INDIAN URBAN AND RURAL SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Urban Society:
Urban society includes the towns, cities and metros with a specific way of life. An urban society can be defined as an area having higher density of population, people engaging mostly in occupations other than agriculture and domestication of animals, having a distinct ecology and culture different from that of the large society’s culture.

Characteristics of urban society:

1. The cities and towns have a higher density of population than the rural areas.
2. Cultural heterogeneity is found in the urban areas because people from various areas having different cultures migrate to the tows in search of employment, education and medical and health care.
3. Cities have a distinct environment that is not natural but a man made environment.
4. The occupation of the urban areas is mainly non agricultural, i.e. based on manufacturing, trade & commerce, professional and governance, etc.
5. In urban areas more social mobility is found in the sense people gradually adapt to class structure (lower, middle or upper class based on the economic criteria).
6. Formal social control is found in the urban areas in the form of courts, police and other administrative bodies.
7. In urban areas interaction among the people is based on secondary contact and not primary contact. It means face to face contact and individual to individual interaction is not possible in the urban areas.
8. People in the cities have an urban way of life. Which means they have formal interaction, impersonal behaviour, non kinship relationships, cultural exhibitionism, passing leisure time in clubs, parks, restaurants, cinema halls or markets.
9. The urban economic organisation is based on market and monetary economy.
10. Civic facilities like roads, electricity, water, communication, parks, hotels and cinemas etc. are found in urban areas.
11. Anonymity is a feature of urban areas societies. It means people do not know each other in the city as in the villages.

Rural Society:
This is defined as remote area or place far away from the seat of government and having no verified nor infrastructural facilities, that is, the countryside and the people living in the villages.

It also refers to areas with

• low population density,
• small size, and
• relative isolation,
• where the major economic activity is largely agricultural production.
• the areas considered rural are the settlements that have between 100 and 200 households.

Village community is a group of rural people living within a continuous geographic area, sharing common values and feeling of belonging to the group, who come together in the common concern of daily life.

Village is rural area in general terms refers to

• settlement which originated many thousand years ago, during the early period of human society.
• is a historical necessity and the factors like land, water, climate, conditions of agriculture, economy, peace and security have played a very important role in the growth of village community.
• The primary forms of human association are far older than the secondary.
• Earliest men apparently lived in relatively small bands, formed on the basis of family and blood ties.
• Their economy consisted of seed and food gathering, of hunting and fishing.
• Today, from two-thirds to three-fourths of the world’s people are living in rural communities.
• Their culture stands intermediate between that of the band or tribe and urban patterns. 

A village community can be defined as a group of rural people living together in a continuous geographic area in such a way that they share, not this of that particular interest, but the basic conditions of a common life.

FEATURES OF VILLAGE LIFE:

Isolation and Self-sufficiency:

• The villages in India were more or less-contained, isolated, and self-sufficient almost till the middle of 19th century.
• The inhabitants of the village had very little to do with people outside.
• All of their essential needs were satisfied in the village itself.
• The changing political and economic conditions are putting an end to the isolation and self sufficiency of the Indian villages.
• The rapid development of means of transport and communication has broken the barriers between the village and city.

Peace and Simplicity:

• The atmosphere in villages is of simplicity and calmness.
• The villagers lead a simple life, dress simply.
• But now the old order is yielding place to a new one.
• Fashion is making its inroads in the life of young men and women in villages.
• However this change is gradual and slow.

Conservatism:

• The inhabitants of village are strongly attached to old customs and traditions.
• Their outlook is primarily conservative and they accept changes with reluctance.
• They love old ways of marriage and other customs.

Poverty and Illiteracy:

• Probably the most glaring and also depressing features of Indian village community are the poverty and illiteracy of the village people.
• They are generally poor with a very low income.
• Beside poverty, the village people are steeped in ignorance and illiteracy.
• The opportunities are meager in the villages.
• Now, governments both at the centre and states have launched schemes for liquidating illiteracy and removing poverty of people living in the villages.

General Environment:

• Rural people are closely related to natural environment.
• So they have to face the vagaries of nature like rain, heat, snow and drought etc. over which they have no control.
• Due to this they build up their beliefs and convictions about nature.

Size of community:

• The rural communities are smaller as compared to urban communities.
• The land to man ratio is higher in rural areas as most of the rural people depend on agriculture.
• The density of per square mile is low as compared to urban areas.

PATTERNS OF RURAL SETTLEMENT:

Basically, Patterns of settlement of rural people are

1. Isolated farmsteads: The individual lives on his farm with his farm surrounding him. His neighbors are a few miles away from him depending on the size of their Adjacent his dwelling he keeps his livestock, barn, farm equipment, harvested produce and other commodities. This pattern is found in Kerala & Tamil Nadu.
   
2. Villages: This pattern consists of dwellings of rural people concentrated together with their farm land outlying their clustered dwellings or villages. The number of dwellings will indicate the size of the village. Most of the countries in the East such pattern exists, specially un India almost all over the country.
   
