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1.The situation chronic hunger is widespread in India.

2. The energy is measured in kilocalories (k.cal.).

3. The national calorie standard was established as 2,400 and 2,100 k.cal. per day for rural and urban areas

4. Hunger is not just painful to bear, it is also destructive.

5. Chronic hunger and calorie deficiency are related to undernourishment.

6. Constant hunger weakens the immune system.

7. The most important contributor to poverty is the lack of regular employment.

8.  More than 50% of people in India, still depend upon agricultural activities for their livelihood.

1. 27.7%

2. Food Corporation of India (FCI) 

3. Yashaswini.

4. Sandhya Suraksha Yojana.

5. at minimum support prices and Buffer stock operation.

The condition in which people are deprived of their fundamental needs like food, clothing, shelter, education and health is called poverty.

Food, clothing, shelter, education, and health are the basic requirements of human beings,

The act of purchasing food grains and making them available for public distribution is called buffer stock operations.

Unequal distribution of income is termed as one of the most important factors for poverty in India. Many programmes and schemes have been initiated to overcome these, but still, no such scheme has proven effective enough to overcome these signs of poverty. In the year 2004-05, the contribution of 20% rich people in the national income was 45.3%, and the contribution of rural people was only 8.1 %. In this way, on one hand, unequal distribution of income depicts poverty, and on the other hand, it also broadly impacts the spread and depth of poverty.

Unequal distribution of land and property:

Before and during the British in India, systems like Zamindari and land ownership were wide spread. As a result, land lied with handful of people like zamindars.

• Zamindars were neither directly associated with land cultivation nor had any interest to invest in agricultural sector. So the real cultivators i.e. farmers became landless and zamindars became land owners.
• The landless farmers had to then work in their own land as tenants and so they had no motivation of work.
• All such factors resulted in poverty among farmers.

1. Per capita household consumption expenditure is the amount of income households spend for the consumption of various goods and services. It is calculated on the basis of market price of durable goods like cars, television, refrigerator, washing machine, etc.

Average per capita household consumption expenditure is calculated with the help of below mentioned formula.

Average per capita household consumption expenditure
=  \(\frac{Country’s \,total \,household \,expenditure \,on \,various \,goods \,and \,services }{ Total\, population \,of\, the \,country }\)

2. Since, the per capita income of developing countries is lesser than the developed countries, the developing countries’ per capita household consumption expenditure is less than developed countries. This works as an indicator which indicatesthat developing countries are poorer.

the following table shows the per capita consumption expenditure of few countries:
Per Capita Consumption Expenditure (Per year)

Source: World Bank

Analysis:
As can be seen in the table, on an average an Indian spends very less as compared to developed countries like US, UK and Japan.

Unequal distribution of income and property:

• After the economic reforms of 1991, economic growth and per capita income have increased sharply in India. But, due to unequal distribution of income, poverty could not be reduced at a large scale.
• In India, on one hand we see rich class of people with high standard of living . and enjoying good facilities and on the other hand we find low income people living in slums and deprived of basic necessities like food, education and health.

The table below shows the actual income of the top 1% rich class in USA, UK and India:

Share of actual national income to top 1% rich class

Source: Economic survey, 2015-16

Analysis;

• From the table we can see that the real income of top 1% has increased in year 2012 as compared to the year 1998.
• India’s rich class held 12.6% national income in 2012 as compared to 9% in 1998. This figure is quite high.
• For India it can be said that the advantage from economic reforms were more in favour of rich class.
• Thus income inequality on a large scale serves as an indicator of poverty.

Global Hunger Index (GHI)

Correct option is (D) All of these

Absolute poverty is one of the kinds of poverty where consumption and expenditure of a person is not sufficient to maintain a minimum acceptable level of living, according to national standard, which is expressed in terms of food grains.

Dandekar and Rath Committee decided minimum value of poverty for rural areas ? 15 and for urban area ? 22.50 taking 1960-61 as base price.

