Poverty is perhaps the most stubborn and hardest to eliminate out of the many afflictions and adversaries which humans have to fight. India recognized the challenge of poverty and made its removal the central aim of its economic planning. Yet, it is also distressingly true that our efforts have met with a limited degree of success than what was originally anticipated. Regardless of which figure one chooses for drawing the poverty line, a quarter of India’s population still live in the abject poverty.
For the first decade and a half after independence in 1947, it was widely believed that growth would automatically reduce and eliminate poverty. But, by the end of the 1960s, it had become evident that growth alone was not enough, and the active state intervention through re-designed as well as new policies of income and asset redistribution was necessary. However, thanks to some very Indian complexities, social, cultural and governmental, by the end of the 1980s, the focus once again shifted to growth.
The rate of GDP growth in India spurted to 9 per cent, making it the second-fastest growing economy in the world, after China. But at the same time, the outcome of this growth has not necessarily been pro-poor and the result is a heightened degree of social unrest, mostly in the countryside. In nutshell, even the basic subsistence needs of millions of people are not being met.
The key question before the Indian state therefore remains that how to fight poverty, how can India mix and match internationally consistent macroeconomic policies with suitable microeconomic ones. The answer lies in internalizing the problems encountered by anti-poverty programmes and designing an effective framework to eliminate these problems faster to ensure an effective pro- poor growth. Asymmetric information and lack of transparency and accountability add to the problem and should also be addressed adequately. One of the most important causes underlying chronic poverty is poor access and connectivity. However, access, connectivity, transport links, have not received the attention that is due to them and though, of late this has been accorded priority but the same is required to be addressed more vigorously.
It may, however, be mentioned that the poverty reduction process in India is quite complex. Although, at the macro-level, it may not be very difficult to identify an inverse correlation between economic growth and poverty reduction, the picture at the micro-level is quite disparate and heterogeneous. This is owing to web of deeply ingrained social, political and structural factors which have a very large bearing on the pro-poorness of development policy, in general, and on the efficacy of the economic growth, in particular.
In view of the much-felt need for assessing the pro-poorness of economic growth, there is need to examine whether the economic growth in India has actually been accompanied by a commensurate improvement in economic and social inequality.
The second element of India’s poverty reduction strategy is the targeted poverty alleviation programmes. The rationale for introducing the targeted programmes for the poor came to the fore in the late 1960s when the government policies had to face severe criticisms because the much anticipated benefits of economic growth was not percolating to the poor and the disadvantaged. The targeted poverty alleviation programmes are basically supply-side interventions on the part of the state in response to the needs of the poor and the disadvantaged.
However, most often, these interventions fail to reach the intended beneficiaries as they are not demand-driven. The problems get further compounded with asymmetric information, lack of transparency and accountability and non-participatory nature of functioning of these programmes. In order to identify the key factors that are impending the pro-poorness in delivery of outcomes of these programmes, it is to be verified that whether there are any problems in identification of the poor and disadvantaged and the poverty alleviation programmes specifically targeted to the poor and disadvantaged irrespective of their caste, class, religion, and gender. Are the financial allocations adequate to meet the needs of the intended beneficiaries of the targeted programmes? Are the implementation mechanisms and delivery systems appropriate, transparent, effective and participatory?
The notion of poverty that has been used in targeted poverty alleviation programmes in India is primarily based on low income or purchasing power. Any discussion on poverty and its alleviation would remain incomplete if one fails to take note of the development literature that emerged in 1980s. This body of literature primarily evolved around the notion of ‘capability’ pioneered by Prof. Amartya Sen. Prof Sen argued that the basic purpose of development is to enlarge people’s choices so that they can live the life they value.Â
This recognition of the multi-dimensionality of poverty also brought to the fore the need for complementing targeted income poverty alleviation strategy with special programme for building the capabilities of the poor and disadvantaged. Though many schemes have been brought, but much more is still required to be done.
