Poverty Alleviation Programmes
The Earlier Phase
During the seventies, a number of special programmes for the rural poor were undertaken of which the important ones were Small Farmers’ Development Agency (SFDA), Marginal Farmers’ and Agricultural Labourers’ Development Agency (MFAL), Drought-Prone Areas Programme (DPAP), Crash Scheme for Rural Employment (CSRE), Pilot Intensive Rural Employment Project (PIREP), Food for Work Programme (FWP). None of these programmes comprehensively covered the whole country, though in certain parts of the country some of these programmes operated simultaneously for the same target groups. Hence the need was felt for undertaking programmes that were not only far more comprehensive in coverage but could also make a direct assault on rural poverty
The Latter Phase
The Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP), the National Rural Employment Programme (NREP) and the Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Programme (RLEGP) were conceived keeping the objective of poverty alleviation in view. The IRDP was initially started in 1978-79 in 2,300 development blocks as a programme of total development. In the Sixth Plan, the IRDP was extended to the entire country. The NERP is commenced at the same time as part of the Sixth Plan and aimed at helping that segment of the population that depended largely on wage employment and had virtually no source of income during the lean agricultural period. The RLEGP was launched on August 15, 1983, to expand the employment opportunities for the rural landless. However, to make the implementation of these three wage employment programmes more effective, NREP and RLEGP were merged into a single rural employment programme on April 1, 1989. The merged programme was named Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY).
The Latter Phase-Comprehensive Programmes
The IRDP was conceived as an anti-poverty programme aimed at helping the small and marginal farmers, landless labourers and artisans. It was thought by the planners that these people were poor because they possessed neither any productive assets nor any special skill. Therefore, the IRDP was designed to help the poor by creating new assets for them. These assets would include sources of irrigation, bullocks and implements besides inputs like seeds and fertilisers for farming, animals for dairy and other animal husbandry activities and tools and training for cottage industries and handicrafts.
The basic strategy was self-employment of the poor with the help of these assets so that they manage to earn enough to rise above the poverty line. The skill endorsement aspect was covered under the Training of Youth for Self-Employment ( TRYSEM). The Programme Evaluation Organisation(PEO) of the Planning Commission, the RBI, the NABARD and the Institute for Financial Management evaluated the performance of the IRDP at different points in time.
The general conclusion that emerges from these studies is that the IRDP was not very effective as a poverty alleviation measure. However, it has now been restructured and renamed Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana ( SGSY). Moreover, certain allied programmes including TRYSEM have been merged into it. Employment Assurance Scheme (EAS) until it was merged into Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana ( SGRY), in September 2001 provided 100 days of unskilled manual work to the rural poor seeking employment.
These poverty alleviation programmes suffered from various specific shortcomings which in Sandeep Bagchee’s opinion were basically the result of not taking into account the complexities of the environment, of having multiple and conflicting objectives instead of simplifying them by focusing on a single operational goal and designing a suitable and viable strategy of this basis.
At present special programmes for employment, generation is being implemented both in rural and urban areas. All these programmes aim at poverty alleviation as well. The programmes for the rural poor include Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY) and Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana (SGRY). The Nehru Rozgar Yojana (NRY) was launched in October 1989 for the benefit of the urban poor. It was merged into the Swarnajayanti Shahari Rozgar Yojana in 1997-98.
Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana ( SGRY) was launched in September 2001. Jawahar Gram Samridhi Yojana (SGSY) and Employment Assurance Scheme (EAS) were merged into it. SGRY aims at providing wage employment in rural areas as also food security. National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) was introduced in February 2006.
The Scheme aims to provide at least 100 days of guaranteed employment in a financial year to every household in the rural areas covered under the scheme and whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work subject to the conditions laid down in the Act.
Check out the notes on Critical Evaluation of the Strategy for Poverty Alleviation.