Poverty: The high incidence of poverty in India is a result of both high population growth rate and slow economic growth as both lead to high unemployment.

Poverty is the state of having little or no money, things or stuff or means of support or resource.  It is the condition of being poor. There are different types of poverty in the world such as – same degree poverty, absolute poverty, relative poverty and subjective poverty. Absolute poverty is the case where people lack basic human needs. Absolute poverty is the worst type of poverty.

There are many reasons and causes of poverty; they are overpopulation, the unequal distribution in world economy, inability to meet high standards of living, high cost of living, inadequate employment and education opportunities, environmental degradation, and certain economic and demographic trend and welfare incentives.

The main causes of Poverty in India are –

1)      Rapidly Rising Population – For the past 45 years the population rate has been increased 2.2% per annum. That is like 17 million people are added to every year to the population. This increases the demand for goods and there will be an increase in rate of consumption.

2)      Low Productivity in Agriculture – There is a lack of productivity in agriculture because there is lack of capital, use of traditional methods of cultivation and illiteracy. This is India’s main cause for poverty.

3)      Under Utilized Resources - Because of under employment and disguised unemployment of human resources, there is low production in the agricultural sector. this brings down the standard of living.

4)      Low Rate of Economic Development – The rate of economic development in India has been below the required level.  This leads to a gap between level of availability and requirements of goods and services.  This results in poverty

5)      Price Rise – Continuous rise in the price has been added to the miseries of poor. Here the lower income group finds it difficult to get the minimum needs. They even find it difficult to get their basic needs or get shelter to live under.

6)      Unemployment - This is main reason behind the poverty caused in India. There are more people seeking and wanting to jobs than the opportunities that are available.

7)      Shortage of Capital – this help in accelerating the growth. But since there not much supply the increase in production significantly a short supply.

8)      Social Factors - The social set up is still backward and is not helpful for faster development. Laws of inheritance, caste system, traditions and customs are putting hindrances in the way of faster development and have aggravate the problem of poverty.

9)      Political Factors – the British started the irregular development in India. It reduced the Indian economy to colonial state. They have exploited India’s natural resources to suit with their interests and weaken the industrial base of Indian economy. Now after the independence, India has developmental plans and is being guided by the political interests. Therefore the planning a failure to tackle the problems of poverty and unemployment.

Rural Poverty India –

There are many factors that are responsible for poverty in rural areas of India. The rural population mainly depends on agriculture as their livelihoods which again high depends on rain and monsoon patterns.  When there is no proper rain and no proper materials or facilities for irrigation there will be a cause in low or zero production of  crops  followed sometimes by the catastrophic  repercussions which often follows.

The families in India are mostly large, they maybe even in a joint families.  This can also make it worse and effect of poverty. The caste system which is till India is a major reason for rural poverty for it keeps people locked in the endless cycle of less facilities and opportunities for the lower castes. The government has planned to eradicate poverty through different programs but all this work at later time.

Urban Poverty in India –

The phenomenal increase in the city populations is one of the main reasons for the urban poverty in India. The massive and relatively recent increase is a result of major migration of rural families to cities. This migration is mainly caused by poor employment opportunities in villages and is exacerbated by the fact that there are few job opportunities in the cities as well.

The Slums of India –

The poverty in India has its roots fixed in the culture and the problems spread just as deep. The slums in India are caused due to mass overcrowding and extreme deprivation. The largest slum in India is in Mumbai. In the slum you can find miles and miles of rubbish, mangled iron, human excrement and open sewers form what millions of people call home. The water is rank, there is no waste disposal, no jobs, no healthcare and little support. There is little opportunity for education so there is no end to the poverty cycle. The slums are affected by frequent outbreaks of cholera, typhoid and malaria and are often ravaged by water shortages and wild fires.

Poverty Reduction in India –

The UNDP Global Human Development Report 2011 ranked India as 134 out 187 countries that UN recognized territories. According to the report India continues to record the impressive growth rates, poverty remains widespread and disparities deeply establish. The Government of India recent estimates suggest that 37 percent of the population still live below the poverty line. Poverty line is the estimated minimum level of income needed to secure the necessities of life. the UNDP works as a partnership between the Central, State Government and Civil Society organizations to enhance the effectiveness of national poverty reduction and livelihood programmed and build partnerships that enable disadvantaged communities o improve skills and diversify to non- farm activities.

