Lakhpati Didi and SHE-LEAPS: Tracking Rural Women’s Income Growth

The government just doubled one of its own targets, mid-mission. Lakhpati Didi set out to create 3 crore women earning ₹1 lakh or more a year. In July 2026, that goal became 6 crore, backed by a new digital platform to actually track it happening.

📑 Contents

1Must Know
2Good to Know
3Test Yourself
4Great to Know
5Current Affairs

Must Know

PM Modi announced Lakhpati Didi in his 15 August 2023 Independence Day speech. It aims to help Self-Help Group (SHG) women reach a sustainable household income of ₹1 lakh or more a year.
The mission runs under Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM). It trains women in enterprise skills, from tailoring and handicrafts to animal husbandry and small-scale farming.
The original target was 2 crore women. It was later raised to 3 crore over five years.
On 1 July 2026, the government doubled that target again, to 6 crore women. It also announced a planned ₹10 lakh crore in disbursals over the next five years.
SHE-LEAPS (Self-Help Entrepreneur-Livelihoods and Enterprise Application for Prosperity and Sustainability) launched on 29 June 2026. Built by Digital India Corporation on the LokOS platform, it’s a new digital tracking system for the mission.

Good to Know

SHE-LEAPS launched at the Rashtriya Gramin Vikas Sammelan in New Delhi, themed “Gramodaya Se Rashtrodaya.” It’s rolling out across 34 States and UTs.
The platform digitises records at every level: individual SHG members, Village Organisations, and Cluster Level Federations. It tracks membership, financial transactions, livelihood activity, and convergence with other schemes.
SHE-LEAPS assists State Rural Livelihood Missions directly. It captures real-time enterprise data end-to-end, from a woman’s initial SHG membership through to her actual income growth.
Lakhpati Didi connects to a wider digital push for rural women’s livelihoods. See IndGov0029 — eSARAS: Rural Women’s Digital Marketplace for the sales-side counterpart. See IndSoc0036 — Self-Help Groups and Women’s Economic Empowerment for the broader SHG movement Lakhpati Didi builds on.

Test Yourself

Great to Know

Doubling a five-year target mid-mission, rather than waiting for the original deadline, signals real confidence in early results. It also raises a fair question worth tracking: whether implementation capacity can actually scale as fast as the headline number.
SHE-LEAPS matters less for what it promises and more for what it makes visible. A target is easy to announce. End-to-end digital tracking of actual income growth is what lets anyone, government or outside observers, check whether it’s really being met.
Lakhpati Didi and eSARAS together show a two-sided approach to rural women’s economic empowerment. One programme builds income and skills at the production end; the other builds market access to sell what gets produced.

Current Affairs

4 August 2026: MoS Rural Development Kamlesh Paswan told the Lok Sabha that NSAP covers 3.09 crore beneficiaries, through 5 sub-schemes. These include Old Age, Widow, and Disability Pensions, plus a one-time Family Benefit Scheme, and food-grain support under Annapurna. States received over ₹8,844 crore in NSAP funds in FY 2025-26 alone. (Source: PIB)
4 August 2026: MoS Rural Development Dr. Chandra Sekhar Pemmasani confirmed SHE-LEAPS is now fully operational, tracking 11.22 lakh SHG enterprises nationally. It runs on the same LokOS platform behind eSARAS. The Ministry has registered “Saras,” “Saras Aajeevika,” and “Aajeevika” as national SHG brands, alongside 25 State-level brands like Maharashtra’s UMED and Tamil Nadu’s Mathi. eSARAS itself now sells through GeM, ONDC, Amazon, Flipkart, Meesho, and JioMart. (Source: PIB)
4 August 2026: The same reply detailed DAY-NRLM’s full scale: 10.08 crore women mobilised into 92 lakh Self-Help Groups. Beyond Lakhpati Didi itself, DAY-NRLM runs several linked sub-schemes. SVEP has supported over 6.5 lakh rural non-farm enterprises. DDU-GKY has skilled 18.45 lakh rural youth since 2014-15, placing 12.35 lakh in jobs. RSETIs have trained 62.45 lakh candidates. Over 70% of them, 43.71 lakh, were women. (Source: PIB)
24 July 2026: In an earlier Rajya Sabha reply, the Ministry detailed DAY-NRLM’s financial-inclusion push for SHG women.
- A Financial Literacy Programme, run with RSETIs and banks, covers modules on savings, credit, insurance, pensions, and enterprise financing. In FY 2025-26, over 3.81 crore women SHG members received this training.
- All Public Sector Banks, and one private bank, now offer dedicated credit products for individual SHG members, to support the Lakhpati Didi initiative.
- In FY 2025-26, Saras Aajeevika Stores and e-commerce platforms together sold over ₹2.94 crore worth of SHG-made products — ₹2.10 crore via Saras Aajeevika Stores, and ₹84.5 lakh via e-commerce. (Source: PIB)
Separately, DAY-NRLM concluded its Lakhpati Didi showcase at Bharat Tex 2026, on 17 July.
- The pavilion displayed handloom and craft traditions, including Pattachitra, Phulkari, Eri silk, and Pashmina.
- It also featured the Saras Shakti Collection, DAY-NRLM’s premium gifting initiative for rural women’s crafts.
- Textiles Secretary Neelam Shami Rao and senior MoRD officials visited the pavilion.
(Source: PIB)
On 16 July 2026, the Ministry of Rural Development held a two-day workshop on the 6 Crore Lakhpati Didis roadmap.
- It was held at BIPARD, Gaya Ji, Bihar, with BRLPS-JEEVIKA as co-organiser.
- Participants worked across three tracks: Farm Livelihoods, Non-Farm Livelihoods, and Management Information Systems.
- The workshop finalised a strategy, roadmap, and Annual Action Plan for FY 2026-27.
- It also launched the book “Fostering Pathways for Rural Transformation.”
- BRLPS-JEEVIKA signed an MoU with the Arunachal State Rural Livelihood Mission, for cross-state learning.
(Source: PIB)