Indiramma Mahila Shakti Scheme: Minority women turn up in hordes

Hyderabad: For the welfare and upliftment of minorities in Telangana, the Telangana State Minorities Finance Corporation is receiving applications for the direct beneficiary scheme providing free domestic sewing machines under the ‘Indiramma Mahila Shakti’ scheme. However, for the over 10,000 sewing machines distributed by the Finance Corporation, a large number of women turned out to apply for the free sewing machines. As per the Finance Corporation, it received nearly 30,000 applications in the last four days across the State which would be continued till December 30.

The State government has allocated financial assistance of Rs 432 crore to the Minorities Finance Corporation, and the Finance Corporation laid out a plan to take up welfare schemes in the State. The corporation announced the applicants from December 16 to 30 for the direct beneficiary’s scheme providing free domestic sewing machines under Congress government and the six guarantees scheme ‘Indiramma Mahila Shakti.’

According to TGMFC, the minority women applicant shall submit their application forms through the web portal tgobmms.cgg.gov.in till December 30 as per the eligibility criteria. The official at MFC said that the unemployed women belonging to minority communities, including Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, and Parsis, shall be given to the poorest of the poor and needy minority women; destitute, divorced, widowed, orphaned, or single women can apply.

Following the announcement, many women applicants are visiting the TGMFC office at Haj House Nampally for the last four days. On Thursday, it was observed that a long queue was formed, and girls and women were standing to submit their applications. It is said that the Finance Corporation would receive nearly one lakh applicants, as ten days are left for the deadline.

A quadragenarian woman standing in queue at Haj House expressed her concerns. “I am eligible for the scheme. I possess a white ration card, my income is under Rs two lakh, and I was recently trained in a government-recognised training institution. However, seeing the large number of women applying for the machine raises doubts about whether the true beneficiaries will actually receive the support they need,” stated Asma Khatoon, a resident of Kalapather.

Asif Hussain Sohail, an activist, raised the issue and said that the government is misleading minorities by providing an inadequate number of sewing machines. The machines have to be distributed among the destitute, divorcees, widows, orphans, and single women, among others, in all sections of the minorities. “With at least 10,490 machines on hand, how many beneficiaries will genuinely be benefitted in the scheme?” he asked.

Asif said, “The Finance Corporation has not confirmed whether the distribution of machines will occur in phases or if the total number will be limited to 10,490 machines. At least they must distribute district-wise across the State. In the past, during the previous government, the Finance Corporation did receive applications in a phased manner, but it did not proceed with distributing them further to the beneficiaries.”