JEEViKA (Bihar Rural Livelihoods Project) Self-Help Group Programme

What is JEEViKA?

JEEViKA is the community-driven rural livelihoods programme of the Rural Development Department, Government of Bihar, implemented by the Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society (BRLPS). JEEViKA began in 2007 as the World Bank-assisted Bihar Rural Livelihoods Project in six blocks of six districts, and BRLPS has since scaled it across all 38 districts of Bihar. The programme is known locally simply as "Jeevika", and its members are called Jeevika Didis.

JEEViKA is not a cash-transfer scheme. JEEViKA is a mobilisation and institution-building programme: it organises rural women into small savings and credit groups, federates those groups, and then channels grant capital, bank credit, training and livelihood support through the federation. BRLPS is also the State Rural Livelihoods Mission agency for Bihar, so JEEViKA follows the funding norms of the Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana - National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM) of the Ministry of Rural Development.

The three-tier community structure

• Self-Help Group (SHG) to 10 to 15 women from the same hamlet who meet weekly, save a fixed amount and lend to each other from the pooled corpus.
• Village Organisation (VO), a federation of roughly 10 to 15 SHGs at village or panchayat level, which receives and disburses larger funds.
• Cluster Level Federation (CLF). A federation of village organisations at block level, which negotiates with banks, markets produce and runs enterprises.

Who is eligible to join a JEEViKA group?

You can become a member if:

• You are a woman aged 18 or above living in a rural village of Bihar where JEEViKA has been rolled out.
• Your household is identified as poor or vulnerable in the Participatory Identification of the Poor exercise carried out in your village, or appears in the SECC-based deprivation list used by DAY-NRLM.
• Only one woman from your household is already not a member; DAY-NRLM design allows one woman member per household.
• You can commit to attending the weekly group meeting and to saving a small fixed amount every week.

You are not eligible if:

• You live in an urban ward. JEEViKA is a rural programme; urban women are covered instead by the National Urban Livelihoods Mission through the Urban Development and Housing Department.
• You are a man. JEEViKA SHGs are women-only groups.
• Another woman from the same household is already an SHG member, since the one woman per household rule applies.
• You are looking for an individual government loan in your own name. Individuals cannot apply to BRLPS for a personal loan; all credit flows to the group first.

Being from a Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Extremely Backward Class or a Mahadalit hamlet does not restrict membership. These households are in fact prioritised during mobilisation.

What benefits does JEEViKA give a group?

JEEViKA support arrives in stages, and each stage is tied to the group proving its discipline.

The revolving fund is a corpus grant, not a loan to be repaid to the government. According to DAY-NRLM norms the revolving fund is released only to groups that have observed the Panchasutra, regular meetings, regular savings, regular internal lending, regular recoveries and proper maintenance of books of account. Groups also receive training on bookkeeping, and the community cadre includes book-keepers, community mobilisers and livelihood specialists drawn from the villages themselves.

Beyond finance, JEEViKA runs farm and non-farm livelihood work — collective paddy and vegetable production, dairy, goatery, poultry, handloom, the "Didi ki Rasoi" canteen enterprises and retail outlets, plus health, nutrition and sanitation behaviour-change work delivered through the same SHG platform.

What documents are required to join JEEViKA?

How to apply to join a JEEViKA self-help group

1. Find out whether your village has JEEViKA groups. Ask at the panchayat bhawan, the anganwadi centre, or the Block Project Implementation Unit at your block office for the name of the community mobiliser covering your ward.
2. Meet the community mobiliser or an existing group. If an SHG in your hamlet has fewer than 15 members and agrees, you can be admitted to that existing group at a weekly meeting, with the decision recorded in the minutes.
3. Form a new group if none has space. Gather 10 to 15 women from the same hamlet who are willing to save weekly, and ask the community mobiliser to register the group with the Block Project Implementation Unit.
4. Open the group bank account. Take the group resolution, member Aadhaar copies and photographs to the nearest bank branch and open a savings account in the SHG's name with two or three authorised signatories.
5. Start weekly savings and internal lending immediately, and keep the register updated. This record is what the block unit checks before releasing the revolving fund.
6. Ask the mobiliser to move your revolving fund proposal once the group has completed three to six months of unbroken meetings and savings.

There is no online application form for SHG membership. Anyone asking for money to "get your name into Jeevika" is running a scam.

How to check your group's fund and payment status

JEEViKA record-keeping happens at two levels. The group's own register, kept by the trained book-keeper, is the first place to check who saved what and which member holds an internal loan. Fund releases from BRLPS to the group are recorded in the block MIS, and the Block Project Manager can print a statement for your group on request. National-level SHG, revolving fund and community investment fund disbursement data is published openly on the DAY-NRLM portal at nrlm.gov.in, which can be filtered down to Bihar districts and blocks.

Why JEEViKA funds get delayed or refused

• Irregular meetings or savings, the most common reason a revolving fund proposal is held back, since the Panchasutra check fails.
• Books not maintained, a missing or back-dated register invalidates the grading.
• Group bank account dormant or not KYC-complete, so DBT fails.
• Duplicate membership; two women from the same household enrolled in different groups.
• Poor internal recovery, earlier internal loans not repaid within the group, which blocks both the CIF and the bank linkage.
• Aadhaar not seeded to the member or group account.

Most of these are fixed inside the group. Restart regular weekly meetings, bring the register up to date honestly, clear pending internal dues, and ask the community mobiliser for a re-grading.

Help and grievance redressal for JEEViKA

• JEEViKA helpline: 1800-102-9318
• BRLPS office line: 0612-2233555
• Email: info@brlps.in
• Head office: Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society, Vidyut Bhawan, Annexe-II, Bailey Road, Patna 800021
• Block level: Block Project Manager, Block Project Implementation Unit
• Portal: brlps.in

Membership of a JEEViKA group is free, and the revolving fund belongs to the group as a whole. No official will ask for a share of it, and no OTP should ever be shared over the phone.