INTRODUCTION

The emergence of entrepreneurs in a society depends to a great extent on the social, economic, religious, cultural, psychological and environmental factors prevailing in a society. Entrepreneurs with their inherent intelligence, drive and hard work making the best use of the opportunities that are made available in the above factors. Women entrepreneurs are no exception to this. Though women, in traditional societies are confined to the four walls of houses doing all the household works including taking care of the children and are treated as property of men, the concept and status of women in the modern society has been changed substantially. Modern age has lifted the veil of ignorance. Slowly and subtly changes are creeping in. Women have come out of the four walls to participate in all sorts of activities. They are growing and blossoming as successful persons in their own right. They have proved that they are no less than men in efficiency, hard work or intelligence. They are treated equally in teaching jobs, IT firms, hospitals and administrative jobs, military and defence fields, law, science, medicines and even aeronautics and space exploration. Now they have jumped into industrial activities and run their enterprises successfully. They are emerging as potential entrepreneurs. They have been making significant impact in all segments of the economy. Indian women also do have vast entrepreneurial talent which could be harnessed to join in the race for development. Therefore, it is now quite significant to discuss about the concept, meaning,, growth, problems and its solutions of women entrepreneurs in India.

Meaning and Concept of Women Entrepreneur:

Increase in cost of living has prompted the Indian women to undertake economic activities in order to support their families. They are coming forward to take risks, face challenges and prove to the world that their role in the society is no more limited to that of buyers but they can be also successful sellers. There are thousands of good examples where women have shown entrepreneurial talents and have succeeded. Women entrepreneurs are the key players in any developing country in terms of their contribution to economic development. Now, it is imperative to know who is an women entrepreneur. In the simplest sense, women entrepreneurs are those women who take the lead and organise the business or industry and provide employment to others. It signifies that section of female population who venture out into industrial activities. It may be defined as a woman or group of women who initiate, organise and run a business enterprise. However, Government of India has given a broader definition of the term women entrepreneur. It defined women entrepreneur as "an enterprise owned and controlled by women having a minimum

financial interest of 51% of the capital and giving at least 51% of the employment generated in the enterprise to women". According to J.A. Schumpeter, "Woman who innovates, imitates, or adopts a business activity is called woman entrepreneur." Thus women entrepreneur are those women who initiate, organise and operate business enterprise and want to prove their mettle in innovative and competitive jobs. She also want to oversee and control every aspects of her business for its overall success.

Growth of Women Entrepreneurship:

Almost half of India's population consists of women. But they constitute a very negligible proportion of the total entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurial traits and competencies have not been well developed amongst the women entrepreneurs. They are very shy in nature and emotionally attached to the family. They are treated as weak and dependent on men. They are the neglected sections in the society. The much low literacy rate 39%, low work participation rate 28% and low urban population share 10% of women as compared to 63%, : 52% and 18% respectively of their male counterpart well confirm their precarious position in the society. In spite of the above, in sixties, women have started entrepreneurial activities as one- woman enterprises at home and from home for self-occupation and engagement. The number of women entrepreneurs were only 6000 which miserably low during the period. Indian women started their entrepreneurial work in 1970s. Their entrepreneurship is traced out as an extension of kitchen activities mainly pickles, powder and pappad. Women are encouraged to start an occupation or venture with an urge to do something independently started to tide over their economic difficulties and responsibilities. In the seventies, Government of India has also brought a change in its policy objective of welfare approach of women to development approach of women. Women were given priorities in all the sectors including small scale industries sector. As a result, the number of women entrepreneurs has increased over the years. During 1980s, government and non-government bodies have paid increasing attention to women entrepreneurs through formulation of various policies and programmes and introduction of new schemes and incentives. It adopted a multi-disciplinary approach for development of women entrepreneurs. Women entrepreneurs were given top priority for implementation of programmes under agricultural and its allied activities of diary farming, poultry, animal husbandary, handlooms, handicrafts and small scale industries, etc. In the nineties, out of the total women population of 437.10 millions, there are 126.48 million women workforce of which only 1,85,900 women accounting for self employed in the country. This indicates a dismally low level of women participation in the entrepreneurial activities. Further women entrepreneurs in India accounted for 9.01% of the total 1.70 million entrepreneurs during 1988-89. There were more than 2,95,680 women entrepreneurs claiming 11.2% of the total

