Abstract

Entrepreneurship is emerging as an important avenue in gaining economic independence for women. In last two decades (in post-liberalisation era), the economic reforms coupled with loosening of social restrictions has further provided an impetus to women to become entrepreneurs. According to the current trends most of the emerging women entrepreneurs are in small and micro enterprises. A cursory look at their situation highlights a number of major challenges faced by them. These challenges can be broadly classified as: lack of awareness, lack of information, difficulty in accessibility of finance, lack of easy access of entrepreneurial training and post training support, lack of market and network support, lack of self-confidence and managerial skills etc. In recent times, the government has realised the importance of entrepreneurship as a prominent alternative to traditional wage employment in the new economy, and its role in increasing the pace of economic growth. Therefore, Indian government has come up with various special policy measures to help women entrepreneurs. However, there are major limitations among women entrepreneurs in accessing those facilities. These limitations arise due to various factors, such as: bureaucratic hassles, far reaching location of the government training centres, lack of transportation mainly in remote areas, restriction of government officials in terms of timing when women also have to perform household activities etc. At this point, the NGOs emerge as a viable and important medium to support and promote women entrepreneurs. A number of NGOs in India are trying to help women entrepreneurs at various levels. To name a few, the AWAKE, the ICECD and the FIWE, three prominent NGOs in this field providing services to women entrepreneurs for more than 15 years. An attempt has been made in the present study to explore the approach and activities of the NGOs (considering the AWAKE, the ICECD and the FIWE as case study for the present research) in order to meet the above mentioned challenges. This also provides the answer to the central research questions of the present research. It is important to highlight that a very limited number of substantial literatures are available on the NGOs and its contribution to the promotion of women entrepreneurship in India. The present study contributes significantly to the knowledge about the appropriate and effective approach of the NGOs to support women entrepreneurship in India. The study also highlights the various limitations of the NGOs while performing these activities. It is hoped that the finding will be helpful to the planners and policy makers in the field of women entrepreneurship. The study would also be great use to the researchers, professionals, corporate consultants and other NGOs interested in the field of entrepreneurship development in general and women entrepreneurship in particular.