India's Gender Budgeting Portal Launch: A Step Towards Equality

Gender Budgeting Women Empowerment Government Initiatives India Annapurna Devi

May 3, 20266 min readAsia

India's Gender Budgeting Portal Launch: A Step Towards Equality

New portal aims to enhance gender budgeting practices in India.

{"results": [{"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/centre-launches-portal-on-gender-budgeting/article69713328.ece", "title": "Centre launches portal on gender budgeting - The Hindu", "author": "The Hindu Bureau", "summary": "- The Hindu reports that the Centre launched a web portal titled \u201cGender Budgeting Knowledge Hub\u201d on June 19, 2025, to serve as a digital repository for gender budgeting processes, tools, policy briefs, best practices, and gender-disaggregated data for use by Central and State governments and other stakeholders.\n- Key context: Gender Budget allocations have risen from \u20b90.98 lakh crore in 2014-15 to \u20b94.49 lakh crore in 2025-26, a 4.5x increase, signaling a stronger government emphasis on gender-inclusive budgeting.\n- The launch was announced by Union Women and Child Development Minister Annapurna Devi during the National Consultation on Gender Budgeting, which involved senior officials from 40 Central ministries/departments, representatives from UN Women, the Asian Development Bank, and experts from national institutes.\n- Additional outcomes from the event included discussion on a draft Training Manual on Gender Budgeting to aid capacity-building and practical understanding across ministries and states.\n- Relevance to your query: The article confirms Annapurna Devi\u2019s role as WCD Minister in promoting gender budgeting initiatives, mentions the June 2024\u2013June 2025 timeline context, and notes the official portal\u2019s purpose and objectives. It does not provide a direct official profile or biographical details beyond the minister\u2019s stated involvement."}, {"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/nirbhaya-fund-helped-set-up-854-one-stop-centres-for-women-across-india-wcd-minister/article70151497.ece", "title": "Nirbhaya Fund helped set up 854 one-stop centres for women across India: WCD Minister - The Hindu", "author": "PTI", "summary": "Summary:\n- The Hindu reports that WCD Minister Annapurna Devi announced that the Nirbhaya Fund has helped establish 854 one-stop centres for women across India. These centres provide shelter, counselling, medical aid, and legal assistance to survivors of violence.\n- The statement was made during a two-day National Annual Stakeholders\u2019 Consultation on safeguarding the girl child, organized by the Supreme Court Juvenile Justice Committee with UNICEF India.\n- The article highlights ongoing government efforts to empower women and protect children, with a focus on creating safer environments and access to support services.\n\nNote: The user\u2019s query seeks official profiles for Annapurna Devi (June 2024; site:wcd.gov.in, site:pmindia.gov.in, 2026 official). This article is a news item from The Hindu (2025) and does not provide official profile details. For official bios, you may want to consult:\n- wcd.gov.in principal profile pages for Minister Annapurna Devi\n- pmindia.gov.in bio pages or press releases referencing her ministry and tenure\n- Government press briefings or affidavit/ministerial profiles archived on the official sites\n\nIf you\u2019d like, I can pull official profile details from the government sites and summarize her roles and tenure."}, {"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/centre-to-roll-out-biometric-based-registration-under-poshan-20-from-august-1/article69805241.ece", "title": "Centre to roll out biometric-based registration under Poshan 2.0 from August 1 - The Hindu", "author": "Abhinay Deshpande", "summary": "Summary:\n\n- The Hindu reports that Union Minister for Women and Child Development, Annpurna Devi, announced that beneficiary registration under Poshan 2.0 will use biometric authentication starting August 1. This is intended to improve targeting, transparency, and service delivery under the Saksham Anganwadi\u2013Poshan 2.0 framework.\n- Biometric tools referenced include Aadhaar-enabled Direct Benefit Transfers (DBTs) and the face-recognition system used in Saksham Anganwadi. The move aims for greater governance, accountability, and real-time data monitoring across schemes.\n- The 2025-26 Union Budget allocates \u20b94.49 lakh crore for Poshan 2.0 across 273 schemes (49 ministries). The Minister highlighted capacity-building through iGOT Karmayogi modules for field functionaries and urged states/UTs to strengthen grievance redressal, digital literacy among adolescent girls and young mothers, and timely Anganwadi service delivery.\n- Additional recommendations include transforming the Poshan Helpline into an interactive platform for citizen engagement and adopting Mission Vatsalya for real-time monitoring. The meeting emphasized convergence under Mission Shakti, Mission Vatsalya, and Poshan 2.0.\n\nContext for the user\u2019s query:\n- The user searched for official profiles of Annapurna Devi (note variant spelling Annpurna Devi) on government sites and requested 2026 official profile information. This article confirms biometric rollout under Poshan 2.0 and mentions her role as WCD Minister, but it does not provide an official bio. For the most accurate 2026 official profile, please visit:\n - wcd.gov.in (Women and Child Development Ministry) profile pages\n - pmindia.gov.in or na? (official bios or press releases)\n - The Hindu article is a news source about policy rollout, not an official bio.