3. Line villages: Here the houses are located along the road or a waterway or artery of transporatation, each with adjoining strips of farm land oblong in shape extending away from the road. There are many villages on the banks of the rivers, Ganga and Godavari.
   
   VILLAGE ALONG THE RIVER                                    VILLAGE NEAR A ROAD
4. Round village or Circular Patterns: In around villages houses are arranged in a circle enclosing a central area with the house and yard at the apex of a triangular plot. In this way houses are closer together without creating a corresponding greater length in the tract of the farm land. Some villages in Israel are found in this pattern where the irrigated land is very limited.
5. Cross roads and Market centre settlements: These type of settlements are predominantly inhabited by the merchant population who handle the agricultural products, bankers, shop keepers and others based on the economic factors of location for supply and distribution of goods like the daily needed commodities and products such as foodstuffs, refreshments, repair shops, barbery etc.
   
6. Hamlets: These are small villages located away from other villages or on the fringes of larger villages. Usually they do not possess adequate supplies and service facilities that may be more available in their village. Banjaras stay in hamlets.
   
7. Others: Other types of settlements exist to serve specific functions. For example in India at points of religious pilgrimage or interest a temple, mosque, or a church may be built and along with it the dwelling places for those who visit and worship like the tirumala temple. The settlement on the seven hills was formed in the above said way.

RURAL / TRIBAL AND URBAN DIFFERENCE

GLOSSARY:

1. Urban society: an area having higher density of population, diversed occupations having a distinct ecology and culture different from that of the large society’s culture.
2. Village community: a group of rural people living within a continuous geographic area, sharing common values and feeling of belonging to the group, who come together in the common concern of daily life.
3. Village: rural area in general terms refers to settlement which originated many thousand years ago, during the early period of human society.
4. Isolated farmsteads: The individual lives on his farm with his farm surrounding him.
5. Line villages: Here the houses are located along the road or a waterway or artery of transporatation, each with adjoining strips of farm land oblong in shape extending away from the road.
6. Cross roads and Market centre settlements: These type of settlements are predominantly inhabited by the merchant population
7. Hamlets: These are small villages located away from other villages or on the fringes of larger villages. 

ASSIGNMENT

1. Write down the features of the village life.
2. Compare and contrast the patterns of rural settlements in India.
3. Explain the differences between rural/tribal and urban areas.

Text books:

1. Chitambar, J.B. (1973). Introductory rural sociology. New York, John Wilex and Sons.
2. Desai, A.R. (1978). Rural sociology in India. Bombay, Popular Prakashan, 5th Rev. ed.

REFERENCES

1. Doshi, S.L. (2007). Rural sociology. Delhi Rawat Publishers.
2. Jayapalan, N. (2002). Rural sociology. New Delhi, Altanic Publishers.
3. Sharma, K.L. (1997). Rural society in India. Delhi, Rawat Publishers.
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWMVI-1GSHI
5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QypAmNtGnc0

RURAL RESOURCES

Resources of rural societies refer to any available developed or undeveloped materials or energies, both natural, manmade or means that are available in that area for use by the people. The resources may vary from society to society and region to region and country to another for different purposes, waus to serve different ends. They are part of the physical structure of the rural society and it is important that they be recognized, understood and appreciated as resources available.

CLASSIFICATION OF RURAL RESOURCES:

A. NATURAL RESOURCES:

Natural resources are useful raw materials that we get from the Earth. They occur naturally, which means that humans cannot make natural resources. Instead, we use and modify natural resources in ways that are beneficial to us. The materials used in human-made objects are natural resources.

Some examples of natural resources and the ways we can use them are:

1. Land: The area of cultivable land, uncultivable land but arable land and land unit for agricultural pursuits.
2. Water: The existence of water supply for purposes such as drinking and other domestic use, irrigation of farm land, for fisheries and fish culture and the growth of edible aquatic plants, as a source of power and electricity, water mills and other industry and mechanical devices using water power, and as a communication channel for transport of goods, livestock and humans from one place to another.
3. Climate: The amount, frequency, velocity, periodicity etc. of each of the natural elements of wind, rainfall and temperature is the area.
4. Forests or Grooves: Either in developed from as a source of income or underdeveloped as a potential resource for income.
5. Minerals: The resources under the surface of the earth. Stone, special sand for glass making, iron bauxite, coal, oil and other types of minerals if available in the area and used.

