Title:
E-GOVERNANCE IN WOMEN EMPOWERMENT: A STUDY ON SME ENTREPRENEURS IN SYLHET CITY

Authors:
Dr. Fatema Khatun and Priya Akther, Bangladesh

Abstract:
Nowadays E-governance is playing an important role in every sector of a country. It has a great contribution in women Empowerment. The study “E-governance in Women Empowerment: A Study on SME Entrepreneurs in Sylhet City” tries to finds out the role of E-governance in Women Empowerment. The main purpose of the study is to analyse the role of e-governance in women empowerment. The study is done on women SME Entrepreneurs of Sylhet city. The study identified how Women SME Entrepreneurs are ensuring their development and progress by using the benefits of E-governance. This study also identified the factors that contribute to the empowerment, opportunities, and shortcomings of SME women entrepreneurs. The study has been conducted in the Sylhet city of Bangladesh. Here open-ended questions for the qualitative method and survey questionnaires for the quantitative method are used here. For data collection, non-probability sampling, where snowball sampling has been chosen due to the unavailability of willing participants, Quantitative data analysis has been done through percentage analysis using the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS), and qualitative data has been analysed through thematic analysis. The outcomes have been shown through tabulations, graphs, charts, and figures. Based on the collected data, the study's findings suggest that entrepreneurs have curiosity and trust in e-governance and most of them belief that e-governance ensures their empowerment both in family and society. The study findings also indicate that e-governance can play crucial role in fulfilling the 5th (gender equality) goal of the SDG. Though entrepreneurs have faced some problems, like income generation, lack of capital, obstacles from family, and others, they have hope to overcome all these gradually. Findings also suggest that the empowerment of women makes their opinions more valuable.