Bihar Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary on Friday, 12 June 2026, announced that Bihar has ranked first in the country under the central government's Lakhpati Didi Yojana, with approximately 48 lakh 30 thousand women from self-help groups achieving lakhpati status in the state.

Posting on X, the Chief Minister wrote: 'आत्मनिर्भर भारत और स्वदेशी के संकल्प को साकार करने में स्वयं सहायता समूहों से जुड़ी हमारी माताएं-बहनें आज परिवर्तन की सबसे मजबूत स्तंभ बन चुकी हैं' — 'Our mothers and sisters associated with self-help groups have today become the strongest pillars of change in realising the resolve of Atmanirbhar Bharat and Swadeshi.'

Context

The Lakhpati Didi Yojana is a central government initiative under the Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana–National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM), designed to help women in self-help groups achieve an annual household income of at least ₹1 lakh through sustainable economic activities including micro-enterprises, agri-processing, and skill-linked livelihoods. The scheme gained renewed momentum after the Union government set a national target of creating two crore lakhpati didis in 2023.

Bihar's performance under this scheme is closely tied to the state's Jeevika programme — one of India's largest rural women's livelihood networks — which has spent over a decade building SHG infrastructure across the state's rural districts.

Policy Backdrop

The DAY-NRLM, launched in 2011, scaled women's self-help groups across rural India by providing access to savings, credit, and market linkages. Post-2020, SHG credit limits and enterprise support were expanded as part of the broader Atmanirbhar Bharat push, which explicitly linked women's entrepreneurship and local value chains to national economic self-reliance goals.

Several states have reported rising lakhpati didi numbers as the Ministry of Rural Development increased capitalisation support for SHG enterprises. Bihar's claim of the top national rank reflects both the scale of its SHG network and the state government's focus on aligning with centrally sponsored scheme targets.

Stakeholders and Impact

The direct beneficiaries are rural women SHG members across Bihar's districts, who now report annual incomes exceeding ₹1 lakh per household — a threshold that signals a shift from subsistence to economic participation. Chief Minister Choudhary described the achievement as 'not merely a statistic, but a symbol of the hard work, self-confidence, and growing economic independence of Bihar's women power.'

State rural development departments, SHG federations, and community resource persons form the delivery architecture behind the numbers. The achievement also carries political weight for the ruling BJP-led alliance in Bihar, positioning women's economic empowerment as a governance deliverable ahead of future electoral cycles.

What's Next

Attention will now turn to updated national and state-wise lakhpati didi figures expected from the Ministry of Rural Development, which will either confirm or contextualise Bihar's claimed first-place ranking. Analysts and opposition groups are likely to scrutinise the methodology used to count lakhpati didis — specifically whether income thresholds are measured annually or on a cumulative basis.

Any new budgetary allocations for SHG capitalisation in the next Union Budget will be a key indicator of whether the Centre intends to deepen the programme further. For Bihar, sustaining the rank will require continued enterprise support, market linkages, and financial inclusion for the women already enrolled — the harder work that follows the headline number.