Located in the dense forest ruins of Satpuda region is Harra the tribal forest village in Betul district of Madhya Pradesh having no access to roads. No developmental work has been taken up in this village in the last five years. As the village land falls in the forest area, according to law, the amount allotted for development of this village goes into the account of the forest department, and no investment is made for the development of the village. On one hand while the 1997-98 BPL survey identified 30 families in BPL but the recent set indicator and process-based survey could only consider one family as poor. While on the other hand the participatory study conducted by the Democratic Campaign for Good Governance in coordination with ActionAid (Bhopal) revealed that 51 families even after staying in the stage of poverty were not included in the list. This is not the only example, but extend to almost all the villages in the state where 10% -15% of families have not been included in the list of Below Poverty Line even after being in the state of acute poverty. 

Even though the economists from their study concluded that poverty in Madhya Pradesh has not declined and has instead increased the development department concluded that during the past five years poverty has reduced by 5.09% in Madhya Pradesh and now it is 37.43%. This conclusion has raised several controversial questions. Even the Supreme Court in its decision given on 8th May 2003, recommended to immediately give benefits of Antyodaya and other Welfare schemes to all the primitive tribes, women headed families, families having mentally and physically disabled member, Destitute and Widows in the village. Thus even the Supreme Court has put question mark on the authenticity of the BPL survey. This means that more than 5 lakh families living Below Poverty Line are not included in the list in Madhya Pradesh. The government has however accepted that the 1996-97 survey was extremely controversial and due to lack of systematic process and proper monitoring system the non-eligible people (rich section) were also included in the BPL list, thus the actual vulnerable and marginalized people were deprived of the developmental and Welfare benefits.

Experience suggests that there are still some loopholes in the process of BPL survey. The Democratic Campaign for Good Governance with help of over 230 other agencies monitored the process of survey in over 10 thousand villages and tried to be just. It is only because of presence of this campaign, was it able to clarify that Charua Singh of Jalpani village of Mandla district was excluded for the BPL list because the enumerator had filled the form with out concerning Charua Singh and thus ignored that he was a bonded laborer. Similarly, in Panna district an amount of Rs.200/- was charged from the poor families as fees for filling the BPL form. The economists believe that around 7% -10% people in our society are facing hidden poverty and starve for food every day. They do Not get two square meals a day but no priority is been given to the problems of mentally and physically disabled, scavengers and beggars. 

On the basis of points allotted (the maximum points fixed for the 13 questions is 52. Out of which 12 to 15 points will any family to be identified as a poor family) those deriving minimum points were included in the BPL list. To ensure proper selection, provision was made to read this BPL list in gram sabha (Village Meeting) so that the villagers come to know about the points allotted to them. In this regard the gram sabha was given right to present and approve the list of actual poor in the village, a lot of confusion was created in this process. Hence, the norm was set that the list would be read in the gram sabha first and the claims raised or controversies/ problems would be sorted out, later and the improvised list would again be presented in the second gram sabha. Although, the top government officials said that their would be two gram sabhas, the block level Panchayat officials declared the list in the first sabha itself, in Patelawad the responsible officer of Block Panchayat Chief Executive Officer gave this order in written. Even after this no clear orders have been given by the State government to solve this confusion. The Kotma Block Panchayat officer refused to disclose the list in public and said that the list was confidential. On the other hand in Bhimpur of Betul district, the Block panchayat officer declared the efforts of NGOs as anti-government activity and ordered to stop them. As per the study of 100 panchayats it was known that in 67 panchayats, no second gram sabha meeting was organized for approving the list and the panchayats where the list were disclosed, no clarity was provided to the villagers regarding the meaning of allotted points. Thus the villagers did not know the points required to be included in the BPL list or to be out of it. Thus, it would be a high time to neglect the role of gram sabha in this process and if even now the gram sabha is not involved the interest of the poor would again be overlooked and the rich and influential people will dominate the list. 

Influenced by political interest the government has disapproved the conclusion of famous economists Sundram and Tendulkar who believe that the reduction in percentage of poverty among Schedule Caste/Schedule Tribe categories is very low in each state as compared to the reduction in poverty in general or higher category. But as per the government in tribal district Balaghat, rate of poverty has reduced to 53.63% from 63.82% which means a straight decline by 10.19%. Similarly, in tribal dominated Mandla and Dindori poverty reduction is from 9.11% to 9.43%. Even in the Jhabua district, which has nearly 90% of tribal population the percentage of people living Below Poverty Line, has reduced from 54.37% to 45.69%. In contrast to this reduction in percentage of poverty amongst the general and upper category districts have been very low, for example, Datia - 2.72%, Indore - 3.18%, Ujjain – 4.69%, Gwalior – 4.9%, Hoshangabad – 5.64%. 