Correct option is (D) Gender inequality

Lakadwala Committee:

• After that the planning commission appointed an expert committee under the chairmanship of Prof. D.T. Lakadawala. This committee decided a new minimum limit of poverty line for the year 1993 taking 1973-74 as base year. They set a poverty line. The new poverty line was set as ₹ 57 per day for urban areas and ₹ 49 for rural areas. People earning below this be considered living below the poverty line.
  Limitation of all these methods:
• Calculating poverty and deciding poverty line with the methuu based on calorie consumption only, does not give a true picture of poverty. The reason for this is that poverty is an economic situation and its scope is broader than consumption expenditure behind food items.
• Hunger is a physical situation whereas poverty is an economic. In this sense, the poverty line defined by these people just becomes a ‘starvation line’.
• So, to calculate poverty line, aspects such as nutritive food, education, housing, drinking water, sanitation, etc. that a person receives should also be considered.

The new poverty line set by lakadwala ₹ committee was ₹ 57 per day for urban areas and ₹ 49 for rural areas.

Correct option is (A) Their method is based on calorie consumption

Correct option is (B) Non-availability of food

Absolute poverty:

The minimum amount of income and expenditure that is needed to satisfy the basic needs of human beings is known as poverty line. People who are below this poverty line are known as absolutely poor and their poverty is called absolute poverty.

Method of deciding the poverty line:

To understand the level of absolute poverty or deciding the poverty line, the minimum expenditure to be made by a person to purchase the minimum physical amount of cereal, pulses, milk, butter etc. is studied.

(A) Method of Indian Council of Medical Research:

• To ascertain minimum expenditure on all these items, the Indian Council of Medical Research during the initial years of planning calculated a minimum limit of calorie that a person needs to consume daily. Based on the calorie requirement the expenditure for items was then calculated.
• The Council calculated that a person belonging to a rural area must consume 2400 calories per day whereas that of urban, 2100.
• Later, even the Planning Commission accepted this method of ascertaining expenditure. By taking prices of year 1960-61 as base year, the Commission decided that ₹ 20 per day be set as minimum value for measurement of poverty or say poverty line. Thus, a person who earned less than ? 20 per day should be considered living below the poverty line or say should be called absolutely poor. Later, various people and committees revised the minimum value of poverty line.

(B) Dandekar and Rath Committee:

• Dandekar and Rath made the first systematic assessment of poverty in India.
• Dandekar and Rath Committee decided minimum value of poverty for rural areas ₹ 15 and for urban area ₹ 22.50 taking 1960-61 as the base price.

(C) Lakadwala Committee:

After that the planning commission appointed an expert committee under the chairmanship of Prof. D.T. Lakadawala. This committee decided a new minimum limit of poverty line for the year 1993 taking 1973-74 as base year. They set a poverty line. The new poverty line was set as ? 57 per day for urban areas and ? 49 for rural areas. People earning below this be considered living below the poverty line.

Limitation of all these methods:

• Calculating poverty and deciding poverty line with the methuu based on calorie consumption only, does not give a true picture of poverty. The reason for this is that poverty is an economic situation and its scope is broader than consumption expenditure behind food items.
• Hunger is a physical situation whereas poverty is an economic. In this sense, the poverty line defined by these people just becomes a ‘starvation line’.
• So, to calculate poverty line, aspects such as nutritive food, education, housing, drinking water, sanitation, etc. that a person receives should also be considered.

(D) Tendulkar Committee Report-2009:

• To overcome drawbacks of all the previous methods of calculating poverty line a committee under the chairmanship of Mr. Suresh Tendulkar was formed.
• It presented its report in 2009 and gave a new measure of poverty line. The method suggested by this committee incorporated expenses done after health and education were also covered to get a more realistic picture of poverty.
• According to the new method, in the year 2011-12, the minimum value of poverty line was modified, for urban and rural area.
• As per the new method, the minimum per capita daily expenditure needed for rural area was set to be ₹ 27 (Rs. 816 per month) and that for urban was set to ₹ 33 (Rs. 1000 per month).

To consider a person as not being absolute poor, the Council calculated that a person belonging to a rural area must consume 2400 calories per day whereas that of urban, 2100.

The limitation of poverty line is that it only takes into account the calorie consumption. It does not consider other factors like housing, standard of living, etc.

