Actor Smriti Kalra visited the Rajya Sabha and new Parliament in Delhi to celebrate the passing of Women Reservation Bill, and she calls it a moment of pride and honour. “It has been a long journey since 1996, when the bill was first presented and it was passed after several attempts.

Drawing upon the data from the recent period, this paper explores the relationship between women’s involvement in microfinance programs and improvement in their empowerment status.

Formal financial institutions (FFIs) in a developing economy often fail to meet the loan requirements of the poor. It is frequently stated that the poor are non bankable. Given this, several models and structures have emerged for making them bankable.