Topics in the Chapter

• Overview
• Introduction
• Poverty as seen by social scientists
• Poverty Line
• Poverty Estimates
• Inter-State Disparities
• Global Poverty Scenario
• Causes of Poverty
• Anti-Poverty Measures
• The Challenges Ahead

Overview

(i) Poverty as a challenge faced by independent India.

(ii) Poverty in social sciences.
(iii) Concept of Poverty line.
(iv) Causes of poverty
(v) Anti-poverty measures taken by the government
(vi) Official concept of poverty into human poverty

Introduction

• Poverty can be defined as lack of daily requirements of livelihood

like food, clothing, education etc.

• The poor could be landless labourers in villages or people living in

overcrowded jhuggis in urban areas.
• Every 4th person in India is poor. India has the largest single
concentration of the poor in the world.

Poverty as seen by Social scientists

(i) Social Exclusion

(ii) Vulnerability

• Social exclusion: For analysis of poverty, social exclusion is very

useful. As per this concept poverty must be seen in terms of the poor
liviving only in a poor surrounding with other poor people.
• Vulnerability: Vulnerability describes the greater probability of
being more adversely affected than other people, which is done due to
earthquake or simply a fall in the availability of jobs.
Measurement of vulnerability to poverty describe the greater
probability of certain communities i.e., members of a backward caste
or individuals i.e. a widow or a physically handicapped person.

• Poverty Line: Poverty line is a way which is used to identify the

poor. It is a method used to measure poverty. In this method poverty is
measured with the help of consumption and income level of the
people.
• If the level of income and consumption falls below the minimum
level of income and consumption of this line, then the person is
considered to be poor.

Poverty Estimates

• Economic Survey 2011–12, Ministry of Finance, Government of

India

The poverty ratio in the year 1973 is 55 per cent and 30 per cent in
2009-10 which shows decline in the poverty ratios. Poverty ratios
further came down to about 26 per cent in 2000 and 36 per cent in
1994.

Therefore, the poverty ratio is continuously decreased from 1974 to

2000.

Vulnerable Groups

• In India, proportion of people below poverty line is also not same

for all social groups and economic categories.

• Scheduled caste and scheduled tribe households are vulnerable to

poverty in social groups.

• In same direction rural agricultural labour households and the urban

casual labour households are vulnerable to poverty in economic
categories.

Global Poverty Scenario

World Development Indicators 2012, The World Bank.

• Through huge investments in human resource development and

rapid economic growth poverty is substantially decreased in China
and Southeast Asian countries.

• In china number of poors has come down from 85 per cent in 1981
to 14 per cent in 2008.

• In Asian countries i.e India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan,

Pakistan despite decline in the percentage of the poor the decline has
not been rapid.

• In India, poverty is higher than the national estimates. It is done

because of different poverty line definition.

• In Latin America the ratio of poverty has declined from 11% in 1981
to 6.4 per cent in 2008.

Causes of Poverty

(i) Low growth rate

During the British colonial administration, the rate of growth was

very low which was the basic cause of poverty.

(ii) Discouragement of development of industries and handicrafts

Products

• Discouragement of development of industries and handicrafts

Products is one historical reason of poverty. The policies of the
colonial government discourage development of industries, like
textile industries which is the basic source of income of the poor. An
uneducated person can easily get job in this type of industries as
labour and sustains his livehood.

• Discouragement of handicrafts Products is also a major causes of

poverty, during the British colonial administration. The households
can easily earn money by the way of to produce handicrafts products.

(ii) High growth rate of population

The population is increasing instead of low level of income. Which
becomes cause of poverty.

(iii) Huge income inequalities

There are huge income inequalities between have or have not. For this
term, huge income inequalities makes it difficult to properly
implement the poverty elimination policies of government.
Therefore , it is the major cause of poverty.

(iv) Lack of land resources

Lack of land resources is the also major cause of poverty. Incomes of

the villagers are fully based on agriculture income and lack of land
resources creates low level of agriculture income which becomes the
major cause of poverty.

Anti-Poverty Measures

• Anti-poverty strategy of the government is based broadly on two

plank:

(i)Promotion of economic growth

(ii)Targeted anti-poverty programmes

(i)Promotion of economic growth

• According to official poverty estimation, the growth rate jumped

from the average of about 3.5 percent a year in the 1970s to about 6
percent during the 1980s and 1990s. With the help of high rate of
growth, reduction of poverty is possible.

• It shows a link between poverty reduction and economic growth.

Therefore, promotion of economic growth helps to reduce poverty.

(ii)Targeted anti-poverty programmes

• National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)

It was launched in September 2005 and it provides 100 days assured

employment every year to every rural household in 200 districts.
Later, the scheme will be extended to 600 districts. One third of the
proposed jobs would be reserved for women. In this Act if an
applicant is not provided employment within fifteen days, then he/she
will be entitled to a daily unemployment allowance. The central
government and state governments will also establish National
Employment Guarantee Funds and State Employment Guarantee
Funds for implementation of the scheme.

• Prime Minister Rojgar Yojana (PMRY)

Prime Minister Rozgar Yozana (PMRY) was launched on 2nd

October, 1993. The objective of the programme is to create self-
employment opportunities for educated unemployed youth in rural
areas and small towns. It also helped in setting up small business and
industries.

• Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY)

This programme was launched on 1st April, 1999. The objective of

this programme is to help rural people to organise themselves into self
help groups by the way of promoting enterprises at the village level.
This programme helps to exist poor families above the poverty line.
In this programme the government provides subsidy and bank credit
to the rural people for generating the income.

• Rural Employment Generation Programme (REGP)

This programme was launched in 1995. The target of this programme

is to provide 25 lakh new jobs to the rural and small towns persons
under the Tenth Five Year plan.

• Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yozana (PMGY)

This programme was launched in 2000. The objective of this

programme to develop standard of living of the rural people by the
way of focus in five critical areas i.e primary health, primary
education, rural shelter, rural drinking water and rural electrification.

• Sampoorna Grameen Rojgar Yojana (SGRY)

This programme was launched in september , 2001.The Employment

Assurance Schemes and JGSY would be merged with SGRY.The aim
of the programme is to provide wage employment and to create
durable community, social and economic assets.

The Challenges Ahead

• Poverty reduction remains India’s most compelling challenge
despite the progress. Because of unequal distribution of income,
increase in population etc.

• The positive situation can be done by the way of higher economic

growth, increasing stress on universal free elementary education,
declining population growth, increasing empowerment of the women
and the economically weaker sections of society, providing health
care, education and job security.

• Unemployment: Unemployment is a situation where a person have

not job despite of he/she able to do job. It is a big cause of poverty.
Unemployment is also a situation of being joblessness when people
are in condition of without job and in situation of seeking job during
recession.

• It is a sign of poverty, where an individual is unemployed. It is a loss

of human resourses to the nation and stigma to the society.

• Child labour: Child labour is a situation where a child is employed

for earning money. Which is mentally, physically and socially
dangerous and harmful for the childern. Child labour is a basic
problem of poverty. Because of doing work, child can not be lliterate
and he/she is unable to make his/her future.

• The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 defines a

child as any person who has not completed his fourteenth year of age.

• According to International labour Organization (ILO), the term

‘child labour’ is often defined as work that deprives children of their
childhood, their potential and their dignity, and that is harmful to
physical and mental development.

• Illiteracy: Illiteracy is the condition where a person unable to read

and write. In India Illiteracy is a major problem of poverty.