Dena Shakti Scheme is a scheme for financing to women entrepreneurs rendered by Dena Bank. Under this scheme, women looking forward to initiating their businesses in sectors such as micro-credit, manufacturing, agriculture, retail, and more would receive loan benefits.
The role of women in the workplace has undergone a drastic change in the last 50 years. The existing social values have caused the women to be dependent and did not create a conducive environment for women to work unless there was a necessity but with time, Indian women have tried to shed the traditional mold set by the societal norms, and they are holding a significant social, political, and economic position in the society. Women have been persistent with their hard work making their mark as competitive businesswomen, and have achieved remarkable growth.
Women entrepreneurs are critical to the country’s economic growth, which can be achieved by enhancing the opportunities to women in all walks of life. The inequalities due to the gender gap persisting in India have always been a hindrance in the growth of women entrepreneurs. The female-founded and co-founded enterprises perform better than those managed by the males as they secure higher critical skills related to business enterprise, e.g., teamwork, problem-solving, and orientation. After realizing the immense potential of women, the Government of India has taken a large number of policy initiatives for mainstreaming women and providing them a platform to put their best in India’s economic growth.
Indian women run around 8 million enterprises constituting about 14% of the total entrepreneurs. This figure might not be encouraging, but every endeavor should be made to increase the number of women-led enterprises by increasing their productivity that will have a direct impact on the country’s economy.
Role of Women Entrepreneurs in the Economic Development of India
Women entrepreneurship has been associated with women empowerment concepts and it is also crucial for increasing the standard of living of women which is a requirement in the developing world. Women empowerment is essential in making the change in the status quo of women in all communities and establishing the balance of power within the family unit. Women constitute around 50 percent of the world population due to which the economic and social participation of women at the international, regional, national, and local levels can be used more effectively.
Women entrepreneurship has made a significant impact in all aspects of economic growth in various developed countries like the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and United States, etc, and also in developing countries like India.
Following are the role of women entrepreneurs in economic development:
Dena Shakti Scheme
Dena Bank is a public sector banking company started with the aim to promote economic opportunities for women and economic empowerment of women. The Dena Shakti Scheme is a scheme that has created a platform for women entrepreneurs in getting business loans easily and in a hassle-free manner. Any women entrepreneur who wishes to establish their business can apply for the Dena Shakti Scheme to meet the requirement of working capital or to expand their business organization.
Sectors Covered under Dena Shakti Scheme
The following fields are covered and highlighted in the Dena Shakti Scheme-
- Agriculture and Allied activities.
- Housing
- Education
- Microcredit
- Retail trade
- Small Enterprises (Direct and Indirect Finance)
- Micro and Small (manufacturing) Enterprises
- Micro and Small (service_ enterprises including small road and water transport operators, small business professionals and self employees, and all other service enterprises.
Following are the ceiling limit of the loan as per the directives of the State Bank of India for the above-stipulated sectors are-
- Rs. 20 lakhs under retail trade
- Rs. 20 lakhs under education and housing
- Rs. 50,000 under microcredit
Interest Rates of Dena Shakti Scheme
The interest rates on the Dena Shakti Scheme will be charged as per the guidelines of Dena Bank and the State Bank of India as applicable to various sectors of Agriculture, SE, and OPS. A concessional rate at 25 basic points is provided to the women beneficiaries subject to conditions laid down by the bank itself.
Benefits of the Scheme
The following are the benefits of the Dena Shakti Scheme:
- It is the combination of the term loan and the working capital.
- Women entrepreneurs are eligible for 25 % concessional rates in the loan.
- The term of loan provided to the women entrepreneurs is from one to three years.
Application Form of Dena Shakti Scheme
The Medium and Micro Enterprise (MSME) branch of UBI (Union Bank of India) provides the application form for the Dena Shakti Scheme.
The following are the details required to fill the form:
- Name and address of the enterprise
- Category belonging to Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe or Minority
- E-mail address
- Permanent Account Number (PAN) card
- Constitution of the enterprise whether it is a private limited company, partnership, proprietary, limited company, or cooperative company.
