'Cash transfers targeted at women may advance gender-related SDGs but carry political and fiscal costs.' Discuss with examples.

Unconditional Cash Transfers (UCTs) to women — cash paid with no behavioural condition attached — have become India's fastest-growing welfare instrument. Twelve States are set to spend about ₹1.68 lakh crore on them in 2025-26, against just two States in 2022-23 [1]. They deliver real gender gains, but their fiscal and political costs are equally real.

Gains for gender-related SDGs

• Recognition of unpaid work: SDG Target 5.4 seeks to recognise and value unpaid care and domestic work through social protection policies [2]; a monthly transfer to the woman head of household is precisely such a policy instrument.
• Financial agency: payments flow by DBT into women's own Aadhaar-linked accounts, as under Tamil Nadu's Magalir Urimai Thogai and Madhya Pradesh's Ladli Behna [1], strengthening intra-household bargaining power and account usage.
• Income floor: unconditional design avoids the exclusion that compliance conditions impose on the poorest, supporting SDG 1 and SDG 10.

Fiscal costs

• Crowding out capital spending: the Economic Survey notes every rupee of transfer is a rupee unavailable for roads, power, health and education infrastructure [3].
• Deteriorating balances: six of the twelve States running UCTs project a revenue deficit in 2025-26; excluding these schemes, Karnataka's Gruha Lakshmi spending alone turns a 0.3% revenue surplus into a 0.6% deficit of GSDP [1].
• Rising commitment: Assam and West Bengal raised allocations by 31% and 15% over the previous year [1] — a recurring, non-reversible charge.

Political costs

• Ratchet effect: once households depend on transfers, withdrawal or freezing becomes politically impossible, locking future governments in.
• Competitive welfarism: parties out-bid one another on amounts, converting welfare into an auction while electoral returns remain uncertain.

Cash transfers are thus a genuine step towards SDG 5, not a substitute for it. The way forward is to cap such outgo as a share of revenue receipts, index it transparently, and pair it with childcare, skilling and care infrastructure — so that recognition of women's unpaid work matures into their redistribution and reduction, which Target 5.4 ultimately demands.