Poverty in a Developing Country essay

India is the modern state with five-millennia-old civilization, which has withstood many negative effects of time. The nation’s land area is 3.28 million square kilometers, making it the seventh major country in the globe, but it is much more than a simple vast country. With a 5,000 year old ancient culture, a multitude of tongues, a convergence of religions and communities of over a billion humans living together in unity, this nation is more than simply the land mass. It is the value system; an important cultural tapestry, whose structure is created on diversity and pluralism. This research paper is meant to discuss the effects of poverty on modern India. The paper provides the historical overview of the country, a discussion on the sociological and cultural makeup of India, a discussion of the issues that may be prevalent in the country, a discussion of things being done in this country in modern day to combat the specific issues and the future evolvement of India.

General Overview of India

The humans of India have had a permanent civilization after 2500 B.C.E., once residents of the Indus River valley evolved the urban culture based on goods exchange and sustained by the agricultural trade. Harappan Civilization, as it came to be recognized, declined approximately 1500 B.C.E., likely due to the ecological alterations. The current history of modern India starts with the arrival of the British people (Gama, 2009). The British Rule in the country lasted among 1858 and 1947. The British people though came as the trading organization – East India Company, gradually intruded into the administration steadily appointing Governor Generals and Viceroys who controlled the nation as deputies of English Queen. The final British Governor General of India was Lord Mountbatten.

Geographically, the nation occupies the central place in South Asia. Sharing the boundaries with Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, Bhutan and Nepal, Myanmar and Bangladesh, India extends from the Himalayas to the waters of the Indian Ocean, and from the desert sands of Rajasthan, to the solid forests of Arunachal Pradesh (Gama, 2009). Due to the nation’s size, the climate depends not merely on a season, but also the place. Generally, temperatures are cooler in the north, particularly among September and March. The south is coolest among November to January. In summer, winds and hot surface currents start to move westwards and northwards. It develops a phenomenon recognized as the south-west cloudburst, and it brings serious rains to the west shore. Among October and December, a similar climatic model called the north-east torrential rain appears in Bay of Bengal, taking rains to the eastern shore. Additionally, to the two torrential rains, there are two other seasons, autumn and spring.

With practically one billion people, India is the second most populous country in the globe. It is hard to discuss only one Indian culture, though there are profound cultural continuities, which link its citizens together. English is the main tongue of politics and trade, but there are 14 official languages in the nation. There are 24 tongues, which are spoken by one million individuals; and numerous dialects. India has seven main religions and lots of minor ones, six major ethnic communities, and countless holidays (Gama, 2009).

Religion is fundamental to local culture, and its practice may be observed in virtually each part of living in the nation. Hinduism is the major faith of India, serving nearly eighty percent of the populace. Ten percent practice Islam, and five percent are Christians and Sikhs; the rest (45 million people) are Buddhists, Bahai, Jains, and more (Gama, 2009).

Education in the country has the roots in the very old study of scriptures and Vedas by a religious class. Nalanda University in Patliputra was actually the initial crucial seat of the higher education in the state and saw a huge amount of foreign pupils. Western education came in India with the English and today Indian education follows an efficient structure starting from the initial standard up to standard four in primary school (Gama, 2009).

With some thousand years, the Indian culture may simply boast being one of the oldest and richest cultures that exist today. The Indian culture is mainly about following the traditions, about colorful and loud celebration of holidays, about moving to the England and USA for higher studies and also about the good study and practice of classical and folk music (Gama, 2009).

Indian Politics and Foreign Relations

India is the major democracy in the world and functions with the help of the bi-parliamentary system. Indian Republic is separated into states that have their own local assemblies some of which possess one or two houses. Two houses of the local parliament are named the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha. The Prime Minister is the leader of the main cabinet of ministers and administration whilst the President is a formal leader of the state (Gama, 2009).

The USA is India’s major investment partner, with a thirteen percent share. Additionally, India’s size, populace, and strategic location provide it with the important voice in worldwide affairs, and its developing economic strength, technical and scientific capacity, and military prowess, give it added weight. India is a leader of the evolving globe and the Non-Aligned Movement. India is today strengthening own commercial and political and relations with the USA, Japan, Iran, China, the EU, and Association of Southeast Asian Nations. India is the active participant of South Asian Association for the Regional Cooperation (Ashwani, 1981).

