IWD 2021: AP First State To Consider Gender Budget Concept

AMARAVATI: Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy has said  that Andhra Pradesh will be the first state in the country to come up with the Gender Budget concept.

Participating in the International Women's Day celebrations at the camp office here on Monday, the Chief Minister virtually inaugurated Women Help Desks in all Police Stations across the State along with Cyber kiosks, launched Swechha programme to create awareness on menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls, and flagged off a fleet of 900 Disha patrolling vehicles and 18 Disha crime scene management vehicles.

The Chief Minister said that women should be given equal rights economically, socially and politically and recognise their services in bettering society. He stated that the government had introduced several schemes for the welfare of women in the state including Amma Vodi, YSR Cheyuta, YSR Asara, Kapu Nestam by spending Rs 80,000 Crores in just 21 months of governance. Besides ensuring women welfare, the government also focused on empowering women socially, politically and economically and made laws to provide 50 percent reservation to women in all nominated posts and nominated works.

The Chief Minister emphasised on bringing the concept of gender budget in this year's budget like nowhere else in the country, clearly listing out the expenditure for women welfare through various schemes. He reiterated that the State government is the first in the country to bring the gender budget concept. The Chief Minister announced to provide free biodegradable sanitary napkins to the girl students studying from class 7-12 in all government schools from July 1. Also, they would be made available at low prices in Cheyutha grocery stores across the State from July 1 onwards.

The casual leaves for women has been increased to 20 from 15 , he said.

Workplace committees to prevent harassment of women will be ‘mandatory’ in all government and private institutions, he said and instructed the Chief Secretary to set up a committee in the Secretariat as the first step. 

According to the 2011 census, only 60 percent of women are literate in the State, and still, 40 percent of women are unable to pursue education. In order to resolve this and lower the burden of providing quality education, the government introduced Jagananna Amma Vodi scheme and spent over Rs 13,022 crore in two years and will be providing Rs 32,500 crore in five years benefiting over 44.5 lakh mothers and 85 lakh students.

Similarly, through YSR Aasara, 87.75 lakh self-help group women were given Rs 6,792 Crore in these 21 months, while through YSR Cheyutha 24.56 lakh women aged between 45-60 years were given Rs 4,604 Crore for empowering economically.

Special Disha police stations have been set up in each district to crack down those committing crime against women. Crimes against women were dropped by 7.5 percent in 2020 compared to 2019 and so thus the investigation period was reduced from 100 days to 53 days. So far, charge sheets for 563 offenses were filed within seven days of the incident.

Home Minister Mekatoti Sucharitha, Women and Child Welfare Minister Thaneti Vanitha, Women's Commission Chairperson Vasireddy Padma, Chief Secretary Adityanath Das, DGP Gautam Sawang, MLA Undavalli Sridevi and many other dignitaries were present.