Telangana’s Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty launches Rs 12.66 Cr fund to scale rural entrepreneurship
The Challenge Fund will focus on women- and youth-led enterprises at the grassroots level.
The Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty, in partnership with TBIS BITS Pilani Hyderabad, T-Hub, and WE Hub, has launched an Rs 12.66 Cr Challenge Fund to scale rural entrepreneurship, focusing on women and youth-led enterprises at the grassroots level.
Backed by the Ministry of Rural Development, the fund will enable over 300 women and young entrepreneurs with targeted institutional support and facilitate enterprise formalisation, capability enhancement, and scalable growth, a press statement said.
This fund transitions 65 lakh SHG (self-help group) women from microfinance participation to formal entrepreneurship and scalable venture creation.
It invites applications from manufacturing, food processing, agri-allied enterprises, services, handicrafts, and emerging sectors and will open on March 8, International Women’s Day.
The programme will be implemented across 33 districts of Telangana through a phased, decentralised outreach model that leverages SERP’s district- and block-level institutional network.
Anchored under the National Rural Livelihoods Mission Incubator Programme, the Challenge Fund will provide a comprehensive support ecosystem for entrepreneurs emerging from SHGs. This includes structured enterprise diagnostics, customised growth roadmaps, sector-specific mentorship, digital enablement, branding and market access support, as well as investment readiness and access-to-finance facilitation.
The initiative brings institutional depth, sectoral expertise, and grassroots reach onto a single platform to formalise and scale women-led SHG enterprises.
Within this framework, TBIS BITS Pilani will offer research-backed technical advisory support. T-Hub will tap into its network of 2,000+ startups and global partners to enable mentorship, market linkages, capital-readiness preparation, and long-term enterprise formalisation. Leveraging its statewide institutional partnerships and tested acceleration models, WE Hub will lead founder mobilisation and enterprise acceleration across districts, driving structured founder discovery, rigorous selection processes, and sustained, hands-on support.
Divya Devarajan (IAS), CEO, Society for Elimination of Rural Poverty (SERP) in Telangana, said, “At SERP, we see this as a catalytic step, moving beyond livelihood support toward structured enterprise development. By creating a dedicated funding and incubation pathway, we are building a stronger foundation for inclusive growth and positioning rural founders as integral to Telangana’s long-term economic trajectory.”
Sita Pallacholla, CEO, WE Hub, said, “Our experience in designing high-impact acceleration programmes for women across urban and rural geographies uniquely positions us to drive on-ground activation, sustained founder mentoring, and long-term enterprise formalisation under this Challenge Fund."