"It should be the endeavour of every party to improve the gender radio by saving the girlchild."
That is Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate on his website, explaining the scheme, Ladli Laxmi Yojana.
Called the Beti Bachao campaign, the BJP leader wants every schoolgoing girlchild to become a lakhpathi.
Advani said India can be empowered only by empowering Indian women. He paid tributes to Indian women by describing them as the personification of Devotion, Culture and Strength:
"Clearly, it is the moral duty as well as democratic responsibility of both Central and state governments to strive their utmost to remove gender imbalance and promote gender justice in every area of development," Advani wrote in his blog.
He reminded the electorate that empowerment of women was started by the BJP government in Madhya Pradesh in 2006.
"In a very short time, it has proved to be one of the most successful social welfare schemes in the history of the state, thanks to the political will and sustained personal attention that Chief Minister Shri Shivraj Singh Chauhan has brought to bear on its implementation," he claimed.
Dewelling on finer points of the implementation under the scheme, the state government buys savings certificates of Rs. 6,000 each year for five consecutive years for every girl born into a family. The girl gets Rs 2,000 after she completes Class V, another Rs. 4,000 after she completes Class XIII, Rs. 7,500 after she completes Class X, Rs 200 per month in her Class XI, and a lumpsum amount of Rs. 1,18,000 after she enters Class XII or, alternatively, attains the age of 18.
"It is my promise that, if elected to form the next government, the NDA will implement the Ladli Laxmi Yojana in every state. It will be our endeavour to make every girl in India a "lakhpati" by the time she attains maturity and is ready to enter a new phase in her life," he said.
