POVERTY REDUCTION STRATEGY TN

ii.
The local level institutions (PRI and municipal) can help in better targeting of
household or individual oriented benefits. Also, they are in better position to
understand the local infrastructure deficiencies.
iii. In the context of primary schools, interface with village panchayats can improve
attendance of both teachers and students.
iv. It is only in programmes or services where specialised and technical inputs are
needed like watershed development programmes, should agencies or societies be
involved, but they should have a clear interface with the PRI institutions.
6.7 Reaching the Urban Poor
a. Features of Urban Poverty
Rural poverty is often considered the core of poverty in India, because of the large
number of rural poor, high incidence of poverty in rural population, their limited access to
information, security, health and education. However, urban poverty is now becoming a
growing problem. Urban poverty generally is qualitatively different from rural poverty.
While rural poverty is related more to inadequacy of income, urban poverty is related,
apart from income shortfalls, to unhygienic conditions of living and deficiencies in basic
services. Cities attract the rural poor who often land into or create urban slums.
Dandekar and Rath (1971) had earlier written: “… The character of urban poverty is the
consequence of the continuous migration of the rural poor into the urban areas in search
of a livelihood, their failure to find adequate means to support themselves there and the
resulting growth of pavement and slum life in the cities”.
In India, Bhanumurthy and Mitra (2003) decomposed changes in poverty into a
growth effect, an inequality effect, and a migration effect for two periods: 1983 to 1993-
94 and 1993-94 to1999-00. The decomposition analysis showed that rural-to-urban
migration contributed to poverty reduction in rural areas by 2.6 percent between 1983
and 1993-94. Poverty in the urban sector increased during the same period, but by a
smaller rate than the reduction of poverty in rural areas. Therefore, the net poverty
incidence for the country as a whole decreased over the period studied. Similar findings
were reported for the 1993-94 to 1999-00 period. Rural poverty declined by 1.64 percent
as a result of rural to urban migration, while urban poverty increased by 1.43 percent.
While rural poverty is marked by connections to agriculture and land, urban poverty is
more heterogeneous in income generation and location patterns. The urban poor exhibit
highly diverse pattern of activities and problems. Devising programmes and policies to
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