Banks have slotted special loan schemes for businesswomen. But do these offer better benefits than the regular loans?

Raising capital has always been a key issue with women entrepreneurs since banks are usually wary of giving long-term loans to women as they tend to question the continuity of their earnings.

The Government of India therefore drew up a 14-point action plan to help empower women. So now we have several banks offering various loan schemes for women. But the question really is: Are these women-specific schemes better than the regular ones?

Few banks offer such loans with big extra benefits. In many cases, the features differ very slightly from regular loans. The Oriental Bank of Commerce, for instance, offers Oriental Mahila Vikas Yojana.

The scheme works like a regular loan, the only difference being that a moratorium period of 12 months may be allowed before the repayment begins. A moratorium period is the time frame during which the borrower does not have to pay any instalments.