core sector communique

Way to Rural Self Reliance: National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM)

Curtain Raiser


The UPA chairperson is to launch the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), a re-christened version of the ongoing Swarn Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana from Banswara, Rajasthan tomorrow. The Minister for Rural Development, Government of India, Sh. Vilasrao Deshmukh and the Chief Minister of Rajasthan, Sh. Ashok Gehlot will also grace the occasion .

NRLM recognizes that the poor people have the potential to come out of poverty with proper handholding, training and capacity building and credit linkage. The handholding support to the SHGs will be in the form of external and internal. External support structure will consist of dedicated professional institutions at the State level, district level and sub – district level whereas internal support structure will evolve in the form of SHG federations at the village level, and block level and later on at district level. NRLM also recognizes that poor people have multiple livelihoods – wage employment and self employment. It will stabilize and enhance incomes from both the livelihoods. It will also promote diversification of livelihoods.

NRLM will have special focus on the poorest households, who are currently dependant on MGNREGA. These families will be supported to broaden their livelihoods through assets and skill acquisition. This will enhance the quality of their livelihoods significantly.

NRLM is based on large scale successes in states such as Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh where social mobilization and building strong institutions of the poor have led to significant reduction in poverty and empowerment of the poor.

The role of Banks will be of prime importance under NRLM as a source of credit for the poor at reasonable rates. NRLM will focus on getting banks to lend to the poor by making them bankable clients through smart use of subsidy. NRLM will focus on women as we believe that the best way of reaching out to the whole family is through the woman. There will be a special focus on vulnerable sections: scheduled tribes, scheduled castes, minorities, women headed families, etc. The second focus of NRLM would be rural youth of the country who are unemployed. They will be supported through placement linked skill development projects through which their skills will be upgraded through short term training courses in sectors which have high demand for services.

A unique feature of NRLM is that it would be led by the poor themselves. It would utilize the services of Community Resource Persons (CRPs) who are women who have themselves come out of poverty through being a part of the Self Help Group. They will spread the concept of NRLM from one village to another and from one district to another making NRLM a people’s movement.

Since the level of development of each State is different so also the availability of local resources and the level of skills of the people, therefore, the State will have the flexibility to develop their own action plans based on their local requirements and availability of resources. It will be a demand driven approach. The main features of NRLM are as follows:

Future Plan: The NRLM will be implemented in a phased manner. It is proposed to cover all the blocks of the Country within a period of seven to eight years. The States are expected to fulfill the following norms, at the earliest, before transiting from SGSY to NRLM:

Ministry of Rural Development has already finalised the ‘Framework for Implementation’ for NRLM and circulated to all States.