalytic in job creation,
innovation and more than tangible contribution to the GNP of the country. An economy
thrives when women get a level playing field as men. Now days the government is also
encouraging the entrepreneurship, thereby to achieve a good economic condition, eradication
of poverty by providing employment. Government banks are providing financial assistance to
the youths, women’s through its programs like startup India , MUDRA yojana scheme for
women, Annapurna scheme, stree shakti package for women entrepreneurs , bharatiya mahila
bank business loan mahila udyami nidhi scheme etc. This paper is an attempt to create
awareness challenges faced, successful women entrepreneur and the government assistance to
achieve progress. There are many women entrepreneurs in India who are running their
respective organizations in a successful way like Indu jain, kiran mazumdar shaw, Indra
nooyi, vandana luthra, Naina lal kidwai etc.

Keywords: Women, entrepreneurship, challenges, support of GOI (government of India) and

Banks, successful women entrepreneurs in India.

1. INTRODUCTION:

In India the women entrepreneurship is glowing with successful stories. There is a proverb
“there is a women behind a success of a men” but it has changed because the women are also
becoming successful by opening up one key i.e entrepreneurship. We can see there are lots of
women processionals working in engineering, medicines, law and other streams. Women
entrepreneurship has been recognised as an important source of economic growth. Women
entrepreneurs create new jobs for themselves and others and also provide society with
different solutions to management, organisation and business problems. However, they still
represent a minority of all entrepreneurs. Women entrepreneurs often face gender-based
barriers to starting and growing their businesses, like discriminatory property, matrimonial
and inheritance laws and/or cultural practices; lack of access to formal finance mechanisms;
limited mobility and access to information and networks, etc. Women’s entrepreneurship can
make a particularly strong contribution to the economic well-being of the family and
communities, poverty reduction and women’s empowerment, thus contributing to the
 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Thus, governments across the world as well as
various developmental organizations are actively undertaking promotion of women
entrepreneurs through various schemes, incentives and promotional measures.

Normally The Women Entrepreneurs Are Found In Kitchen Activities , Mainly

Preparing And Marketing The Products Like Pappad , Pickles And Powders .The Women
Entrepreneurs Are Rising Drastically In Addition To This The Government Of India Is Also
Giving Importance For The Augmentation Of Women Entrepreneurs In India. Our Central
Government Has Announced Various Schemes To Support Women And Thereby To Uphold
The Importance Given To Them At Same Time The Various Ngo’s Are Also Enlightening
The Women To Become Entrepreneurs By Joining Hands With The Government .Hence The
Women Entrepreneurs Now Can Open Up Their Business Activities From Small Scale To
Large Scale Operations.

2. PROBLEM’S FOUND:
Over the years the number of women taking on entrepreneurial responsibilities has
picked up indicating a healthy trend however despite the number slowly growing it still has a
long way to go before more and more Indian women can be convinced about the potential
that can exploited in having their own start up. The reason for this being that many women
nip their interests in the bud or give up midway not because it is hard to become an
Entrepreneur but because they find their journey too uphill to become one. There are many
problems face by the women like societal mindset, security, lack of education, business
mindedness, prioritization expectations, lack of finance, scarcity of raw material, stiff
competition and limited mobility.

Despite these bottlenecks that most urban women face in India, there are many who
have risen above them and built successful businesses. Communicating with the family and
thinking the business idea out with a long term sustainable plan can act as a key to succeed.
Most important of all, developing an attitude to persevere despite all odds goes a long way in
being successful.

Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, counted among the most successful women entrepreneurs
in India, did not build Biocon overnight. It took her time, perseverance and a ‘never say die’
attitude to get to where she is today. Indu Jain. Current Chairperson Of India’s Largest
Media Group, Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd., Which Owns The Times Of India And Other
Large Newspapers. Indra Nooyi is an Indian American Tamil business executive, serving as
chairman of PepsiCo, the second largest food and beverage business in the world by net
revenue, and as CEO for 13 years from 2006-2019. She has consistently ranked among the
world's 100 most powerful women.
Vandana Luthra is an Indian entrepreneur and the founder of VLCC Health Care
Ltd, a beauty and wellness conglomerate represented in Asia, the GCC and Africa. Naina Lal
Kidwai is an Indian banker, Chartered Accountant and business executive. She was formerly
a Group General Manager and the Country Head of HSBC India. She is also a former
President of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

3. NEED FOR THE STUDY:

 In India, the Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises development organisations, various
State Small Industries Development Corporations, the Nationalised banks and even NGOs are
conducting various programmes including Entrepreneurship Development Programmes
(EDPs) to cater to the needs of potential women entrepreneurs, who may not have adequate
educational background and skills. The Office of DC (MSME) has also opened a Women
Cell to provide coordination and assistance to women entrepreneurs facing specific problems.