B. MAN MADE RESOURCES: 

1. Transport and communication facilities: Highways, gravel or soft surface roads, foot paths, water ways, bicycles, rickshaws, horse drawn vehicles, cars, trucks, bus services rail, boats, dugouts, steamers, radio, television, telephone, print media, post and telegraph services.
2. Health and welfare facilities: Medical facilities include a sophisticated rural clinic with equipment and well trained staff to public health and preventive medical facilities. Welfare facilities refer to he existence of programmrs and arrangements by agencies aimed programmes other than health, such as agricultural production development, home and family improvement, village community development, programmes for children, youth and the aged, development of handicrafts and village industries. These programs run by the government or by both.
3. Supply and Service Agencies: The existing facilities for the supply of the commodities demanded by the rural people and those for which a demand is being created through welfare and development programmes. The existing channels of supply, the available services and their agencies and channels.
4. Marketing and Industrial facilities: Resources available to process and to distribute products such as flour and oil mills, rice hulling and other small industries marketing systems and facilities like storage and disposal of products, cooperative societies and other organisations to provide the relevant services to the villagers.
5. Financial facilities: Provision of adaquate banking, credit and loan facilities, perhaps through government or non government agencies such as credit cooperatives, money lenders and private banks.
6. Public Utilities: Adaquate means of water supply, electricity or gas supply, consernvation facilities and other pubic utlities.
7. Educational facilities: School, technical and vocational educational training facilities, colleges, educational services of any kind available to people in the rural society through adult education, rural welfare, rural extension or other agencies under whatever sponsorship- government or non government.
8. Religious facilities: Temples, mosques, churches, centres, of religious pilgrimage, religious instruction, discourse or meditation centre like ashrams, monastries, and convents.
9. Recreational facilities: A variety of facilities such as play grounds for games, recreational facilities like Cinema theatres, recreation centres, clubs to provide recreation and enjoyment to the people in ways and forms acceptable to the society.

C. HUMAN RESOURCES: The greatest resource of any organisation, enterprise or society is the people in it. They can be of two types – Physical and mental.

For instance, countries with high population figures have many people to utilise as a physical human resource. India as an example recognised these physical resources years ago and launched ‘Man power mobilisation programme (MGNREGA)’ as a part of the community development effort in rural areas.

The mental resources contain the vast experience and folk knowledge about farming, other occupations, life and living in the villages. The farmers and other people such as elderly people in the village having contended with natural elements for centuries have learned to manipulate them to the best advantage and have gained an almost uncanny intuition about seed time, optimum tilt of soil, harvest time and other such matters such as health practices, child caring methods, traditional recipes in various situations, etc. Further, experience has developed manual skills about other aspects of village life such as house construction and maintenance so on and so forth.

Glossary

1. Natural resources: Useful raw materials that we get from the Earth.
2. Examples for natural resources: Land water, Minerals, Forests or grooves.
3. Examples for Manmade resources: Hospital, Markets, industries, Banks, schools, temples, mosques, Churches theatres, clubs etc.
4. Physical Human Resources: The people in the society.
5. Mental human resources: The experience and the indigenous knowledge of the elders and the people like the traditional practices, farm practices, child care and health practices, traditional recipes etc..

ASSIGNMENT

1. Classify the resources available in the rural areas with examples.
2. Explain about the rural resources available in the rural areas.

Text books

1. Chitambar, J.B. (1973). Introductory rural sociology. New York, John Wilex and Sons.
2. Desai, A.R. (1978). Rural sociology in India. Bombay, Popular Prakashan, 5th Rev. ed.

REFERENCES

1. Doshi, S.L. (2007). Rural sociology. Delhi Rawat Publishers.
2. Jayapalan, N. (2002). Rural sociology. New Delhi, Altanic Publishers.
3. Sharma, K.L. (1997). Rural society in India. Delhi, Rawat Publishers.

SOCIAL INSTITUIONS
Social institutions

• have been created by human beings
• from social relationships in society
• to meet such basic needs as
  • stability,
  • law and order, and
  • clearly defined roles of authority and decision making.

Five major institutions in rural society have emerged because of such needs –

• political,
• educational,
• economic,
• family and
• religious and culture

“An institution is

• an organised system of social relationships
• which embodies certain common values and procedures and
• meets certain basic needs of society”.

“Social institutions are formal cultural structures devised to meet basic social needs”.

An institution is

• a relatively permanent structure of social patterns
• of roles and relations that people enact in certain sanctioned and unified ways
• for the purpose of satisfying basic social needs”
• is an organized system of social relationships
• which represents certain common values and procedures and
• meets certain basic needs of the society.
• They are culturally approved patterns of behavior
• including prescribed roles and procedures and
• are grouped to satisfy some basic social needs.
• They have continued long enough to be considered as permanent institutions.

COMPOSITION AND FUNCTION OF INSTITUTIONS
Institutions may vary in their purpose and in other ways but also exhibit strong similarities.

Institutional problems such as

• the maintenance of loyalty,
• formulation of codes of behavior, and
• the assignment of authority often are commonly shared.

Common aspects in the composition and function of institutions:

1. Institutions consist of material cultural objects,

• Specified patterns of behavior, a set of attitudes, roles and expectations.
• Cultural objects of a material nature that are a part of institutions include symbols such as the flag of a nation, a crescent, a cross, a star or a thrisul (trident) in the case of religious institutions; and a ring in case of the institution of marriage.
• All institutions develop symbols to remind members of institutions of its existence and their loyalty to it.

