PATNA, Sept. 8 -- Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday launched the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana, a plan that seeks to help one woman from each family to start business with financial assistance from the state government. As per the module of the scheme, the woman would be provided an initial corpus to launch an enterprise and after assessment of her business model, she would be given Rs.2 lakh to expand it. The scheme, according to officials, will begin this month itself. The state cabinet had already approved the plan. Janata Dal (United) leaders termed the scheme as an extension of programmes for women's empowerment by making them financially independent through entrepreneurship. The CM, flanked by both deputy CMs Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha and state's parliamentary affairs minister Vijay Kumar Choudhary, launched the portal for filing application online and flagged off 250 publicity vehicles to spread the message across the state so that all eligible women could avail the benefits. For women in rural areas, who may have difficulty in applying online for the scheme, offline applications would also be accepted. The main objective of the scheme, said JD(U) minister Vijay Kumar Choudhary, is to boost the state's rural economy for self-reliance through large-scale participation of women in income-generating activities. With Nitish Kumar seen as the main beneficiary of women votes due to a slew of affirmative actions for them, all the parties have this time promised different schemes to woo the "caste-neutral" lot, as they have consistently outnumbered men in vote count over the last couple of decades. RJD leader Tejashwi Prasad Yadav has promised "Mai-Bahin Samman Yojana" within a month of the formation of his government, under which women will get Rs.2,500/month. The party has also started circulating forms for women to fill up, drawing attack from the JD-U minister Vijay Kumar Choudhary, who described it "unethical". The Congress launched 'Mahila ki Baat, Congress ke Saath' campaign with a promise to include women's needs in its election manifesto and Rs.2,500 per month. Jan Suraj Party has announced that it would give 40 of the 243 seats it would contest to women and loan to women at 4% for livelihood and entrepreneurship. A senior party leader said that it would also come up with a financial scheme soon. Choudhary, however, said that the Opposition parties had a problem of seeing everything from the prism of election, as they could not insightfully assess the empowerment initiatives of Nitish government for women over the years, which manifested in more ways than one....