2.64 million entrepreneurs in India during 1995-96. The number of women entrepreneurs have increased to 3,28,000 in 1996-97. During the ninth five year plan, the government has introduced in 1998 an important scheme on Trade Related Entrepreneurship of Assistance and Development (TREAD) aiming at economic empowerment of women in rural, urban and semi-urban areas. It develops their entrepreneurial skill and eliminates the constraints faced by women entrepreneurs. The TREAD programme was operated through Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI). SIDBI has initiated various schemes for the growth of women entrepreneurs through Mahila Udyam Nidhi (MUN), Mahila Vikash for Nidhi (MVN), Micro Credit Scheme (MSC), Women Entrepreneurial Development Programme (EDP), and Marketing Development Fund (MDF) for women entrepreneurs. In the context of the opening up of the economy and the need for upgradation of technology, the Consortium of Women Entrepreneurs of India (CWEI) is a common platform to help the very women entrepreneurs in finding innovative techniques of production and marketing and finance. Prime-Minister Rozgar Yojna (PMRY), National Rural Employment Programme and (NREP), Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Programme (RLEGP) are some of the important schemes floated by the Government which encourage women to enter into work entrepreneurial activities. With growing awareness about business and due to growth of educational level, in professional education, industrialisation, urbanisation and democratic values awareness, the tradition bound Indian society has undergone a change and women entrepreneurs have shifted their entrepreneurial activities to engineering, electronics and energy. They made personal choices, stood up for their convictions and had the courage and strength to enter into new ventures. As a result of these efforts, number of women entrepreneurs have increased over the years.

Need
There was a blind belief that men are the only bread winners of their families. This has been proved incorrect because GAD (Gender and Development) has clearly identified the role of women entrepreneurs. Now-a-days, service sector has played a significant role in providing employment opportunities to women. Besides most of women lives in semi-urban and rural areas and a lot of measures have been taken to promote women entrepreneurs. It is observed that women can establish business units in those areas where they have core competency. Women have proved their core competency in the areas of Information Technology (IT), management, personal care services and health care services.

Women are encouraged in these areas of business as they have core-competency. Besides the above areas, women entrepreneurs have emerged in the new areas like data base management, designing and multi-media services. The followings are some of important reasons for emerging women entrepreneurship. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Educated women do not find suitable job. Women do not feel comfortable to work in their houses. Women have an instinct to prove their innovative skill like men. Women desire additional income to provide support to their families. They have a desire for new challenges and opportunities for self-fulfillment. Desire to enjoy social status equal to that of men. Economic compulsions have encouraged for emerging of women entrepreneurs. Women desire to share family responsibilities like men.

Functions of Women Entrepreneurs: Women entrepreneur performs all the functions an entrepreneur performs while establishing an enterprise which are already discussed under the heading functions of an entrepreneur. However, Federick Harbison has enumerated five entrepreneurial function of women entrepreneur as follows: 1. Exploration of the prospects of starting a new business enterprise, 2. Undertaking of risks and handling of economic uncertainties involved in the business. 3. Introduction of innovations or imitation of innovations. 4. Co-ordination, administration and control. 5. Supervision and leadership.

Like a male entrepreneur, a woman entrepreneur has to perform the following function: 1. Innovation: Innovation is the basis function of woman entrepreneur. She has to introduce new product, creation of new markets, application of new process of production, discovery of new and better sources of raw materials and developing a new and better form of industrial organization. 2. Risk taking: It is the fundamental function of a woman entrepreneur. It refers to take the responsibility for loss that may occur due to unforeseen contingencies of the future. A woman entrepreneur visualizes opportunities for introducing new ideas and handles economic uncertainty. She is a self confident and highly optimistic lady willing to assume the risk involved in innovations, new ventures and expansion of an existing venture.

