Major Schemes of Madhya Pradesh: Ladli Behna and Ladli Laxmi

Madhya Pradesh runs some of the best known state welfare schemes in India, and MPPSC, MP Police, MPESB (vyapam) and SSC papers ask about them every year. Two schemes define the state's welfare record: the Ladli Laxmi Yojana of 2007, built around the girl child, and the Mukhyamantri Ladli Behna Yojana of 2023, a monthly cash transfer to women. This note explains both, their eligibility conditions and amounts, and the other state schemes an examiner picks questions from.

Ladli Laxmi Yojana (2007)

The Ladli Laxmi Yojana was launched on 1 April 2007 by the Government of Madhya Pradesh to improve the sex ratio and the standing of the girl child in the family. The Department of Women and Child Development implements it through anganwadi centres. For every registered girl the state invests in National Savings Certificates worth Rs 6,000 a year for the first five years, so certificates of Rs 30,000 stand in her name while she is still a child. The certificates mature into a total assured benefit of Rs 1,18,000, paid in stages that are tied to her schooling.

• Rs 2,000 on admission to Class 6.
• Rs 4,000 on admission to Class 9.
• Rs 6,000 on admission to Class 11.
• Rs 6,000 on admission to Class 12.
• Rs 1,00,000 after she completes 21 years of age, if she passed Class 12 and was not married before the age of 18.

The main conditions are that the parents are natives of Madhya Pradesh, that they are not income-tax payers, that the girl was born after 1 January 2006, that she is registered under the scheme in early childhood through the anganwadi, and that the family has not more than two children with the parents having adopted family planning. Relaxations exist for orphan girls, for girls in child care institutions and for the first-born girl child. Ladli Laxmi 2.0, announced in 2022, extended the scheme beyond school by adding assistance for higher and professional education and by linking the beneficiaries to college admission support.

Mukhyamantri Ladli Behna Yojana (2023)

The Mukhyamantri Ladli Behna Yojana was launched on 5 March 2023. Applications were taken from 25 March 2023 at camps in wards and gram panchayats, and the first instalment was transferred on 10 June 2023 at a state function in Jabalpur. The scheme pays an unconditional monthly amount directly into the woman's own Aadhaar-linked bank account by DBT on the 10th of every month, so that the money is hers and not the household's. The instalment was Rs 1,000 a month at launch and was raised to Rs 1,250 a month from the October 2023 instalment.

Eligibility is defined by residence, age and family means. The applicant must be a native of Madhya Pradesh and a married woman, which includes widowed, divorced and abandoned women. The age band was 23 to 60 years at launch and was lowered to 21 to 60 years in the second round. The family's annual income must be below Rs 2.5 lakh, no member of the family may be an income-tax payer or in regular government service, the family may not hold more than 5 acres of land, and it may not own a four-wheeler other than a tractor. Village and ward level Ladli Behna Sena groups were formed to help women apply and to carry grievances, and the related Ladli Behna Awas Yojana of 2023 offers a house to beneficiaries left out of the rural housing list.

Other major schemes of Madhya Pradesh

How the money reaches the beneficiary

Madhya Pradesh delivers these schemes through the Samagra portal, which gives every family and member a Samagra ID that is used to check eligibility, and through scheme portals of their own for Ladli Laxmi and Ladli Behna. Payments move by Direct Benefit Transfer into Aadhaar-linked accounts, which removes the middleman and leaves an auditable trail. Applications are taken offline at anganwadi centres, ward offices and gram panchayat camps, so that women without a smartphone are not left out, and provisional lists are read out and displayed before final approval. Grievances go to the local body first and then up the Women and Child Development chain.

Reading the two flagship schemes together

The two schemes work at different points in a woman's life and that contrast is the examiner's favourite. Ladli Laxmi is a conditional, long-horizon scheme: the state pays only as the girl stays in school and only in full if her marriage is not advanced before 18, so the money is an incentive to educate and to delay marriage. Ladli Behna is an unconditional, monthly income support for adult women, with no schooling or behaviour condition attached, limited instead by income and asset tests. Together they mark the shift in state welfare from certificates held for a child to cash in an adult woman's own account, a shift several other states have followed.