Measurement of Absolute poverty in India:

1. Tendulkar Committee:

• 2004-05: 37.2%,
• 2011 – 12: 21.9%

2. According to Planning Commission:
Among various states of India

• Goa: Lowest poverty 5.09 %
• Chhattisgarh: Highest poverty 39.93 %

Correct option is (A) ₹ 57

Level of malnutrition:

• The condition in which the food taken by individuals lack proper nutrition i.e. the food lacks sufficient calories, protein, carbohydrate, vitamin and minerals is called malnutrition.
• India’s per capita income is low and there exists a widespread income disparity. Hence, in spite of rise in agricultural production people with low income are unable to get nutritive food i.e. they suffer from malnutrition.

Life expectancy and infant mortality:

Life expectancy:

• The average expected life span of a new born baby is called the life expectancy.
• The average life expectancy of people in a country is based on nutritive food, cleanliness, pure drinking water and health services. Poor people are deprived of such facilities and so they have low life expectancy.
  Infant mortality:
• The number of deaths per thousand new born before reaching the age of one year is called the infant mortality.
• The rate of infant mortality depends on availability of health services, mother’s education, vaccination among children and nutrition of food.
• Life expectancy and infant mortality is also an indicator of poverty with respect to poor health services.

Medical facilities:

• Medical facilities include number of hospitals, doctors, nurses, compounders, etc. available to provide health care to the citizens of country.
• In developed countries medical facilities are widely available and hence life expectancy of the citizens is high and infant mortality rate is low. Whereas this is not the case in developing countries and hence the life expectancy is less.
• As per an estimate there is 1 doctor per 350 people in developed countries ’ whereas there is 1 doctor per 6000 people in developing countries.
• In developing countries because of poverty, people do not have access to medical facilities and therefore life expectancy rate is low and infant mortality is high.
• In developing countries, every year 1.7 crore people die from diarrhoea, Malaria and T.B.
• 2.3 crore people are suffering from AIDS world over. Out of this 90% belong to developing economies.

Drinking water:

Lack of pure drinking water is the root cause of all the health problems.

• In India around 63% of the population gets drinking water from treated sources i.e. the water is given treatment of purification, around 9% population gets drinking water from untreated sources and around 26% population gets drinking water from other sources like ponds, tube well, hand pump, etc.
• Unavailability of pure drinking water leads to many water prone diseases which again impacts life expectancy and infant mortality rate.
• Thus, drinking water is an indicator of poverty.

Provision for toilets:

• India is a land of villages because around 70% population lives in villages. Most of the villages still use untreated sources of water like tube well, hand pump, canal, ponds, etc. Hence, villagers are more prone to water related diseases.
• Cleanliness is another important aspect and it is directly related to sanitation facilities.
• In India as per census 2011 report, 34% of the households do not have toilets in their home and this leads to several diseases.

Correct option is  (B) Income inequality of different groups of people in society

Relative poverty:

• The condition in which people lack the minimum amount of income needed in order to maintain the average standard of living in the society in which they live is called relative poverty.
• Note that the concept of absolute poverty focuses on the minimum consumption expenditure required for satisfying minimum needs whereas the concept of relative poverty focuses on income inequality existing in different groups of people living in society.
• Income disparity exists in all economies. Those who earn less are considered relatively poor than those who earn more.
• To assess relative poverty, the society is divided in different income groups to study unequal distribution of income. Thus, relative poverty exhibits the level of income inequality among different class of people i.e. different groups. The concept of Relative poverty can be studied with the help of hypothetical example. For example, suppose our country’s population is 125 crores and we divide this population into five groups based on their income as shown in the table.

Division of population in five groups

Analysis:

We can see in the above table that the class in group 2, has more income then the class income of people in group 1. Hence, it can be said that people in group 1 are relatively poor than group 2.

The people of group 2 have lower income than income of people in group 3, 4 and 5. Hence people of group 2 are relatively poor than 3, 4 and 5. Lorenz curve and Gini co-efficient are used to measure relative poverty or income inequality.

Relative poverty is different from absolute poverty because in absolute poverty we only take the consumption expenses behind minimum basic needs as criteria to decide poverty line but in relative poverty we compare one group of society with another group based on their incomes.

To make the poverty line concept more progressive, the factors like nutritive food, -education, housing, drinking water, sanitation, etc. that a person receives should also be considered.

The minimum amount of income and expenditure that is needed to satisfy the basic needs of human beings is known as poverty line. People who do not earn this amount are said to be living below poverty line and hence are absolute poor. Their poverty is called absolute poverty.