Indian Economy

The local economy is the twelfth major internationally if measured in terms of the USD. It has GDP of US one trillion dollars and GDP development level of nine percent for year 2006–2007. Nevertheless, India has a huge populace that has the per capita profits of $4,542 at PPP and $1,089 in the nominal terms (2007). Thus, India’s boasts one of the international fastest developing economies and although the country has averaged a yearly growth level of approximately nine percent, there is still a huge majority of the nation, which exists below the poverty line and has little advantage from the economic evolvement. One of the major challenges experienced by the Indian administration is to spread the reward of the economic accomplishment across all margins of the social order. It comes across as challenging assignment as it has been calculated the deficiency in the country is set to rise if its populace enlargement is not stopped in time. Moreover, the economic development is constrained by insufficient infrastructure, an unwieldy bureaucracy, work force market inflexibilities, corruption, the “reservation” of key goods for small-scale spheres, and high economic deficits (Ravallion & Datt, 1996).

The Problems of Poverty in India

Since nation’s independence, the subject of poverty in the country has preserved the huge concern. Consistent with the usual definition of poverty, once an individual may no longer meet the required degrees to maintain standard of existing, people are considered poor. This presupposes that in the nation alone there are nearly 220 million individuals exist below the poverty line. The poverty in the country is not identical everywhere; there is the sort of poverty and there is the harshness of poverty. India is a huge nation counting a vast amount of humans, all with dissimilar religions, political opinions and social standings – this united with the fact the distribution of wealth and sources is extremely unequal, presupposes dissimilar districts, and in at times peoples suffer more than the others. Some resources assert today practically 60% of the world’s poor call India home. It is also the state with the highest degree of starvation among kids under the age of 36 months: 46%. Youngsters are taken out of school at extremely young age (if they ever studied) and forced to work to support own families. The smallest of kids are picking rubbish piles removing plastic bottles or metal stuff. Girls in their teens are becoming prostitutes (Sen & Sengupta, 1983).

Urban Poverty in India

The poverty in India has the roots well-established in the culture and the troubles spread just as profound. Over crowding and deficiency have resulted in large man made slums, the major of which is in Mumbai. The water is rank; there is no works, no waste disposal, no healthcare organizations and practically no official hold up. There is little chance for education, so there is no finish to the scarcity cycle. The slums are influenced by usual outbreaks of malaria and typhoid and are ravaged by water deficiency and fires.

The phenomenal boost in the city populaces is one of the main causes of the urban poverty in the nation. The massive and comparatively recent boost is the outcome of huge migration of country families to the large cities. This relocation is mostly caused by poor working chances in villages and is worsened by a fact that there are not too much job chances in the cities as well (Ravallion & Datt, 1996). Thus, the major causes of urban poverty in India are:

• Improper preparation;
• Slow job development;
• Failure of PDS system;

Rural Poverty in India

Lots of factors are accountable for poverty in the rural districts of the nation. Rural populaces mainly depend on agriculture as the livelihood is highly dependant on monsoons and rain patterns. Inadequate rain and inappropriate irrigation facilities may cause low or even zero assembly of crops followed by the natural but at times disastrous repercussions, which usually follows (Ravallion & Datt, 1996).

A local family is usually very large, which may exacerbate the impacts of poverty. Also, a caste system that is still wide-spread in the nation is the main cause for rural scarcity for it keeps humans locked in the never-ending cycle with less facilities and chances for the lower castes (Ravallion & Datt, 1996). The administration has planned and realized poverty eradication programs. However, the advantages of all these programs have yet to achieve the center of the nation. Thus, some of the fundamental grounds of rural poverty in India are:

• Unequal distribution of profits;
• High populace development;
• Illiteracy;
• Huge family units;
• Caste system.

Effect of Poverty on the Development of a Child

It is a recognized fact the attitude of a youngster and the way it conducts, is determined during a kid’s formative years. In India it is usual sight to discover kids experiencing poverty during the first years are more prone to aggressive conduct. A traditional outcome – children end up with an attitude of obtaining everything not caring about the means but only the ends. Nobody except the circumstances of the child’s up bringing could be accused (Sen & Sengupta, 1983).

India is evidently ranked best in relation to the values and traditions. But one more part of westernization, which indirectly supports the poverty, is single motherhood. The mothers, not capable to bring up the kid with self-respect, thanks to the set up of the social order towards females, and the youngster exposed to mocking of his friends is adequate to bring up aggressive attitude in the child’s mind.

The most usual misinterpretation that could probably occur is that one main reason for poverty could be boost in the amount of school drop outs. Another manner of looking at it is that, education drop out is caused mainly due to the poverty. The current generation of kids is that they cannot value anything if the other individual is not from their circle of the social order. Many kids from lower rungs of the social order, once made to associate with youngsters from a usual back ground, are likely to be treated as the outcaste (Sen & Sengupta, 1983).

It is not the responsibility of a state to get it over loaded with moving humans from poverty all on the sudden. However, it may for sure, provide impact to the instruction principles of the policy of a state, that state has to take certain crucial steps to guarantee the tender period of youngsters is defended. Considering so many researches being submitted and with even a usual man’s approach it may fervently be contested poor financial circumstances and prolonged exposure to the kids may simply and more positively influence the mind of a kid.