2. Institution must prepare their members for effective participation.

• Each role usually has associated with it specified and accepted formal codes of behavior;
• an individual may have to go through ritualistic patterns of behavior in accordance with the role,
• Example: Marriage ceremony involves the repetition of marriage vows.
• However, sworn allegiance, or vows, to maintain certain patterns of behavior as required does not guarantee in practice the fulfillment of these codes.
• Individuals may be faithful to the code or violate it.

3. In addition to defining roles, institutions define procedures of action and reasons for action:

• Ideologies are useful to institutions not in terms of correctness,
• but in ability to inspire loyalty and cooperation of participants of an institution.

4. Institutions function in achieving for people realization of some of their basic needs, such as

• child-rearing in the family institution;
• or securing of food, shelter and clothing in economic institutions.

5. Institutions have a dual structure:

• One structure consists of the set of norms of expectations, rules and procedures
• that direct operation within the institution in keeping with the purpose for which it was established.
• The second, of individuals or personnel – the network of roles, persons and statuses through which the institution carries out its activities. 

Institutions may be closely or loosely structured depending on whether authority is highly centralized or highly decentralized.

A greater freedom of action and less rigid definition of roles exist in the latter. Between the two extremes may be variations.

The most effective structure for an institution depends on the purpose and goal of the institution, the situation and prevailing conditions.

An army in peace time may in actual practice have a looser structure than an army at war.

6. Institutions have manifest and latent functions.

• The manifest functions are those deliberately intended to be the functions of the institution in accordance with the purpose which it is intended to serve.
• Thus the manifest functions of a school are
• the provision of basic education
• imparting knowledge, skills and attitudes to children
• so as to influence their behaviour along desirable lines
• in order to make them responsible citizens and members of society.
• The latent functions of an institution are those which are unintended.
• A latent function of a school may be the development in children of loyalties to certain ideologies.

7. Institutions function as gigantic mechanisms exerting social control on individuals who are a part of them. The individual usually is constrained to conform to the specific prescribed roles that he fills.
8. An institution generally has more than one function and does in fact constitute an amalgamation of functions.
9. The elements that compose an institution have been divided into four parts:

• Common reciprocating attitudes of individuals and their conventional behaviour patterns.
• Cultural objects of symbolic value e; objects charged with sentimental meaning to which human behaviour has been conditioned.
• Cultural objects possessing utilitarian value, e. material objects that satisfy creature wants and through conditioned response and habit attach the other parts of the pattern to a specific location; objects called property.
• Oral or written language symbols that preserve the descriptions and specifications of the patterns of interrelationship among the other three parts-attitudes, symbolic culture traits, and utilitarian culture traits or real property.
• When the formulation is compactly organized it is called a code.

10. The generalised functions of institutions may be divided into those that affect the individual positively and those whose effect is negative.

(a) Functions with a positive effect:

1. Inasmuch as institutional behaviour and attitudes are already described and defined, social behaviour required by the individual is simplified since it does not have to be carefully thought out and formulated. Institutionalised behaviour becomes almost automatic.
2. Roles, statuses and other forms of social relations are already prescribed and defined. The individual hence does not ·have to take time to formulate these roles but is in advance aware of these roles, their involvement and expectations.
3. lnstitutions serve to provide coordination and stability to culture and give a sense of security to the individual not only in terms of the present but also of the future.
4. Institutions serve as mechanisms of social control and exert pressures for conformity on individuals in society in various The individual therefore knows what is expected of him and the consequence of deviance. 

(b) Functions with a negative effect:

1. Because of their rigidity and relative permanence, institutions sometimes stand as obstruction in the path of social progress. Individuals espousing different ideas are thus considered deviants.
2. For the same reason institutions tend to conserve social values that may be inconsistent with the actual behaviour of people, and in addition tend to conserve patterns of behaviour even when the underlying values have become outmoded.
3. An institution may therefore function in such a way that is not in the interests of the individual. Even though customary ways may be outmoded and unjust-requiring change responsibilities are so diffused in an institution, to initiate and effect change is a difficult task. It may be easier to tolerate the discomforts of the status quo.

Many factors may be responsible for the ineffective operation or the malfunctioning of institutions.

Four major sources of ineffective operation have been identified:

(a) Lack of clarity and understanding of the conception of roles in the institution.

• Individuals do not have the same conception of their own role that others in the institution do.
• This may be due to internal influences such as a failure in communications between individuals in society.

(b) Influence of outside pressures and outside interests.

• External influences and pressures also prevent identical conception of roles and role expectations within an institution.
• Sudden pressures occur when the social environment opposes activity and functioning of an institution, perhaps because it has outlived its original purpose.
• Such an institution is said to be ineffective because it suffers from cu1tural-lag.
• Further, involvement of members in roles outside of an institution is one of the most important causes for its ineffective operation.
• A person functions not in a single role within a single institution, but in various roles in and outside of institutions.

(c) Roles of members of institutions may not be interesting:

The activities of the institution may satisfy the needs of only a few of its members.

