Poverty

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It is a situation where people are unable to fullfill their basic necessities of
life. Basic necessities include food, clothing, housing, education and health
facilities. If these basic needs are not fulfilled the person is said to be poor.
In simple way we can say that poverty is hunger, poverty is lack of shelter,
poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor, poverty is not having
access to school and not knowing how to read and write.
Poverty is not having a job, is fear for future, poverty is losing a child to
illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of
representation and freedom.
MEASURES OF POVERTY
(i) Relative Poverty
(ii) Absolute Poverty
Relative Poverty
Relative poverty refers to poverty of people, in comparision to other
people, regions or nations.
Relative poverty is also interpreted in terms of inequality of income within
the country. In India 20 percent of low income group of people contribute
only 8% in national income and 20% of high income group of people
contribute 45.3 percent in National income.
e.g. Mohan income is lower as compared to Sohan hence we can say
Mohan is relatively poor.
Absolute Poverty
Absolute poverty is when household income is below a certain level,
which makes it impossible for the person or family to meet basis needs
of life including food, shelter, safe drinking water, education, healthcare
etc. Here people lives below poverty line.
(Poverty line is the level of income to meet the minimum living conditions.
In India (2012) 22% of its population lives below poverty line. In India,
persons who spent `816 on consumption in rural areas and `1000 in
urban areas per month are treated as those below poverty line.
The Planning Commission has defined poverty line on the basis of
recommended nutritional requirements of 2400 calories per person per
day for rural areas and 2100 calories per person per day in urban areas.)

The poverty line divides the poor from the non-poor

Absolutely Very Poor Not so Middle Upper The The Millionaires Billionaires
Poor Poor Poor Class middle rich very
class rich
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Categorising Poverty
1. Chronic Poor: It includes people who are always poor and those who are
usually poor.
2. Transient Poor: Transient poor may be classified as churning poor (who
regularly move in and out of poverty, like small farmers) and occassionally
poor (who are rich most of the time and poor some times).
3. Never poor: They are never poor.
Five states (Uttarapradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and
Odisha) account for about 70% of India’s poor. During 1973-74, about half
of the population in most of these large states was living below the poverty
line.)
CAUSE OF POVERTY
(i) Rise in Population: Population has been rising in India at a rapid
speed. This rise in mainly due to fall in death rate and rise in birth rate.
India’s population was 84.63 crores in 1991 and became 137 crores in
2019. This pressure of population proves barrier in the way of economic
growth.
(ii) High level of unemployment: Due to continuous rise in population,
there is chronic unemployment and under employment in India. There
is educated unemployment and disguised unemployment. Poverty is just
the reflectioin of unemployment.
(iii) Poor State of Agriculture: Government make various policies to increase
the productivity but still the agriculture in India shows backwardness
due to this most of the farmers lives below poverty line.
(iv) Lack of Capital: Capital is needed for setting up industry, transport and
other projects. Shortage of capital creates hurdle in development which
makes economy poor.
(v) Low literacy rate: Due to lack of knowledge and skill the weaker sections
of the society have to take up low paid jobs. There is unemployment in
both rural and urban sector.
(vi) Increase in price: The rise in prices has affected the poor badly due to
rise in price poor become more poor.
(vii) Low level of per capita income: The net national income is quite low
as compared to population. Increase in population is more than increase
in national income which reduces the per capita income. Low per capita
income shows low per person income.
(viii) Lack of infrastructure: Lack of infrastructure shows poverty because
people suffers due to low quality of education, health, transport,
communication etc., this low infrastructure stops people in earn more
and growth of the economy.
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Three Dimensions of Government approach to reduce poverty in India.