- Date of establishment of the company
- Name, address, and PAN details of partners, proprietors, and directors of the company
- Loan details
- Collateral security details
- Banking and current existing details of the credit cards
Loan Details
The rate of interest provided for the Dena Shakti Scheme will be 0.25 % below the base rates for women entrepreneurs. Such women entrepreneurs must be the majority of stakeholders in the company before applying for the Dena Shakti Scheme. The amount of loan provided for the agricultural sector will be up to Rs. 20 lakhs. The amount of loan for manufacturing purposes, retail traders, or small enterprises will be up to Rs. 20 lakhs. Such finance can be both direct and indirect finances.
The loan amount for the retail trader and micro-credit will be up to Rs. 50,000 under the micro-credit schemes. The processing fee for the Dena Shakti Scheme will be 0.50 % of the loan amount and the tenure of such loan will be up to 7 years. The women entrepreneur will be eligible to apply under the scheme that holds more than 50% ownership of the business enterprises.
Eligibility Criteria for Dena Shakti Scheme
Following are the requirements of the Dena Shakti Scheme-
- Any women involved in retail, service activities, manufacturing will be eligible for the loan in the Dena Shakti Scheme. Women who are working under self-employment such as architects, Chartered Accountants, doctors, etc, will also be eligible for the benefits of the Dena Shakti Scheme.
- The loan will be provided to such women entrepreneurs that are holding the business all by themselves or at least have more than 50 % stake in the business.
- The women applying for the Dena Shakti Scheme must be a part of or pursuing the Entrepreneurship Development Programs (EDP) which is organized by various state agencies to avail the loan under the Dena Shakti Scheme.
Relaxation Concerning the Scheme
The concessions and reductions in the margins with the optimal floating interest are provided by the State Bank of India (SBI) which is directly linked to the base rate of the respective bank. This relaxation by the State Bank of India will help in incentivizing the economic activities of women entrepreneurs. In certain categories of situations, the given margin can be lowered even by a 5 % rate. But in case of loan advance to retails traders, such concession will not be provided.
Document Requirements
Following are the documents which will be submitted while applying for Dena Shakti Scheme-
- Identity proof- PAN card, Aadhaar Card, Driving License, Voter ID, Passport, etc.
- Address Proof- Aaadhaar Card, Valid passport, utility bill, property tax bill, etc.
- Details of the Bank Accounts.
- One passport size photograph of the applicant applying for the Dena Shakti Scheme.
The Procedure of Application for the Dena Shakti Scheme
The applicant to apply for the Dena Shakti Scheme will have to approach the nearest branch of Dena Bank and the applicant must obtain the application form from the bank office and fill in the details required for applying for the Scheme.
Conclusion
The economic activities of women entrepreneurs contribute directly to the growth and development in dealing with informal business problems and poverty reduction. Women entrepreneurs are described as ‘survivalist’ and they dominate the low skill, low capital intensive, and informal and micro business. The Indian women entrepreneurs have been constantly exploiting the opportunities and they are converting the opportunities as well as the resources into national wealth and income.
The growth of women entrepreneurship plays a crucial role in generating employment both directly and indirectly and they are not only empowering themselves but also empowering others by offering jobs to the members of their community.
The Dena Shakti Scheme is a wonderful initiative of the Dena Bank which will contribute towards improving the balanced regional development and improving the standard of living of women and others too. The Dena Shakti Scheme aims to remove the regional disparities in the economic development that exist in India for ages. This will help them to set up the industries in backward and underdeveloped areas to avail the resources concessions and subsidies offered by the scheme as well as by the government.
Aatmnirbhar Sena is here to help you out in meeting all the requirements to avail the benefits of the Dena Shakti Scheme. The Dena Shakti Scheme is helping the women entrepreneurs in setting up the small-scale industries, reducing the scarcity of essential goods and due to which such women entrepreneurs are producing wide varieties of goods on large scale and thus, achieving improvement in the standard of living.
The women entrepreneurs are contributing largely to the economic growth of the country and they need to be better organized to identify their higher potential business opportunities, develop markets for their products, and secure better premises for them. Thus, women entrepreneurs have been making a noticeable impact on all segments of the Indian Economy.