There are also several other schemes of the government at central and state level,
which provide assistance for setting up training-cum-income generating activities for needy
women to make them economically independent. Small Industries Development Bank of
India (SIDBI) has also been implementing special schemes for women entrepreneurs.
In addition to the special schemes for women entrepreneurs, various government schemes for
MSMEs also provide certain special incentives and concessions for women entrepreneurs.
For instance, under Prime Minister’s Rozgar Yojana (PMRY), preference is given to
women beneficiaries. The government has also made several relaxations for women to
facilitate the participation of women beneficiaries in this scheme. Similarly, under the MSE
Cluster Development Programme by Ministry of MSME, the contribution from the
Ministry of MSME varies between 30-80% of the total project in case of hard intervention,
but in the case of clusters owned and managed by women entrepreneurs, contribution of the
M/o MSME could be up to 90% of the project cost. Similarly, under the Credit Guarantee
Fund Scheme for Micro and Small Enterprises, the guarantee cover is generally available
upto 75% of the loans extended; however the extent of guarantee cover is 80% for MSEs
operated and/ or owned by women. There is need of an enquiry of weather the performance
of these schemes is improving, whether number of beneficiaries is increasing, whether the
amount of loan disbursed is growing etc. With considering these selected parameters the
performance of schemes may be evaluated and it can be seen whether this corporation is
playing proper role in the developing entrepreneurship among women.

4. OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY:

1. To study the role of scheme in the development of women entrepreneurs.
2. To review various programmes of government to promote women entrepreneurs.
3. To study the problems faced by the women entrepreneurs.
4. To provide knowledge regarding the financial assistance.

5. LITERATURE REVIEW:

In India there are a number of institutions established for the development of women
entrepreneurship, namely, National Institute for Entrepreneurship and Small Business
Development (NIESBUD), Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII), National
Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), Federation of Indian Women
Entrepreneur (FASME), and World Assembly of Small and Medium Entrepreneur
(WASME), District Financial Institutions (DFI) in general and Small Industries Development
of Bank of India (SIDBI), etc. According to the research conducted by the Stefoovic and
Prakic, in Serhia understanding motivational and success factors can be helpful for
entrepreneurs and their SME’s because it could affect the in cress of percentage of successful
ventures. They suggest that it is necessary to make significant improvements in the process of
institutionalization of supporting SME’s. This can be achieved by creating environment that
will facilitate development of entrepreneurship through numerous stimulating activities such
as incentives that would facilitate cooperation of SME’s and large enterprises and creation of
 clusters, establishing organizations for providing assistance to entrepreneurs (eg: Association
of entrepreneurs, government agencies for SME’s development, business incubators,
industrial parks etc.) and providing easy accessible capital. According to Rajan an saradha
women entrepreneurship and support systems research says that internal support is very
important for starting any business more than external support. According to the study
internal supports are family, Spouse, Parents, Moral Support, Internal Support, Financial
support, Motivation and encouragement from internal family members. Sanjay kaushik 2013,
finding their study the challenges faced by the women entrepreneurs in india and the
assistance provided by the government through their scheme. According Sonia et al., as per
the research that women‘s political empowerment in a country was positively linked with
women Entrepreneurial behaviours also this study also revealed that association of women’s
political leadership at the country level with women’s entrepreneurship at the individual
level. Political empowerment with in a country produced a significant direct effect on female
entry into entrepreneurship. Manuela Pardo-del-Val, study finds that three important issues
across the counties of women entrepreneurs those are level and type of training, available of
funding and selection of industry for starting business.

6. METHODOLOGY:

The paper is descriptive in nature and based on secondary data. The information has
been collected from the various papers, articles websites of private and government sites.

7. RESEARCH:
7.1 Lack of Education: women are generally denied of higher education, especially in rural
and under developed countries. Women are not allowed to enrich their knowledge in
technical and research areas to introduce new products.

7.2 Security: In today’s times, probably this is the biggest obstacle for women in India. The
security blanket is at its thinnest thus making women hesitate to take on roles that demand
long hours and interactions with a world of strangers. The rise of social crime and the need
for safety pushes everything down the priority list when there is a demand to spend late hours
at getting work going. While urban women are taking the plunge after much thought, the
silver lining is when women from rural areas turn Entrepreneurs in their own small ways with
things such as opening a small grocery store or something as simple as rearing cows to sell
dairy products. A small step in the rural world can be a huge motivation in the urban one.

