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The workfare scheme, the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), and the direct food subsidy programme, the Targeted Public Distribution Scheme (TPDS), represent two social safety nets instituted in India as anti-poverty measures. This paper examines whether from the point of view of individual households the two programmes are substitutes or complements, as this will shed light on the appropriateness of the design of the two programmes. Based on primary household data collected for the Indian states of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh (MP), we show that, in Rajasthan, a large percentage of households consider TPDS and NREGS programmes to be substitutes for each other, while in MP the households often perceive the two programmes as complements. Thus it appears that the two programmes are better designed in MP since an incentive for participation in one programme has desirable side effects on participation in the other. Correlates of participation in the two states are identified and the paper advances several policy conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Despite accelerated growth there is pervasive hunger, child undernutrition and mortality in India. Our analysis focuses on their determinants. Raising living standards alone will not reduce hunger and undernutrition. Reduction of rural/urban disparities, income inequality, consumer price stabilization, and mothers’ literacy all have roles of varying importance in different nutrition indicators. Somewhat surprisingly, public distribution system (PDS) do not have a significant effect on any of them. Generally, child undernutrition and mortality rise with poverty. Our analysis confirms that media exposure triggers public action, and helps avert child undernutrition and mortality. Drastic reduction of economic inequality is in fact key to averting child mortality, conditional upon a drastic reordering of social and economic arrangements. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The objective of this analysis is mainly to construct an intuitive measure of the performance of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) in India. The focus is on divergence between demand and supply at the district level. Some related issues addressed are: (i) whether the gap between demand and supply responds to poverty; and (ii) whether recent hikes in NREGS wages are inflationary. Our analysis confirms responsiveness of the positive gap between demand and supply to poverty. Also, apprehensions expressed about the inflationary potential of recent hikes in NREGS wages have been confirmed. More importantly, higher NREGS wages are likely to undermine self-selection of the poor in it. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article reports on mean consumption, poverty (all three FGT measures) and inequality during 2004 for rural India using National Sample Survey (NSS) data for the 60th Round. Mean consumption at the national level is much higher than the poverty line. However, the Gini coefficient is higher than in recent earlier rounds. The headcount ratio is 22.9 per cent. Mean consumption, all three measures of poverty and the Gini coefficient are computed at the level of 20 states and 63 agro-climatic zones in these 20 states. It is surmised that despite impressive growth rates deprivation is pervasive, pockets of severe poverty persist, and inequality is rampant. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

As part of the structural adjustment programme the Government of India, in 1997, introduced the Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) with the objective of targeting the food subsidies to the poor and reducing fiscal deficit. While the universal Public Distribution System (PDS) had several limitations, the Targeted PDS has only worsened the problem of 'adequate access to food' for the poor. This article examines the limitations of income targeting based on the official poverty line under the TPDS. The article argues that the TPDS has worked counter-productively to the policy objective of reaching the poor. As per the National Sample Survey (1999-2000) and the National Family Health Survey (1998-9), a significant proportion of the poor and food insecure suffer from severe malnutrition and calorific deprivation. With a large section of the population falling out of the TPDS the article suggests policy alternatives to ensure better 'access to food' for the poor and vulnerable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]