Role of self-help groups in achieving gender equality in Bihar

Dr. B.R. Ambedkar stated that, “I measure the progress of a community by the degree of progress women have achieved.” A family’s abundance and stability are not complete until a woman is empowered. Empowerment refers to an individual’s or a community’s spiritual, political, social, gender, or economic strength. If a woman is educated, she can engage in, organize, and inform others about the different important programms for women’s ennoblement. Women have been discriminated against and are regarded as second class citizens in society traditionally. Because of their limitations, they cannot express themselves to outsiders. Women’s conditions are declining due to their jobless, low status, lack of creating decision authority, absence of literacy, and absence of awareness of both sexes’ laws. Hence it is very much important to recognize the services, skills, potentialities of women for attainment of cultural advancement, political autonomy, social development and economic progress of the country. There must be full freedom to women exposure equally as men and transfer her from being primarily a vehicle of human reproduction, producing biological goods, to a vehicle of social, cultural and economic change. SHGs are informal associations where people come together to overcome their common problems, to save money, share resourses and support each other. Self Help Groups are playing an important role not only in reduction of poverty and improves the lives of the poor, but also in providing gender justice and establishment of gender equality in society. This paper highlights the role of Self-Help Groups in achieving gender equality in Bihar.