What is the aim of Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yojana?

Option A is correct. Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yojana, launched in 2000, was built around meeting primary rural needs: health, education, rural shelter, drinking water, rural roads, electrification and nutrition. It was a response to the gap in Basic Minimum Services in villages, and its funds were routed through states to district and panchayat level implementers.

• B is wrong: poverty alleviation through micro enterprises and credit was the domain of SGSY, later restructured into NRLM. PMGY was not an enterprise scheme.
• C is wrong: rural employment was the mandate of schemes like JRY and later MGNREGA. Employment may follow from rural works, but it is not PMGY's stated aim.
• D is wrong: strengthening Panchayati Raj is a constitutional and institutional matter under the 73rd Amendment (1992). PMGY used panchayats as implementers, not as its goal.

Core concept: Basic Minimum Services and their delivery gap in rural India. Mains angle: whether social sector schemes should be needs-based (services) or income-based, a recurring theme in GS-II and GS-III.

Note: PMGY has since been restructured and its components folded into other programmes, so verify the current status before quoting it.

Trap: candidates pick C because most rural schemes are seen as employment schemes, but PMGY is a basic services scheme.