Bihar: Government officials in Bihar are working to create self-help groups (SHGs) for transgender people.
Transgender people who want to establish a business can create an SHG and the social welfare department is willing to provide seed money, according to authorities aware of the matter.
The Bihar Rural Livelihood Promotion Organisation, an autonomous society within the state government’s rural development department, has been running Jeevika, a World Bank-funded poverty reduction initiative, for women in Bihar since 2007.
The initiative was created to help rural women become economically self-sufficient through a variety of occupations, including farming, goat and poultry keeping and producing masks during the pandemic. It has helped approximately 12 million women become economically self-sufficient.
Rajkumar, director of the social welfare department, said: ‘Likewise, the social welfare department has planned self-help groups for transgender persons also. This way we will be able to provide them financial support. They may sell vegetables or start beauty salons or any other kind of work. The department will give them the seed money for any kind of business.’
He also mentioned that a self-help organisation of transgender people selling veggies in the state capital was created on an experimental basis last week. ‘The department has given them three months’ time to function this way and after that, the department will give them seed money to plan something bigger,’ he added. The seed money would be supplied by the social welfare department’s transgender welfare board, which has a budgeted allotment of 50 lakh, according to the official.
SHGs for transgender people, according to Reshma, a former member of the department’s transgender welfare board, have been a long-awaited initiative, and transgender people have been anxiously awaiting this facility. ‘An SHG is, in fact, a group of persons living in the same geographical area and of an almost similar level of income. They form a group and help one another when there is a need for financial support. Every month, the group members deposit some amount of money in the group account and if needed, they get a loan from this fund,’ Reshma said.
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She noted that a group can have a minimum of 10 members, with one person serving as secretary and another as treasurer to keep track of the finances.
According to Census 2011, there are approximately 40,000 transgender people in the state, with 2,200 in the state capital.
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