(d) The changing roles and functions of institutions make smooth operation toward the achievement of consistent goals very difficult.

• With its establishment for a definite purpose or function, an institution builds up a hierarchy of roles, rules, and procedures for the achievement of the purpose or functions. Such an establishment of roles and rules is referred do as a
• As functions expand in size and number so also does bureaucracy, and when roles, rules, procedures become numerous and rigid, the very superstructure of bureaucracy, set up to achieve a purpose, actually complicate and otherwise obstructs such achievement.
• While the above are major types of malfunctioning of institutions, there are others lesser in nature and importance.

Basicaly, there are five social institutions both in rural and urban areas:

Family

• The most multifunctional of all the institutions in the society
• It performs the functions of procreation, upbringing and socialization
• It provides economic and social security to the family members.
• The members perform different roles in decision making, participation in physical activities relating to earning and home making.
• Within the basic institution of family are secondary institutions such as
  • Engagement,
  • Marriage,
  • Courtship,
  • Relationships

Religion

• Religion constitutes a set of beliefs regarding the ultimate power in the universe, the ideal and proper pattern of behavior and ceremonial ways of expressing these beliefs.
• It provides a foundation for mores and sanction of taboos in certain societies as they are
  • A set of beliefs regarding the ultimate power in the universe
  • A set of beliefs regarding the ideal and proper pattern of behaviour
  • A set of ceremonial ways of expressing these beliefs
• It provides a means of strength and determination to withstand crisis and ups and downs in life.
• The secondary institutions within the major institution of religion include
  • Rituals
  • Forms of worship and
  • organised groups for propagating religions

Culture                                     

• It is a complex whole of knowledge, belief, art, morals, laws,, customs, and other capabilities and habits acquired by the people as member of society.
• It is social heritage, inclusive of material non material aspects.
• House, food, clothing, tools, equipments and other material items are material aspects while family, kin group, caste group, education, political organizations, government, economic system, religion etc are non material aspects.

Government

• As a political institution it administers the regulatory functions of law and order, thus maintain security in the society
• Moulds the behavior of the society through its form of governing.
• Plans and executes development programmes for the welfare of the people.
• Seeks the participation of people for effective implementation of the programmes.
• The secondary institutions in this institutions are such as
  • Military systems
  • Police forces
  • Legal systems
  • Diplomatic relations with the other countries

Economy or maintenance

• Provides basic physical sustenance of the society by meeting the need for food, shelter and clothing and other necessary supplies and services.
• Promotes and strengthens economic institutions like agriculture, industry, marketing, credit and banking.
• Included are the economic institutions of production like
  • Agriculture,
  • Industry,
  • The distribution,
  • Exchange and
  • Consumption of commodities,
  • Goods and services necessary for human survival
• Secondary institutions included within the major economic institutions are
  • Credit and banking systems,
  • Advertising,
  • Cooperatives etc.

Education

• It socializes the individual right from family to formal educational institutions.
• It develops knowledge, skill and attitudes of the individuals and moulds them as competent members of the society.
• It tremendously influences the behaviour of the individuals, by widening scope for receptive ideas.

GLOSSARY

Social institutions are formal cultural structures devised to meet basic social needs.

Family is the most multifunctional of all the institutions in the society.

Religion constitutes a set of beliefs regarding the ultimate power in the universe, the ideal and proper pattern of behavior and ceremonial ways of expressing these beliefs.

Culture is a complex whole of knowledge, belief, art, morals, laws,, customs, and other capabilities and habits acquired by the people as member of society.

Government is a political institution it administers the regulatory functions of law and order, thus maintain security in the society.

Economy or maintenance is provision basic physical sustenance of the society by meeting the need for food, shelter and clothing and other necessary supplies and services.

Education is socialisation of the individual right from family to formal educational institutions.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Explain the composition of social institutions and their functions?
2. Write down the physical and symbolic traits of social institutions.
3. List down the reasons for malfunctioning of the social institutions.

TEXT BOOKS

1. Chitambar, J.B. (1973). Introductory rural sociology. New York, John Wilex and Sons.
2. Desai, A.R. (1978). Rural sociology in India. Bombay, Popular Prakashan, 5th ed.

REFERENCES

1. Doshi, S.L. (2007). Rural sociology. Delhi Rawat Publishers.
2. Jayapalan, N. (2002). Rural sociology. New Delhi, Altanic Publishers.
3. Sharma, K.L. (1997). Rural society in India. Delhi, Rawat Publishers.
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institution
5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNVVHMVET20

BASIC CONCEPTS OF RURAL SOCIOLOGY

Concepts are important to give precision in the use of words in any field of science and to convey ideas that are contained therein.

They are of particular importance in Rural Sociology and other social sciences because the same words may have other meanings in common speech, words such as community, culture and society.

The sociological concepts, are list the most important of these and comment briefly on their significance and practical utility.

These concepts are not the final subject matter of Rural Sociology, but are intellectual tools for analysing social situations in rural society.