7.3 Business Mindedness: Unfortunately most women lack the shrewdness that is required
while dealing with their stakeholders. Part of this also stems from the fact that most women
do not hold a long term view of their business and do not have a clear picture of how they
want their start up to grow.

What also contributes to this absence of behaviour is the lack of the ability to say no.
Traditionally Indian women have learned to adjust and adapt instead of putting their foot
down when necessary and saying No. This nature works against them when it comes to the
business world.

7.4 Prioritization Expectation: Societal expectations that whatever a woman does, she
should always prioritize her family over everything else can prove to be a big deterrent for
 those running their own show. Most women bow down to the pressure instead of working out
a win-win situation. A successful woman entrepreneur once pointed out an easy solution to
this dilemma; she worked out a solution where she and her husband shouldered their
domestic responsibilities equally thus giving her enough time to focus on her work.
Understanding that men are also quite capable of handling family responsibilities and making
that a reality can go a long way in resolving these obstacles.

7.5 Lack of finance: family members do not encourage women entrepreneurs. They hesitate
to invest money in the business ventures initiated by women entrepreneurs. Bank and other
financial institutions do not consider middle class women entrepreneurs as proper applicants
for setting up their projects and they are hesitant to provide financial assistance to provide
financial assistance to unmarried women or girls as they are unsure as to who will repay the
loan- either their parents or in-laws after their marriage. This humiliates unmarried women
and they generally leave the idea for setting up their ventures.

For example Kiran Mazumdar shaw initially aced many problems regarding funds for
her business. Banks were hesitant to give loan to her as biotechnology was a totally new field
at that point of time and she was a women entrepreneur, which are rare phenomenon.

7.6 Scarcity of Raw Material: Most of the women enterprises are plagued by the scarcity of
raw material and necessary inputs. Added to this are the high prices of raw material, o the one
hand, and getting raw material at the minimum of discount, on the order. The failure of many
women cooperatives in 1971 engaged in basket making is an example how the scarcity of raw
material sounds the death-knell of enterprises run by women.

7.7 Stiff Competition: Women face a lot of competition from men. Due to limited mobility
they find difficult to compete with men.

7.8 Limited Mobility: Moving in and around the market is gain a tough job for middle class
women entrepreneur in Indian social system. .

7.9 Low Risk-Bearing Abiliy: women in India lead a protected life. They are less educated
and economically not self-dependent. All these reduce their ability to bear risk involved in
running an enterprise. Risk bearing is an essential requisite of a successful entrepreneur.

8. FINDINGS OF THE STUDY: Government has introduced many programs for boosting
women entrepreneurs in central, State and nongovernmental levels. Creating all facilities
awareness programs for entrepreneurs. Most of the entrepreneurs are utilizing and benefited
and few entrepreneurs are waiting for availing the benefits National level Institutions are
introduced different schemes and programs for empowering entrepreneurs and agenda of
these programs are solving the issues relating to MSME’s and providing many employment
opportunities for rural and unskilled, Semi-skilled people. In district wise supporting systems
are involving and supporting entrepreneurs in the line of networking, Business training.
Assistance in financial funding, Infrastructure, completion of statutory requirements.
Technology upgrading and transformation and export systems training. Easy to access and
approachable. All National, State and nongovernmental organizations objectives are same for
promoting entrepreneur development in every level of their activities and make them
 economically independent and creating many employment opportunities through them and
make them successful contributors for the economic development of the country.

9. CONCLUSIONS :

Women sector occupies nearly 45% of the Indian population. At this stage, effective
steps are needed to provide entrepreneurial awareness, orientation and skill development
programs to women. It can be considered that today we are in a better position, where in
women participation in the field of entrepreneurship is increasing at a considerable rate.

10. REFRENCES:

1. Rajani N, Sarada ,D. (2008). Women Entrepreneurship and Support Systems. Stud
Home Communication Science, 2, 107-112.

2. Sanjay Koushik; (2013). Challenges Faced By Women Entrepreneur In India;

International Journal Of Management And Social Sciences Research.

3. Sonia G, Mari W, B, Saurav, P, (2015). Political Empowerment, Rule of Law, and

Women’s Entry into Entrepreneurship. Journal of Small Business Management 53
605-626.