Microfinance and Women EmpowermentEmpirical Evidence from the Indian States

Microcredit is essentially utilised as the source of empowerment among the poor women in both rural and urban areas of the Indian states. Based on a panel of the Indian states for the period 2007 to 2014, our study examines the impact of women empowerment via the number of women Self Help Groups and women employment opportunities. Our empirical evidence finds that both are complementary to each other. Furthermore, we notice that changes in percapita income and poverty rate influence the scope for women employment and outreach of women SHGs across the Indian states. Factors like increasing access to bank loans and female literacy also help improve the women empowerment drive. The implications of the findings are discussed in the paper.