Context: Women are playing an increasingly significant role in Indian agriculture, but agricultural databases and welfare systems often identify farmers through land ownership rather than actual cultivation.
- Maharashtra’s Women Farmers’ Empowerment Bill, 2026 seeks to address this gap by giving women an independent identity as farmers, irrespective of land ownership.
Maharashtra’s Women Farmers’ Empowerment Bill
- Passed in July 2026, the Bill provides women engaged in agriculture with a Woman Farmer Certificate, independent of land ownership.
- It gives legal recognition to an activity-based definition of a farmer, delinking farmer identity from ownership of agricultural land.
- This operationalises an approach proposed in the National Policy for Farmers, 2007, which defined farmers more broadly but was not effectively implemented.
- The legislation comes nearly two decades after the policy and 15 years after a similar national Bill introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2011 lapsed.
- It also represents the culmination of several decades of advocacy by women farmers’ movements and civil society organisations.
Existing State-Level Initiatives
- Kerala’s Kudumbashree has enabled women to participate in collective and group farming.
- Odisha’s KALIA scheme has extended support to categories including landless and sharecropper women.
- However, a dedicated women farmers’ registry independent of land records has generally been absent.
- Maharashtra therefore marks a shift from recognising the owner of agricultural land towards recognising the person actually engaged in farming.
Growing Role of Women in Agriculture
- In 2025, agriculture employed approximately 110 million women and 127 million men, bringing the agricultural workforce close to gender parity.
- Women’s agricultural workforce has more than doubled since 2017–18.
- Nearly three-fourths of rural women workers are now engaged in agriculture, compared with less than half of rural male workers.
- However, more than 41% of female agricultural workers were unpaid in 2025, compared with around 20% of male agricultural workers.
- Nearly 63% of male agricultural workers were own-account workers, compared with about 39% of women.
- Thus, women’s increasing participation has not been accompanied by equivalent economic recognition, ownership or access to agricultural resources.
The Worker–Owner Dichotomy
- Women commonly work on family-owned agricultural land without owning it or having their names recorded in land records.
- Patriarchal inheritance and ownership practices have historically resulted in agricultural land records being predominantly held by men.
- According to the Agricultural Census 2015–16, women accounted for only 14% of operational agricultural land holdings.
- Since government databases frequently use land records to identify beneficiaries, the person whose name appears on the record is more likely to be recognised as the farmer.
- Consequently, women who actually cultivate land may remain invisible in official farmer databases.
Impact on Access to Government Schemes
- The land-linked identification system can restrict women’s access to agricultural credit, subsidies, technology, extension services and other government programmes.
- Women accounted for only around 23% of beneficiaries of Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN), which provides ₹6,000 annually to eligible landholding farmer families.
- In several States, women constitute more than half of the agricultural workforce but less than one-third of scheme beneficiaries.
- This indicates that the key constraint is not simply the availability of agricultural land, but the identification mechanism through which access to State support is determined.
State-Level Variations
- Meghalaya, where women constitute around 70% of PM-KISAN beneficiaries, and Kerala, with around 44%, illustrate alternative pathways to recognition and access.
- In parts of the Northeast, customary tenure and matrilineal systems can provide women greater access to land and agricultural resources.
- In Kerala, collective farming through groups such as Kudumbashree provides an alternative mechanism for women’s participation and recognition.
- Conversely, in Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh, women constitute nearly two-thirds of the agricultural workforce but represent a much smaller share of beneficiaries.
- The variation suggests that where land records act as the primary gatekeeper, women are more likely to be excluded, while alternative identification mechanisms can improve access.
International Year of the Woman Farmer, 2026
- The legislation coincides with the United Nations’ designation of 2026 as the International Year of the Woman Farmer.
- Maharashtra’s initiative provides an opportunity for other States to develop mechanisms for independently identifying women engaged in agriculture.
Key Features of Maharashtra’s Approach
- The legislation broadens the definitions of ‘agriculture’ and ‘farmer’ to recognise women residents engaged in agriculture for at least one agricultural season annually.
- Recognition is provided irrespective of the nature or ownership status of the land through a Woman Farmer Certificate.
- It explicitly covers landless cultivators, landless livestock rearers, agricultural labourers, plantation labourers and pastoralists.
- This can provide women without land titles with an independent agricultural identity and potentially improve access to welfare schemes and agricultural credit.
Additional Concept: Agri Stack and Farmer ID
- Agri Stack is a digital agricultural ecosystem developed by the Union Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare to integrate agricultural data and services.
- Farmer IDs can provide individualised digital identification within this ecosystem and facilitate access to agricultural services.
- Linking Woman Farmer Certificates with Agri Stack and Farmer IDs can help integrate women currently excluded from land-based agricultural databases.
Challenges in Implementation
- Legal recognition alone will not ensure inclusion; women farmers without land titles must be identified and registered effectively.
- Registration could involve self-registration or identification through the Gram Sabha, including women who neither own land nor have land titles in their names.
- Awareness campaigns will be necessary to ensure that eligible women understand the certification process and available schemes.
- States will need to integrate women-farmer databases with existing agricultural databases while preventing duplication, exclusion and multiple registrations.
- Differences in definitions and identification mechanisms across States could hinder portability of women farmers’ identities across schemes.
Way Forward
- States should develop standardised definitions and identification criteria for women farmers while retaining flexibility for local agricultural practices.
- Woman Farmer Certificates should be systematically linked with Farmer IDs, Agri Stack and welfare databases.
- Benefits should be linked to the actual cultivator, rather than exclusively to land ownership.
- Gram Sabhas, self-help groups and farmer collectives can support identification, awareness and last-mile access.
- Credit, technology, extension services, insurance and subsidies should increasingly recognise women as independent agricultural stakeholders.
Conclusion: Recognising women as farmers based on their actual contribution to agriculture rather than land ownership can address a long-standing institutional gap. Effective implementation can turn legal recognition into greater access to resources, welfare and economic opportunities.
