Maharashtra passes bill to recognise women as independent farmers
The Women Farmers’ Empowerment Bill grants women legal recognition as farmers regardless of whether they own land, according to The Hindu.
Maharashtra passed the Women Farmers’ Empowerment Bill in July 2026 to grant women independent recognition as farmers. The legislation allows for this recognition through a Woman Farmer Certificate, irrespective of land ownership.
According to The Hindu, this is the first Indian State legislation to provide an enforceable legal form to an activity-based, land-delinked definition of a farmer. This definition was previously set out in the 2007 National Policy for Farmers but was never operationalised.
The new Bill arrives nearly two decades after that national policy and 15 years after a comparable bill was introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2011, which subsequently lapsed.
The legislation is described as the culmination of three decades of women farmers’ movements supported by civil society organisations. It addresses a mismatch where women who work on farms and make agricultural decisions remain nearly invisible due to existing data collection and policy design.