Empowering Rural Women through Institution Building: The Case of Sri Ksehtra Dharmasthala Rural Development Project

Abstract

The anti-poverty approach has been advocated as an effective and efficient development approach for not only combating poverty but also empowering poor women. One of the most popular ways in which development agencies have sought to address women's poverty has been through "synergistic approaches" that seek to conterminously address poverty and gender issues. One of the important activities to stimulate economic growth, increase women's income and quality of life is the promotion of women's entrepreneurship. It has the capacity to alleviate female poverty and gender inequalities. Especially in rural areas, research shows that women are a remarkable and unexplored source of the labour force. Nevertheless, few researchers have examined rural women and the issues pertaining to their entrepreneurship separately. In this paper an effort is made to analyse the creation, institution development and sustenance of group enterprises by Shri Kshethra. Dharmasthala Rural Development Project (SKDRDP).