Tag: poverty : challenge facing india

The beneficiaries of Kutir Jyoti Scheme will have to pay the energy bills for energy utilised regularly as per the company's norms. The scheme has been started to light up BPL homes.

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) was notified on September 7, 2005. The objective of the Act is to enhance livelihood security in rural areas by providing at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work.

The Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) is a program of the Government of India launched in financial year 1978 and extended throughout India by 1980. It is a self-employment program intended to raise the income-generation capacity of target groups among the poor.

• The Public Distribution System in Tamil Nadu reduced poverty due to its coverage as well as pricing. Each family, whether below the poverty line or not, is entitled to 20 kg of rice at Re. 1 a kg. 
  
• To reduce poverty in Andhra Pradesh, white cards are issued to the households falling below the poverty line, to provide the subsidised rice. Thus number of people below poverty line declined during 1990's increasing white cards distribution.

The poverty line is estimated periodically once in five years, by conducting sample surveys. These surveys are carried out by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO).

NSSO is an organisation setup by the government to carry out surveys on socio-economic, demographic, agricultural and industrial subjects for collecting data from households and from enterprises located in villages and in the towns.

Land reform constitutes the measures to improve the economic con­dition of agricultural tenants in West Bengal. It aims at the redis­tribution of land-ownership in favour of the culti­vating class.

The results of the poverty alleviation programmes have been mixed. One of the major reasons for less effectiveness is the lack of proper implementation and right targeting. Moreover, there has been a lot of overlapping of schemes. Despite good intentions, the benefits of these schemes are not fully reached to the deserving poor. Therefore, the major emphasis in recent years is on proper monitoring of all.

The Planning Commission constituted an Expert Group under the Chairmanship of Professor S.R.Hashim for identification of BPL (Below Poverty Line) households in urban areas based on a threefold methodology of residential, social and occupational vulnerabilities.

The day is marked to raise awareness among the masses about the issues that affect the old people. It is also a way to acknowledge the contributions of the elderly to the society.

To check the poverty line, daily consumption of food is checked along with income and spending of an individual. The threshold for food consumption has been set to 2400 calories per day in rural areas below which the individual is considered as poor.