There are two types of concepts in rural sociology:

I. Structural concepts: Family, Group, Community, Society

II. Functional Concepts- Socialization, Social system, Social stratification, Social institutions, Social interaction, Culture, Values and beliefs, Culture.

1. Society is

• a group of people who have lived together,
• sharing common values and general interests,
• long enough to be considered by others and by them as a unit.
• Rural Sociology studies such societies when they exist in rural areas.

2. Structure is

• the systematic arrangement characteristic of a society,
• the smaller parts arranged to form a larger discernible unit.
• A society’s structure is composed of such parts as groups, institutions
• Example: Government and schools, Neighbourhoods and communities, Organisations and collectivities.
• Constituent parts may differ one from another in type and number; thus a group might consist of certain individuals drawn together for the common purpose of collective work-harvesting crops for example-or it might consist of members of one sex alone, a men’s smoking group or a group of village women at the village well in rural India.
• One aspect of structural analysis is careful identification of the kind and number of component parts (which may be analysed into further smaller parts), until all components are laid bare for examination.
• Not only are kind and number of parts important in structural analysis; the relations among component parts are also significant.
• The individuals in a farmers’ working group will relate to and influence one another in various ways which affect not only the operation of their group, but also influence other groups and the structure of rural society as a whole.

3. Function is

• an aspect of the relationship
• between components mentioned above.
• may involve the services provided by one component to another within the total structure.
• In analogy, the function of the oil pump in a tractor is to ensure lubrication of moving parts. The function of the village school is to provide sound educational facilities to village children so that they acquire the skills, knowledge, and attitudes necessary to citizens and members of society.
• The concept of function may also apply, in a mathematical sense, to relations among variables where changes in one are governed by changes in the other.
• For example, the density of population in a given geographical area will be governed by the size of population.
• Increase in density will be a function of increase in size of population.

4. Change means that

• some aspect of function or structure
• differs at later times from what it was at earlier times.
• Change involves the processes of disorganisation, organisation, or reorganisation.
• When one component changes, it may no longer fit with other parts and changes or modification of other parts and reorganisation of the whole structure may result.
• For example, the Hindu caste system in an Indian village may function smoothly until certain caste members (components of the system) change their caste, occupation by working in a nearby sugar mill.
• This change will result in disorganisation of the structure of the system, and possibly, later reorganisation.
• Similar changes can occur in other aspects of the structure and functions of other components of the rural society.

5. Groups are defined as

• two or more people in reciprocal interaction with one another.
• It is not incorrect to say that the entire sociological field revolves around group relations;
• Hence the importance of this concept for comprehension of social phenomena.
• For Example: Self Help Groups

6. Institutions

• are “crystallized mechanisms”-
• clearly defined ways in which society meets its needs that have existed long enough to become embedded in the social structure.
• Examples: Government bodies, school systems, the Panchayat or village council, and any religious system.

7. Organisations are

• groups with special concerns and interests that have developed a structure
• involving specific roles for various members, and
• that have a more or less formal set of rules and regulations for operation.
• One example in India is the Vikas Mandal or village development organisation.

8. Communities and neighborhoods are

• groups of people living within a adjoining geographic area, sharing common values and a feeling of belonging to the group,
• who come together in the common concerns of daily life.
• A society may include many communities and even more neighbourhoods (a smaller entity than the community characterised by much more frequent face to face contacts).
• A community can be
  • a village, a caste-community which cuts across village boundaries, or
  • a college campus.
• Examples of neighborhoods are Hamlets and the Purwa Or Tola fringe settlements in rural areas of India.

9. Culture is

• actually an anthropological concept
• which has been described as the continually changing pattern of learned behaviour and products of learned behavior transmitted and shared by the members of a society.
• It is the total way of life of people-their pattern of thoughts and behaviour-and constitutes the man-made environment as opposed to the natural environment.
• Within this wide area called culture fit sub concepts such as
• culture trait, the smallest component and unit of analysis;
• culture complex, the organisation of culture traits-around one dominant trait;
• culture area, the geographic area within which a common culture exists; and
• culture lag, the time difference between some logical change and the resulting change in culture.

GLOSSARY:

1. Structural concepts: Family, Group, Community, Society
2. Functional Concepts- Socialization, Social system, Social stratification, Social institutions, Social interaction, Culture, Values and beliefs, Culture
3. Society is a group of people who lived together sharing common values and general interests.
4. Structure: The systematic arrangement characteristic of a society the smaller parts to form a larger discernible unit.
   Example: Government and schools, Neighbourhoods and communities, Organisations and collectivities

5. Function: An aspect of the relationship between components mentioned above may involve the services provided by one component to another within the total structure.
   Example: The function of the village school is to provide sound educational facilities to village children to acquire the skills, knowledge, and attitudes necessary to be citizens and members of society.