\n\nIf you want, I can pull the latest official Annapurna Devi profile from wcd.gov.in and summarize it."}, {"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/using-tech-to-empower-women-and-children/article69760575.ece", "title": "Using tech to empower women and children - The Hindu", "author": "Annapurna Devi", "summary": "Summary:\n- The Hindu op-ed highlights how the Modi government, through the Ministry of Women and Child Development, has digitally transformed access to nutrition, education, safety, and entitlements for women and children over the past decade.\n- Key initiatives include Saksham Anganwadi modernization, large-scale integration of Anganwadi services with Poshan Tracker (covering over 14 lakh centres and 10.14 crore beneficiaries), and equipping Anganwadi workers with smartphones and training to improve last-mile service delivery.\n- Poshan Tracker supports real-time data, performance monitoring, and evidence-based policy, advancing Swasth Bharat and Suposhit Bharat goals; facial recognition is used to reduce leakage in the Supplementary Nutrition Programme.\n- Safety and justice measures include the SHe-Box portal for workplace harassment complaints, and the Mission Shakti dashboard/app for connecting women to nearest one-stop centers (now in nearly every district).\n- Other featured outcomes: recognition with the Prime Minister\u2019s Award for Excellence in Public Administration (2025) and digital training modules under Poshan Bhi, Padhai Bhi to support early childhood education.\n- The piece frames technology as a catalyst for empowerment, transparency, and inclusive governance, aligning with Prime Minister Modi\u2019s Viksit Bharat@2047 vision.\n\nNote: The user query appears to seek information on Annapurna Devi and official profiles on pmindia.gov.in and wcd.gov.in (June 2024, 2026). This article does not mention Annapurna Devi or provide official profiles; it discusses broader digital initiatives by the Ministry. If you need official profile details for Annapurna Devi or directorate profiles, I can pull those from the specified government sites."}, {"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/centre-issues-guidelines-to-co-locate-11-lakh-anganwadis-on-nearest-school-premises/article70009397.ece", "title": "Centre issues guidelines to co-locate 11 lakh anganwadis on nearest school premises - The Hindu", "author": "Maitri Porecha", "summary": "Summary:\n- The Hindu reports that the Centre issued guidelines on Sept 3, 2025 to co-locate or map about 11 lakh anganwadis (AWCs) with nearest primary schools, to improve transition from early childhood to formal schooling and align curricula.\n- Benefits highlighted include smoother progression to Class 1, better curriculum alignment, stronger community participation, and improved data interoperability between MoE and MoWCD.\n- As of now, around 2.9 lakh AWCs have been co-located or mapped with Class 1 schools; approximately 11 lakh remain unmapped.\n- A new Aadharshila curriculum for ages 3\u20136 will be complemented by co-location to enable joint planning between AWC staff and school teachers.\n- The guidelines mandate interoperable data systems (Poshan Tracker, UDISE+) and propose extending APAAR IDs to three- to six-year-olds attending AWCs for unified tracking.\n- Key voices: Sanjay Kumar (School Education Secretary) and Ministers Dharmendra Pradhan (Education) and Annapurna Devi (Women and Child Development) emphasized cross-agency coordination and convergence.\n\nIf you\u2019re specifically looking for Annapurna Devi\u2019s official profile and statements from June 2024 or 2026 updates:\n- Annapurna Devi (Minister, Women and Child Development)\u2019s official profiles are typically hosted on the wcd.gov.in site and related cabinet/press release pages on pmindia.gov.in or wcd.gov.in. For exact June 2024 entries or a 2026 profile, please specify and I can pull the precise pages."}, {"url": "https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/health/pm-to-launch-swasth-nari-sashakt-parivar-abhiyaan-and-eighth-poshan-maah/article70052404.ece", "title": "PM to launch \u2018Swasth Nari, Sashakt Parivar Abhiyaan\u2019, and eighth \u2018Poshan Maah\u2019\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 - The Hindu", "author": "Bindu Shajan Perappadan", "summary": "The Hindu reports that India will launch a major health and nutrition initiative, \u201cSwasth Nari, Sashakt Parivar Abhiyaan,\u201d alongside the eighth Poshan Maah, on September 17. The campaign is led by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) and the Ministry of Women and Child Development (MoWCD). Key aims include delivering widespread women- and child-focused health services through 100,000+ health camps and ongoing services at government facilities, integrating nutrition activities with Poshan Maah, and promoting awareness on anaemia, balanced diets, menstrual hygiene, obesity prevention, and mental health. MoHFW will oversee preventive, promotive, and curative care, while MoWCD will drive nutrition counseling, anganwadi outreach, and large-scale demonstrations. The effort also emphasizes early disease detection (NCDs, anaemia, TB, sickle cell), maternal/child/adolescent health, and community engagement, including voluntary blood donation. PM Modi is set to launch the initiative, with private hospitals invited to participate in the nationwide campaign."}]}