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Social Context of Poverty

In the Indian context poverty has sharp social, geographic and occupational etchings, validated in multiple
poverty assessments including the recent multi-dimensional poverty index developed by Oxford Poverty
and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) where 8 Indian states being poorer than 26 poorest African
nations. Poverty and hunger is concentrated in the central and eastern states, with relatively higher
percentage of Tribal and Dalit communities, higher proportion of rural population; the poverty or
opportunity deficiency map of India carries the inter-generational underpinnings of social and economic
exclusion and/or isolation accentuated with disproportionate focus of state and market on better endowed
regions or politically more important areas eg. urban population. Patriarchal and feudal social normative
practices further accentuate, particularly the gender inequities intra-household as also in social spaces;
acting in unison this has created a situation where the problem not only affects this generation but
actually is transmitted inter-generationally.

The analysis of poverty as power and social construct shapes TRIF’s engagement

in communities with focus on stimulating human processes to impact multiple
dimensions of a poor person’s life so that the quality of the person live is
irreversibly altered. The engagement thus is anchored on contextual collective

led processes to trigger “personal responsibility” for change and trigger “public
and market systems” to support change.

The personal dimensions of navigation and social mobility like “aspirations”; “self-belief”; “sense of
agency” together with an “eco-system” that supports fulfilment of these aspirations is activated and Transforming Rural India Foundation ANNUAL REPORT 2021-22
energised through : social support group; responsive public systems and equitable market
based systems.

The Self Help Groups (SHG) helps each woman
internalise the need for change and come to a Public Infrastructure
& Services
stage where they are ready to make personal
commitments to make the change happen;
understanding the skewed ‘power’ dynamics
around caste, class and gender; and exploring
cross-cutting issues to start “collective action”
leveraging the social mobilisation is a critical
dimension to our work. The action strategies is
context curated with an analysis of : “what Organised Private
Communities can do on their own”; “What they Community Service
can do with little external support” and “what
they will need external support to do”, these
encompass community led “individual” and
“collective action processes” and engagement of
Public Systems and Market Mechanisms.

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