6. Change: Some aspect of function or structure differs at later times from what it was at earlier times.
7. For example: Hindu caste system in an Indian village may function smoothly until certain caste members (components of the system) change their caste, occupation by working in a nearby industry.
8. Groups: Two or more people in reciprocal interaction with one another.
   For Example: Self Help Groups.

9. Institutions: Crystallized mechanisms clearly defined ways in which society meets its needs that have existed long enough to become embedded in the social structure. Examples: Government bodies, school systems, the Panchayat or village council, and any religious system.
10. Organisations: Groups with special concerns and interests that have developed a structure involving specific roles for various members, and that have a more or less formal set of rules and regulations for operation.
    Example in India is the Gram Vikas Mandal or village development organisation.

11. Communities and neighbourhoods: Groups of people living within a adjoining geographic area, sharing common values and a feeling of belonging to the group, who come together in the common concerns of daily life.
    Example of communities are a village, caste community, a college campus.
    Examples of neighbourhoods side by side villages in rural areas.

12. Culture: An anthropological concept which has been described as the continually changing pattern of learned behaviour and products of learned behaviour transmitted and shared by the members of a society.

• Culture trait: The smallest component and unit of analysis in an individual;
• Culture complex: The organisation of culture traits as around one dominant trait;
• Culture area: The geographic area within which a common culture exists; and
• Culture lag: The time difference between some logical change and the resulting change in culture.

ASSIGNMENT

1. List down and write the meaning of the basic concepts of Rural Sociology.

FAMILY

Family is a group defined by a sex relationship sufficiently specific and enduring to provide for the procreation and upbringing of children.

According anthropologists, a family is ”

• a group characterized by
• common residence,
• economic cooperation and reproduction.

It includes

• adults of both sexes,
• at least two of whom maintain a socially approved sexual relationship, and
• one or more of their children of their own or adopted
• by the sexually cohabit adults.”

May 15 is celebrated as the International Day of the Family. This day highlights

• the importance of families.
• It aims at promoting equality,
• bringing about a fuller sharing of domestic responsibilities and employment opportunities

The Family as a Functional Unit
Every association of people; it be a state, a nation, or a tribe — has its own distinctive culture, its modes of living and thought, which are developed as a response to the peculiar circumstances of the environment, natural and ideological.

Family is

• the agency through which the impressionable rising generation is made familiar with such traditions.
• It teaches the individual what situations to anticipate, how to behave and what behaviour to expect, by giving one the gifts of language and dress which integrate within one’s cultural ethos.
• It facilitates adjustment to people and groups outside the family circle.
• Family plays an important role in transmission of the cultural traditions from one generation to another.
• It acts as an educative unit and a socio-cultural agency.
• The importance of this aspect lies in the fact that children all over the world get their earliest instruction in the family beginning with language.

STRUCTURE OF THE FAMILY
The structure of the family is mainly based on

• The husband-wife relationship.
• The familial structure is procreation.
• The common residence.
• is related to economic system.

The present urban industrial system and the occupations have encouraged the structure of nuclear and individualistic family.

In the tribal, agrarian and rural system of economy where family is still a unit of production, we generally find large and joint families, apart from husband, wife and their procreations.

These families generally include father, mother, brothers, their wives, unmarried sisters and others.  The Indian joint family is the best example of this type.

The family cannot be understood through clusters of members such as husband, wife, their children and relatives.  These members develop affective relationship and perform their roles through social values, customs and traditions.

The structure of family possess following features:

1. Nature of family – Nuclear, Joint or extended.
2. Members and ancestors.
3. Institution of Marriage,
4. Differentiation of the roles of the family members
5. Origin and succession
6. Property of family
7. Family occupation
8. Nomenclature
9. Residence
10. Customs, traditions, patterns
11. Authority

The main functions of family are

1. Procreation- Reproduction is the main function of any society, either socially or in a biological way, or both.
2. Providing sustenance and care of dependants especially children and the aged.
3. It acts as an educative unit and a socio-cultural agency. The importance of this aspect lies in the fact that children all over the world get their earliest instruction in the family beginning with language. Furnishing education for the young, thus passing down the accumulated knowledge, traditions, values and techniques. Family plays an important role in transmission of the cultural traditions from one generation to another.
   1. Furnishing status to the family members
   2. It teaches the individual what situations to anticipate, how to behave and what behaviour to expect, by giving one the gifts of language and dress which integrate within one’s cultural ethos.
   3. It facilitates adjustment to people and groups outside the family circle.
   4. Providing cooperative interaction necessary for production or earning a living, Consumption, recreation, worship and companionship.

Functions of the family

The family as a social institution performs several functions. They can be Primary and secondary functions:

THE PRIMARY FUNCTIONS: Some of the functions of family are basic to its continued existence. They may also be regarded as primary functions of family.