1. Growth-oriented Approach: It is based on the expectation that the
effects of economic growth would rapidly increase the gross domestic
product. Increase in GDP leads to increase in per capita GDP it means
availability of goods per person increased and per person income also
increased which helps to reduce poverty.
2. Poverty Alleviation programmes: In the third five year plan, govt.
has introduced a variety of poverty alleviation programmes to reduced
poverty.
3. Minimum Needs Programme: Third approach is to provide minimum
basic amenities to the people. Through this approach, programmes have
supplemented the consumption of the poor, generation of employment
opportunities and improvement in health and education. To improve the
food and nutritional status of the poor, govt. has started mid day meal
scheme.
*Poverty Alleviation Programmes in India
These are refers to tools such as free education, free school meals for
children, debt relief to small farmers, free healthcare facilities to poor
etc. To improve living conditions of the section of society which is
unable to fulfil even the basic necessities of life by the government and
internationally approved organisations.
The main aim of the government behind this programme is to reduce the
unemployment in the economy basically in rural areas. Govt. provides
various employment generation opportunities to poor people. These are
the “self-employment programmes” and “wage employment programmes”
by the government.
*Self-employment Programmes
1. Rural employment Generation Programme (REGP): To promote self
employment in rural areas and small towns, govt. has started this
programme. This was implemented by Khadi and Village industries
commission. Banks are also giving loans to set up small industries.
2. Prime Minister Rozgar Yojna (PMRY): It is being implemented since
1993. The scheme is designed to create and provide sustainable self
employment opportunities to one million educated unemployed youth
in the country during the eighth plan period. Government also provides
financial assistance to set up any kind of enterprise which creates
employment in the economy.
3. Swarna Jayanti Shahri Rozgar Yojna (SJSRY): SJSRY in India is a
centraly sponsored scheme which came into effect on 1st Dec. 1997.
The scheme provide gainful employment to the urban unemployed
and underemployed poor, through encouraging the setting up of self
employment ventures.
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This scheme is being implemented on a cost sharing basis between the

centre and the states in the Ratio of 75 : 25. Given the low allcations
for the scheme, only about 2 lakh urban poor under skill development
and 50,000 under self-employment are being benefitted under SJSRY
annually.
4. Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojna (SGSY): The aim of this scheme
was to provide employment in rural areas. It promotes micro enterprises
so that they can create employment opportunity in rural areas it is also
funded by the centre and the states in a ratio of 75 : 25 and is implemented
by commercial banks, regional banks and co-operative banks.
The scheme is established to help low-income families (also referred to as
swarozgaris) above the poverty line. The scheme facilitiates the formation
fo self-help groups (SHGs), who will be assisted on a loan-cum-subsidy
basis for undertaking income-generating activities. Under the scheme
half of the groups formed at the block level should be exclusively women
groups.
* Wage Employment Programme
1. Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojna (SGRY): It was a scheme launched
by the Govt. of India to gain the objective of providing gainful employment
for the rural poor. It provides additional and supplementary wage
employment and thereby provide food security and improve nutritional
levels in all rural areas.
Secondary objective of this scheme is to develop social and economic
infrastructure in rural area.
2. National Food for Work Programme (NFFWP): The national food for
work programme (NFFWP) 2004 was launched by Minister of rural
development, Central Govt. on November 14, 2004 in 150 of the most
backward districts of India with the objective of generating supplementary
wage employment about 20 lakh metric ton of food grains and `2020
crore were allocated for the programme during 2004-05. The objective
of the programme was to provide additional resources apart from the
resources available under the Swampoorna Gremeen Rozgar Yojna. The
scheme was 100 percent centrally sponsored.
(MGNREGA: Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act
2005 is an Indian labour law and social security meausre that aims to
guarantee the “right to work”. It also aims to enhance livelihood security
in rural areas by providing at least 100 days of wage employment in a
financial year to every household. In 2013-14, nearly five crore households
got employment opportunities under this law).
(PMJDY: Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yozna is a financial inclusion program
of Govt. of India which is applicable to 20 to 65 years of age group that
aims to expand and make affordable access to financial services such as
bank accounts, insurance and pensions. This was launched by the Prime
Minister of India Narendra Modi on 28 August 2014. He had announced
POVERTY 9

this scheme on his first independence day speech on 15 August 2014.

Government of India stated that people can get benefits of subsidies
directly in to their Bank Account. People also entitled `1,00,000 accident
insurance and `30,000 life insurance cover.)
EVALUATION OF POVERTY ALLEVIATIOIN PROGRAMMES
Positive Aspect
i. There has been a decline in the percentage of population below poverty
line from 55 percent in 1973-74 to 21.9 percent in 2011-12.
ii. Increase in income of poor people due to poverty alleviation programmes
people can earn more wages.
iii. Reduce unemployment in the economy.
Failure of Poverty Alleviation Programmes
i. Definition of ‘poor’ was not clear to many people due to this non poor
people also took advantages of the various schemes.
ii. Due to massive poverty, available resources is not sufficient to reduce
poverty.
iii. People who were living in remote areas are not able to take advantages of
these programme and government has not taken any step to provide any
kind of benefit to them.
iv. Lack of credit institutions, for set up micro industries people need finance
but very few financial institutions were there to help them.
v. PAPs have failed due to inefficient administration, staffs are not
responsible to their duties and there was no one to monitor the follow-up
action.
vi. There was lack of infrastructural facilities, such as roads, schools,
training center, IT, Communication etc. in backward areas which makes
it’s applicatioin difficult.