India Antipoverty Programs

The administration has initiated, continued, and refined lots of programs after the independence to assist the poor get self-sufficiency in foodstuff production. Most likely the most vital initiative has been the supply of fundamental commodities, especially food at controlled prices, accessible throughout the nation. The poor spend 80 percent of income on food whilst the rest of the populace spends 60 percent (Suryanaryana, 1996).

In rural districts, the administration has undertaken programs to lessen the worst impacts of adverse monsoon rainfall that influences not merely farmers but rural artisans and traders once the cost of grain increases. The administration has supplied water by sponsoring well digging and, canceled land taxes for drought districts; attempted to keep stable costs for products; and provided foodstuff through the food-for-work program.

India has had lots of antipoverty programs since the early 1960s. These comprise, among others, Rural Landless Employ Guarantee Program and National Rural Employment Program. State governments are crucial participants in antipoverty programs. The constitution assigns accountability to the states in many matters, counting the ownership, redistribution, development, and taxation of land (Suryanaryana, 1996). State administrations put into practice most central programs concerned with the land reform and the state of affairs with small landless villagers. The basic administration attempts to create programs and norms among states and union areas, but accomplishment has usually remained at the lower bureaucratic degrees. In some issues about irrigation projects and subsoil rights, the central administration exerts financial and political influence to get its aims, but the states at times change or hinder the influence of central administration programs and policies.

Future of India

No vital reduction in poverty in the nation is achievable unless interventions for poverty lessening are intensified. The track record of dissimilar states in lessening the poverty is extremely varied. Whist some states were capable to achieve the substantial lessening in the incidence of scarcity, other states made less progress in scarcity decrease during the last decades.

Hunger is a more serious trouble in rural India and is especially severe in rural West Bengal, Kerala, Orissa, Assam and Bihar (Sen & Sengupta, 1983). Non-accessibility of two square meals daily peaks in the summer months with a longer duration, thus, suffering in Orissa and West Bengal. Several of the states are among those with the utmost income poverty. Nevertheless, hunger exists even in a little bit better parts of the nation and policy action is required to address this.

Wages provided to agricultural labor leave little surplus over cereal consumption for meeting foodstuff and non- foodstuff requirements. Fixation of minimum wages, their constant revisions and use of bargaining power to demand their effectual execution become very vital especially during slack season when salaries fall.

Chronic poverty appears to be excessively high among traditionally marginalized groups, for instance, scheduled castes, the elderly, scheduled tribes, females and the disabled (Suryanaryana, 1996). The multiple deprivations faced by these groups make it more complex for them to escape poverty as dissimilar types of drawbacks tend to be mutually strengthening.

The anti-poverty programmers of the administration of India are already created for generation of self-employment, wage employment and provision of safety nets through, for instance, food subsidy programs. Some of the schemes have experienced reforms, rationalization and much better targeting with greater role to local administration for execution and for beneficiary selection and monitoring. Reforms additionally lay stress on the transparency, making data concerning the programs public at village level, and on the significance of physical, social and financial audits (Suryanaryana, 1996). In a context of leakages and distraction of the funds meant for poverty decrease, it has to be recognized state failure or supremacy failure may be corrected if authorized communities are willing to put in the time and attempt required to demand accountability and transparency.

Conclusion

Religion, tongue and caste are the main determinants of political and social organization in India nowadays. However, the administration has made strong attempts to lessen the significance of caste through active positive action and social policies. Also, with more job opportunities in the private sphere and better opportunities of upward social mobility, the nation has started a social transformation in this area. The administration has recognized eighteen official languages; Hindi, the national tongue, is the most broadly used, though English is the national lingua franca. Though about eighty percent of all humans are Hindu, India also is a nation of nearly 130 million Muslims is one of the international largest Muslim populaces. The citizens also include Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, and Parsis. The Hindu caste system reproduces local occupational and collectively defined hierarchies.

Although India boasts of the extremely high economic evolvement, it is shocking there is still a large scale scarcity in the nation. Poverty in the state may be defined as the state of affairs when the certain sections of humans are not capable to accomplish their fundamental requirements. India has the international major number of poor people existing in one nation. Out of the total populace of more than one billion, up to 400 million humans are living below the poverty line. Approximately 75 percent of the poor humans are in rural districts, most of them are landless laborers, daily wagers, and freelance house holders. There are many causes for poverty in the state. Poverty in India may be classified in two categories – rural and urban poverty.

The steps taken by administration to stop urban poverty are, for instance, Urban Basic services for the poor Program and National social Assistance Program. However, these processes may be useful only if the policies go to those individuals for whom it is created. The clash among the central administration and the state administration usually results in the absence of execution of the policies. Thus, it is extremely crucial the administrations do not play power politics once it comes to a severe matter such as scarcity.