The 18 member team from Maharashtra was given a brief lecture on Panchayats and Kudumbashree- Opportunities for Convergence by the Minister. Prior to this, Kudumbashree executive director Sarada Muraleedharan made an extensive prwswntation on the ideology and concept of Kudumbashree, its evolutaion, training strategies, identification of experts for skill training, convergence with agriculture, health, employment guarantee schenes and social welfare.
The members of the Maharashtra team, whose visit is to help in the implementation of the National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) in Maharashtra, include three state core team members on NRLM, six chief executive officers of zilla parishads, projects director of the District Rural Development Agency and additional chief executive officers of the zilla parishads. The team interacted with the Panchayat Minister and Kudumbashree director on the funding of Kudumbashree, its structure, self-help group, account keeping, raising of funds, resource mobilization, core differences between Kudumbashree and other states such as Andhra Pradesh and the need for strong panchayats to implement such initiatives.
The ream, after the initial interaction, was divided into two and taken on field visits to Kollam and Thiruvananthapuram, where they would visit Buds schools, apparel parks and places Kudumbashree had scripted success stories in various micro-enterprise units such as garments-making, food production and agriculture.