3. Organization building: Organization and management of the enterprise is the main function of a woman entrepreneur. It refers to bring together the various factors of production. She alone decides the lines of business to expand and capita to employ.

Problems of Women Entrepreneurs : There are umpteen problems faced by women at various stages beginning from their initial commencement of enterprise, in running their enterprise. Their various problems are as follows: 1. Patriarchal Society: Entrepreneurship has been traditionally seen a male preserve and idea of women taking up entrepreneurial activities considered as a distant dream. Any deviation from the norm is frowned and if possible, immediately curbed. Women also have to face role conflict as soon as they initiate any entrepreneurial activity. It is an uphill task for women to face such conflicts and cope with the twin role. 2. Absence of Entrepreneurial Aptitude: Many women take the training by attending the Entrepreneurship Development Programmes without entrepreneurial bent of mind. As per a study, involvement of women in small scale sector as owners stands at mere 7 percent. Women who are imparted training by various institutes must be verified on account of aptitude through the tests, interviews etc. 3. Quality of EDPs: All women entrepreneurs are given the same training through EDPs. Secondgeneration women entrepreneurs don't need such training as they already have the previous exposure to business. 4. Marketing Problems: Women entrepreneurs continuously face the problems in marketing their products. It is one of the core problems as this area is mainly dominated by males and even women with adequate experience fail to make a dent. For marketing the products women entrepreneurs have to be at the mercy of middlemen who pocket the chunk of profit. Although the middlemen exploit the women entrepreneurs, the elimination of middlemen is difficult, because it involves a lot of running about. Women entrepreneurs also find it difficult to capture the market and make their products popular. 5. Financial Problems: Obtaining the support of bankers, managing the working capital, lack of credit resources are the problems which still remain in the males domain. Women are yet to make significant mark in quantitative terms. Marketing and financial problems are such obstacles where even training doesn't significantly help the women. Some problems are structural in nature and beyond the control of entrepreneurs. 6. Family Conflicts: Women also face the conflict of performing of home role as they are not available to spend enough time with their families. They spend long hours in business and as a result, they find it difficult to meet the demands of their family members and society as well. Their inability to attend to domestic work, time for education of children, personal hobbies, and entertainment adds to their conflicts.

7. Credit Facilities: Though women constitute about 50 per cent of population, the percentage of small scale enterprise where women own 51 percent of share capital is less than 5 percent. Women are often denied credit by bankers on the ground of lack of collateral security. Therefore, women's access to risk capital is limited. The complicated procedure of bank loans, the inordinate delay in obtaining the loans and running about involved do deter many women from venturing out. At the same time, a good deal of selfemployment programme has been promoted by the govt. and commercial banks. 8. Shortage of raw-materials: Women entrepreneurs encounter the problems of shortage of rawmaterials. The failure of many women co-operations in 1971 such as these engaged in basket making were mainly because of the inadequate availability of forest-based raw materials. 9. Heavy Competition: Many of the women enterprises have imperfect organizational set up. But they have to face severe competition from organized industries. 10. High cost of production: High cost of production undermines the efficiency and stands in the way of development and expansion of women's enterprises, government assistance in the form of grant and subsidies to some extent enables them to tide over the difficult situations. However, in the long run, it would be necessary to increase efficiency and expand productive capacity and thereby reduce cost to make their ultimate survival possible, other than these, women entrepreneurs so face the problems of labour, human resources, infrastructure, legal formalities, overload of work, lack of family support, mistrust etc. RECENT TRENDS
Women entrepreneurs are gaining a hold in the business market. They have become an important part of the business community. Women entreprenuers are diversifying from some set businesses. Normally they were involved in beauty product business, or beauty saloon business, or boutiques, or even restaurants. However, this trend is changing and they are diversifying into more technical businesses such as computers, software, technical equipment, etc. They are also venturing into male dominated businesses such as supplying and contracting etc. They have in fact built a repo for themselves due to their far sightedness and truthfulness.