Even after accepting that the 1997-98 survey was irrelevant and partial, the government has still taken it as a base for the new survey and by taking the ratios as baseline have standardized poverty for different states and districts. Thus there is a need to analyze this economics from the political point of view. The communities and districts, which have their hold in politics of Madhya Pradesh, have decided the percentage of poverty as per their convenience. For example, the district of Narsinghpur has good and productive land but when it comes to BPL the survey says that the district has 46.58% of its population living Below Poverty Line, because it is a politically powerful district. In this context the district of Hoshangabad too is no different, it too holds a good share of good quality productive land but the reduction in poverty has been recorded to be only 5.64%. On the other hand the districts with high population of Sahariya community like Shivpuri and Sheopur and where people die of starvation showed only 24.89% and 26.14% of people living Below Poverty Line. In Balaghat, Mandla and Badwani although the number of people living below poverty line is higher but as compared to the last survey the number have reduced considerably. 

The BPL cutoff point (the point/ one obtaining minimum points would be included in the BPL list) will play vital role in deciding the percentage of people living below poverty line in a district. As per the decided percentage of BPL families for a district those families obtaining minimum points would be considered as poor and this point would be considered as cut off point for the district. The family of Gulab adivasi of Dobri village, Seoni obtained 20 points. Thus the family of eight members earnings of Rs.35/- per day was excluded from the BPL list, because as per the government norms only 34.79% of families of Seoni district could be included in the BPL list and as the figure got completed with the families obtaining 13 points, this point was considered as cut-off point for the district. Thus family of Gulab, which struggles hard for its survival, was out of the BPL list. While going through the figures of BPL families in Balaghat 53.63% families were identified as BPL families and the points obtained by these families was 14, which was declared as cut-off point. The cut-off point varied from 12-15 in different districts like in Mandla (15), Badvani (15), Morena (12), Datiya (13), Seoni (12), and Gwalior (13). Thus the controversy is that by deciding different cut-off points the parameters taken for measuring poverty is different for each district, thus the government has tried to relate the figures. However, one suggestion has come that instead of taking districts wise cut-offs why not prepare one survey list at state level and consider 37.43% from the bottom as the cut-off point for all districts. However the government for making its work simpler has adopted easy way. 

Considering the limitations of technical process and decided indicators for conducting wealth survey, the Government of Madhya Pradesh in August 2002, gave relevant suggestions to the central government, which said that for keeping the non-eligible people out of the BPL list and including the actual needy, a participatory approach involving the villagers should be adopted at village level. One such exercise identified and suggested is by doing a wealth ranking. Besides this the gram sabha should decide the list of poor families and each state should be given free hand to change the survey questioner as per their requirements and status of poverty in their state. But these suggestions were overlooked by the Central Government. After this the state government did not raise the issue nor did it take any constructive measures by itself in its region. This is the reason why people’s participation has been questioned in this survey. Some perception clarify that even after putting claims-objections no changes were made in the below poverty list, mainly because with this the organizers would have fallen in circle of skepticism. In such situation many eligible poor people were excluded from the below poverty line list.

One can only conclude from the nature of events that the government is not at all serious in poverty eradication. The functionaries too do not wish to admit that their region is still in the strong grips of poverty and starvation. This very clearly means that the poor must remain poor till the extent they are unable to express and retaliate, and food must only be provided to the  extent that it keeps the flame of worry of filling belly burning on the platter of hope. With the consistent worry for survival the poor would be forced to think only about food, clothing and shelter and unable to think about their entity in the larger society. Thus it stands true that the poor and poverty works as a better proposition to some administrators who enjoy the luxury of power – one can always use this struggling section of the society as cheap but quality labour force and earn profits without even voicing out for justice and rights. They form the major section that can be used by the politicians to rule. In context to rights the irony of the situation is that the poor does not even have the right to determine whether they are poor, deprived, marginalized and battling hunger. 

Sachin Kumar Jain