Empowerment of Rural Women Through Vocational Trainings Conducted by Krishi Vigyan Kendras of Punjab

Empowerment is a process that makes women understand her unique potential and enables her to break barriers to make her realize that she has the capacity to utilize her full potential. But it is unfortunate that because of centuries of inertia, ignorance and conservation, the actual and potential role of women in the society has been ignored. Study was conducted to measure empowerment of rural women in terms of socio-psychological and economic empowerment after getting training from selected Krishi Vigyan Kendras of Punjab namely Bathinda, Ferozpur, Gurdaspur, Hoshiarpur and Saheed Bhagat Singh (SBS) Nagar. All long duration vocational training courses conducted by these Krishi Vigyan Kendras for women from year 2009-2013 were included in the study. A sample of 140 trainees was drawn by applying probability proportional to size (PPS) sampling method and data were collected personally from the selected trainees by using an interview schedule. The findings of the study revealed that even after getting training from Krishi Vigyan Kendras the socio-psychological and economic empowerment level of majority of the trainees was low. Age, social participation and mass media exposure of trainees had positively and significant relationship with the level of empowerment while education had negative but significant relationship with the level of empowerment. So there is a need to impart socio-psychological and economic empowerment aspect to women trainees during the training programme through different strategies.