In India, poverty line is referred as minimum consumption expenditure required to get minimum calories.

Most countries of the world define poverty as a lack of money. Yet, poor people themselves consider their experience of poverty much more broadly. A person who is poor can suffer from multiple disadvantages at the same time – for example, they may have poor health or malnutrition, lack of clean water or electricity, poor quality of work or little schooling. Focusing on one factor alone, such as income, is not enough to realize the true reality of poverty. Multidimensional poverty measures can be used to create a more comprehensive picture. They reveal who is poor and how they are poor – the range of different disadvantages they experience. As well as providing a headline measure of poverty, multidimensional measures can be broken down to reveal the poverty level in different areas of a country, and among different subgroups of people.

Correct option is (A) Standard of living

• As per the UNDP report, the three important parameters for Human Development Index (HDI) and Human Poverty Index (HPI) are:
  1. Knowledge,
  2. Health and
  3. Standard of living.
• Knowledge covers the aspects of literacy rate and enrollment ratio, Health covers life expectancy and Standard of living considers per capita income.

Growth oriented approach to poverty reduction:

It is the first Government’s approach to poverty reduction. This approach was based on the expectation that the effects of economic growth would spread to all sections of society and trickle down to the poor section also. This approach was the major focus of planning in the 1950’s and early 1960’s.

It was felt that rapid industrial development and transformation of agriculture through green revolution would benefit the under developed regions and the more backward sections of the community. But this approach was failure. The benefits of economic growth has not trickled down to the poor.

The green revolution exacerbated the disparities regionally and between large and small farmers. There was unwillingness and inability to redistributed lands.

The growth oriented approach has not succeeded in reducing poverty. This is mainly because of rapid growth rate of population and lack of proper implementation of land reforms.

Income concept of poverty is a traditional concept which states that it is only on the basis of a person’s income to decide whether the person is poor or not.

The base for health is life expectancy and base for standard of living is per capita income.

Modern meaning of poverty (Non-income poverty):

• Non-income poverty reflects various aspects of human development to decide whether a person is poor or not. This concept includes not only income and food but other aspects like housing, clothes, drinking water, health, sanitation, etc. to give an overall picture of poverty.
• This method is better and broader than traditional method because in this method income is not the only measure of poverty but there are other aspects also like housing, clothes, drinking water, health, sanitation, etc. Therefore this concept gives a broader meaning of poverty.

Modern approach of poverty reflects various aspects of human development to decide whether a person is poor or not. This concept includes not only income and food but also other aspects like housing, clothes, drinking water, health, sanitation, etc. to give an overall picture of poverty.

Literacy rate and enrollment ratio are the two factors that falls under the parameter of knowledge

• Illiteracy : People, who are illiterate, cannot get good employment opportunities. As a result, they go for petty and small jobs, such as daily wage labour and other less paid jobs. Hence, illiteracy increases poverty and this also compels persons to remain illiterate. 
• Dependence on Agriculture : Indian farmers make themselves fully dependent upon the agriculture. But, absence and lack of knowledge in using modem techniques of agriculture has resulted in the inability of farmers to protect their fields from pests and animals, and hence, less production and less income. 
• Irregular Employment : This is one of the major causes for poverty. Non-availability of proper employment leads to lowering the standard of living of people. 
• Indebtness : Poverty is perhaps a major cause for rural indebtedness. The low level of rural incomes, the uncertain and primitive farming of small land holdings, makes it impossible to meet the needs required for their living. Often, the rural people take loans to meet these needs. 
• Social Backwardness and Lack of Mobility : The lack of education in rural areas, lack of awareness and lack in the desire of making positive changes, create social backwardness and lack of mobility. 
• Faulty PDS : Indian Public Distribution System (PDS) targets to provide subsidized essential commodities to economically weaker households. But this is also faulty. Ration is not distributed to the people on time and corruption prevails in this system also.
• Weakness of Development Strategy : Development strategies are made for large industries and businesses but not for the improvement of agriculture and social awareness, which results in the lack of employment. Even today, 55 per cent of the total population is dependent upon agriculture, and its contribution in GDP is 13.9 per cent. 
• Low Agricultural Production : Absence and lack of knowledge in using modem techniques of agriculture has resulted in the inability of farmers to protect their fields from pests and animals. In India, during the British rule, there was no improvement done in agriculture. The Government did not render any assistance to the cultivators to use modem techniques of agriculture.

