Vijayawada: Aiming to create an entrepreneur in every household, skill training is being provided to the youth under the newly launched ‘Viksit Panchayat’ programme in the Vijayawada parliamentary constituency. In the first phase, 100 panchayat champions were appointed to work at the village level, identifying self-employment opportunities and assisting young individuals in securing financial and govt support.
Vijayawada MP Kesineni Sivanath (Chinni) initiated the programme to guide nearly 10,000 youth in 294 villages towards self-employment. As part of this initiative, selected panchayat champions will undergo special training at the National Institute for Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRDPR). The training will focus on accessing govt loans and subsidies, learning business strategies, and marketing locally produced goods.
The Kesineni Foundation is funding this training, ensuring that once trained, the appointed panchayat champions will work across different villages, identifying aspiring entrepreneurs and helping them establish sustainable businesses. Each champion will oversee six villages, covering a population of approximately 10,000 people. They will collaborate with BC Welfare, SC Welfare, and Minority Welfare departments to organise Gram Sabhas and provide essential guidance to self-employed individuals.
MP Kesineni Chinni stated that this is an experimental phase, and each Panchayat Champion will receive a monthly honorarium of ₹10,000 from his personal funds. He emphasised that empowering youth through self-employment is key to economic growth. “Many young people prefer self-employment over traditional jobs. With the right guidance and training, we can create successful entrepreneurs. Initially, we are training 100 individuals, but we aim to scale this to 250 in the future,” he said.
