BHULI to Incubate 150 Women-Led Rural Businesses

By: Women Entrepreneurs Review Team | Wednesday, 15 July 2026

As an important move towards inclusive development, the Rural Development Ministry has launched Business & Handholding Unit for Livelihood Incubation (BHULI) scheme in Dehradun to encourage entrepreneurship among rural women. It is worth noting that the scheme has been created to help rural women at all stages from developing ideas to marketing and expansion.

Within the initiative, 150 women-led or women-owned companies would be chosen to access comprehensive business development services in order to increase their productivity, profitability, and competitiveness.

This program shall be implemented by means of National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM) and Uttarakhand State Rural Livelihood Mission (USRLM) in collaboration with FIED IIM Kashipur. Thus, through collaboration of government livelihood missions with academic and entrepreneurial knowledge, a strong ecosystem is being fostered to encourage innovation and self-employment.

Key Highlights:

• BHULI empowers 150 women-led rural enterprises with end-to-end business support
• Challenge Fund offers grants and zero-interest loans for business growth
• Programme aims for 15% annual growth and creates 3–4 jobs per enterprise

Addressing the launch, the Rural Development Minister Bharat Singh Chaudhary emphasized the Uttarakhand government's determination to empower rural women through providing opportunities for them to set up viable businesses. He emphasized that the BHULI initiative has been formulated with a view to provide women linked to Self Help Groups (SHGs) all necessary technical and financial assistance along with market linkage.

It is expected that within the programme, 15 percent annual turnover growth per year on average would be achieved by the companies involved in the programme while giving each business an opportunity to provide three to four job vacancies. Also, there will be a Challenge Fund, which provides grant and zero-interest soft loan for highly promising entrepreneurs, where up to 75 percent of capital and working expenses would be provided.

BHULI tackles the classical issues of market entry, capacity building, and financial education by providing comprehensive support from application through to implementation of enterprises. This approach takes place at the community level in order to strengthen the rural economy.

Project BHULI helps accelerate the growth of grassroots ventures using well-planned business assistance, mentoring, financing, and market connections to convert informal livelihoods into growth-oriented businesses by identifying, incubating, mentoring, and supporting numerous growth-oriented women-owned, women-led enterprises in the state.

The program plays an important role in venture identification, application assistance, beneficiary handholding, documentation assistance, mentoring, and monitoring.

FIED is a program designed to foster and support the entrepreneurship environment in several focal areas including Agriculture, Education, Arts and Crafts, Ayurveda & Wellness, Tourism and Hospitality.