i. Increase in the pace of economic growth : If rapid economic development takes place in the country, it would cause income to rise. The rise in income would percolate down to the poor class. The result would be creation of employment opportunities due to development, which would reduce poverty and the tax income of the government will increase. In this way, development is considered important for the country to grow. However, as the speed of development was not satisfactory and economic employment could not create employment in sufficient measure. Therefore, alleviating poverty only through economic development proved to be a failure.

ii. Implementation of Wage Employment and Self Employment Programme for Alleviating Poverty : In the decade of 60s, the poverty ratio was quite high. It also presented the fact that the number of poor is higher in rural areas and poverty was particularly rife in marginal and small farmers and in landless agricultural labourers. And in order to alleviate poverty, programmes directly impacting poverty will have to be adopted. This presented the extensiveness of the problem of poverty in India. As a result, marginal farmers development agency, small farmers development agency, intensive programme for rural employment, initial intensive rural employment programme, food for work programme etc. were adopted. 

Later, some more programmes were also launched for poverty alleviation.

• Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) 
• Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY) 
• Employment Assurance Scheme (EAS) 
• Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana 
• Pradhan Mantri Gramodya Yojana 
• Swama Jayanti Shahri Rozgar Yojana 
• Sampuma Gramin Rozgar Yoj ana 
• ValkimiAmbedkarAwas Yojana 
• National Food for Work Programme 0 Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana 
• National Rural Employment Programme (NREP) 
• National Rural Livelihood Mission 
• National Urban Livelihood Mission

iii. Social Assistance Programme : In order to provide social security, the National Social Assistance Programme was launched in August 15, 1995. This programme had four components. These included old age pension, window pension, inability pension, and family benefit scheme. The Social Assistance Programme was basically meant for those poor people who could not become a part of wage employment and self employment programmes due to some inability.

iv. Area Development Program and Infrastructure Development : The problem of poverty was more acute in some regions of the country due to backwardness and natural losses. Attention was given to development in these regions by implementing special programmes, so that the income of the poor people living in these regions could be increased. The Drought Prone Area Programme (DPAP) and Desert Development Programme (DDP) was launched in 1977-78. Under this program, scheme was implemented for maintaining ecological balance in desert areas, productive employment, income growth, restricting expansion of deserts and increasing productivity of land.

Programs were undertaken to provide rural housing. The Public Distribution System was increasingly targeted towards the rural classes. All these efforts were made so that these areas could be developed and the condition of the extent of poverty of the people living in these areas could be controlled.

Prime Minister Rural Road Programme is a nationwide plan in India to provide good all weather road connectivity to unconnected villages. Its objective was to connect villages having a population of 500 and more with cemented roads till the end of the tenth five year-plan. Till the end of the programme, 7866 crore rupees were spent on it and 60024 km long rural roads were built.

Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana.

‘Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee’ (MGNREGP).

‘Bhagya Lakshmi Yojana’.

‘Yashaswini Yojana’.

• In India, small and cottage industries immensely contribute in gross national income and employment. So, if small and cottage industries can be developed and encouraged then poverty can be reduced on a larger scale.
• Favourable environment, reducing controls, making available raw material, providing loans and technology and market to sell final goods are few developmental activities that the government should undertake.
• Recently on 8th April, 2015 Indian government has established MUDRA (Micro Unit Development and Refinance Agency Ltd.) to provide loans to micro and small units.
• The government has also started ‘Start-up India’ scheme from 16th January, 2016.The objective of this scheme is to encourage entrepreneurship, provide loans to new ventures and increase employment opportunities.

In India, around 63% of the population gets drinking water from treated sources i.e. the water is given treatment of purification, around 9% population gets drinking water from untreated sources and around 26% population gets drinking water from other sources like ponds, tube well, hand pump, etc.

As per an estimate there is 1 doctor per 350 people in developed countries whereas there is 1 doctor per 6000 people in developing countries.

Programmes like:

• Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana
• Basava Vasathi Yojana (Karnataka)
• Public Distribution System
• Integrated Child Development Scheme.