SHGs, Socio-Economic Status and Women Empowerment

The article examined the impact of self-help groups (SHGs) on the empowerment of women measured in terms of capacity building and skill development (CBSD) through a self-anchored scale. This CBSD scale (reliability, α = 0.7645) was administered to a representative sample of 408 women. The data was analysed with the help of mean, group scores, quartiles, t-test and chi-square. The significance of relationship between SHGs membership status and CBSD of women was statistically tested by independent sample t-test, and genuineness of relation is re-examined by controlling for socio-economic status (SES) (control variable). The results indicated that the relationship between the SHG membership status (independent variable) and CBSD (dependent variable) was statistically significant (t = 7.45, p = 0.000) and that the control variable SES has no effect on the association between SHG membership status and CBSD of women.