The UNDP fosters partnerships to enable deprived households to improve skills. This will help in access to credit, financial services and markets. they support livelihood plans in agriculture , forestry, fishers, land resource development, rural tourism and handicrafts.

Livelihood Missions

UNDP promotes innovative institutional mechanisms that can strengthen links between the poor and the market such as the Rajasthan Mission on Skill and Livelihoods and the Jharkhand State Livelihoods Mission, which has benefited nearly 350,000 people in these two states. 

Empowering Women in India –

The UNDP is aiming to an advance social inclusion by promoting relationships among men and women, different groups and individuals within communities so that all identify with the belongingness to a community. The women in India, this is a challenge in particular complex.. Forty-nine percent of the poor are women and 96 percent of the women work in the informal economy. The 11th Five-Year Plan (2008-12) points out that “gender inequality remains a pervasive problem and structural changes are having an adverse effect on women.” UNDP in India with support from the IKEA Foundation adopts an integrated approach to achieve social, economic, and political empowerment of 50,000 women in 500 villages across eastern Uttar Pradesh. The project has now been scaled up to reach out to 2.2 million women and their families across four states – Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

The main focus now in India is to eradicate poverty. The only possible way to eradicate poverty is by having a proper government India who would with this issue. To have drastic change and growth in the Indian economies. To be able to give work opportunities and support of the some of the families that are at poverty line, Help them till they are able stand on their own legs, and lets them go. The government and other organization must start making laws that help change India. They must support people in any possible way they can to help the country come out of poverty. They must guide the people and send children to school so that there is better future. 

Maya Chandrashekaran

FSLE-3

Socio-economic reasons for Poverty in India with reference to Agriculture

India is still in the developing stages. The major issues hindering the development in India are- Poverty, lack of education, corruption, unsteady industrial growth, bad legislation and so on. The others are quite eradicable if adequate measures are taken. Poverty is not a petty problem. Maximum population comes from rural areas and therefore poverty is something which would be very difficult to eradicate.

Agriculture is India’s major occupation. The economy is striving on the agricultural produce and its export. But the incidence of poverty is on a persisting high due to backward agriculture. The production per hectare and per capita is very low. This is not only because of over-population but also because of very low production which is only about 60% of the world average.

State of Punjab has the productivity potential equivalent to that of the developed countries. If India is to attain the same productivity potential as of Punjab, its production would be more than double than what it is today. If the vast untapped potential of the Indian agriculture, the amount and quality of scientific knowledge and the positive response of the farmers, neither Indian agriculture should remain backward nor our people should be the poorest in the world.

India has about 40 million ha of land which lies unutilised. We still depend on natural resources to grow our crops. Farmers still rely on rains as the source of water. They cannot afford irrigation to supply water to their crops. Due to lack of awareness and education, they do not benefit from the various schemes of the government. Thus, the condition of agriculture remains backward no matter the kind of steps that are taken to develop it.

Due to this dependability, the production is of very low quantity and quality. Thus, the farmers lose a large share of crops in destruction. They are forced to sell the crops at a much lower costs which hardly recover their capital. Most of them incur losses leading to bad debts and increased credits. This results in more and more poverty among already poverty struck areas.

Considering rate of agricultural growth, the factors determining its distribution across farm sizes, its impact on tenancy conditions, its effect on the demand for labour, etc, the increase in poverty is just massive as all these factors get affected with backward agriculture. The growth of agricultural output has only just kept pace with the growth of the rural population which results in stagnation in output per head.

If a regression analysis is done between the incidence of poverty and agricultural performance, we find that improved agricultural performance is definitely associated with reductions in the incidence of poverty. Fluctuation in poverty incidence simply mirrors the movement in agricultural production per head and this inverse relationship is even more firmly identifiable when account is taken of the lags involved. 

The evidence on the relationship between rural poverty and agricultural performance is more difficult to evaluate for two reasons. In the first place, the evidence itself is somewhat mixed. Much depends upon the level of aggregation at which the analysis if conducted with the all-India results presenting a somewhat different picture from that obtained at the level of individual states. Furthermore, the evidence necessarily is difficult to interpret since we are implicitly searching for causal relationships in what are at best observed correlations. 

Maya Chandrashekaran

FSLE -3