They are

1. Stable satisfaction of sex need
2. Reproduction or procreation
3. Production and rearing of the child
4. Provision of Home
5. Family – An instrument of culture transmission and an Agent of Socialization
6. Status ascribing function
7. Affectional function

 (1) Stable satisfaction of Sex Need: Sex done is powerful in human beings. Man is susceptible to sexual stimulation throughout his life. The sex need is irresistible also. It motivates man to seek an established basis of its satisfaction. Family regulates the sexual behaviour of man by its agent, the marriage. The Hindu Law gives Manu, and Vatsyayana, the author of Kamasutra, have stated that sexual satisfaction is one of the main aims of family life.

2. Reproduction or Procreation: Reproductive activity is carried on by all lower and higher animals. But it is an activity that needs control or regulation. The result of sexual satisfaction is reproduction. The process of reproduction is institutionalizes in the family. Hence it assumes a regularity and stability that all societies recognize as desirable. By fulfilling its reproductive function family has made it possible to have the propagation of species and the perpetuation of the human race.

3. Production and Rearing of the child: The family gives the individual his life and a chance to survive. We won our life to the family. The human infancy is a prolonged one. the child which is helpless at the time of birth is given the needed protection of the family. Family is an institution; no other institution can as efficiently bring up the child as can the family. This can be referred to as the function of ‘maintenance’ also.

4. Provision of Home for Family: provides the home for its members. The desire for home is strongly felt in men and women. Children are born and brought up in Homes only. Even the parents who work outside are dependent on home for comfort, protection and peace. Home remains still the ‘Sweet’ home

5. Family an Instrument of Culture Transmission and An Agent of Socialization: The family guarantees not only the biological continuity of the human race but also the cultural continuity of the society of which it is a part. It transmits ideas and ideologies, folkways and mores, customs and traditions, beliefs and values from one generation to the next. The family is an agent of socialisation also. Socialisation is its service to the individual. The family indoctrinates the child with the values, the morals, beliefs and ideals of society. It prepares its children for participation in larger world and acquaints them with a large culture. It is a chief agency which prepares the new generation for life in community. It emotionally conditions the child. It lays down the basic plan of personality. Indeed, it shapes the personality of the child. Family is a mechanism for disciplining the child in terms of cultural goals. In short, it transforms the infant barbarian into the civilized adult.

6. Status ascribing function: The family also performs a pair of function.

(i) Status ascription for the individual and

(ii) Societal identification for the individual.

Statuses are divided in to “Ascribed and Achieved’’. The family provides the ascribed statuses. Two of these, age and sex are biological ascriptions. Others, however, are social ascriptions. It is the family that serves almost exclusively as the conferring agency or institution. People recognize us by our names, and our names are given to us by our family. Here, the family is the source of our social identification. Various statuses are initially ascribed by our families. Our ethnic status, our nationality status, our religious status or residential status, or class status sometimes our political status and our educational statuses well are all conferred upon us by our families. Of course, these may be changed later. Wherever statuses are inherited as in the case of royalty and mobility it is the family that serves as the controlling mechanism. Status ascription and social identification are two faces of the same process. The importance of family in this regard can hardly be exaggerated.

7. Affectional Function: Man has his physical, as well as mental needs. He requires the fulfillment of both of these needs. Family is an institution which provides the mental or emotional satisfaction and security to its individual members. It is the family which provides the most intimate and the dearest relationship for all its members. The individual first experiences affection in his parental family as parents and siblings offer him love, sympathy and affection. Lack of affection actually damages an infant’s ability to thrive. A person who has never been loved is seldom happy.

SECONDARY FUNCTIONS OF FAMILY: In addition to the above described essential or Primary Functions the family performs some secondary or non-essential functions in some way or the other. Of these, the following may be noted

(1) Economic Functions

(2) Educational Functions

(3) Religious Functions

(4) The Re-creational functions

(1) Economic Function: The family fulfills the economic needs of its members. This has been the traditional function of family. Previously, the family was an economic unit. Goods were produced in the family. Men used to work in family or in farms for the production of goods. Family members used to work together for this purpose. It was to a great extent self-sufficient. But today the situation has changed. The family members do not work together at home. They are engaged in different economic activities outside the same. They are no longer held together by division of labour. The economic role of modern family is considerably modified. The process of industrialization has affected family. The centre of production has moved from home to the factory. The factory is given job only to the individual worker and not to the entire family. The factory is producing goods which are consumed with in the family. Thus, family has become more a consuming unit than a producing one. Its members are busy with “earning wages” rather than with “making a living”. Family is thus slowly transferring its economic functions to the external agencies. Still, the institution of property is embedded with the family.

(2) Educational Functions: The family provides the basis for the child’s formal learning. In spite of great changes, the family still gives the child his basic training in the social attitudes and habits important to adult participation in social life. When the child grows up, he learns to manage situations outside the home and family. He extends his interests to other groups. With all this his intelligences his emotions, and his social habits develop until he wears himself from the original dependence on the mother, father and other family members

(3) Religious functions: The family is a centre for the religious training of the children. The children learn from their parents various religious virtues. Previously, the home was also centers of religious quest. The family used to teach the children the religious values, moral precepts, way to worshipping God, etc. The family meets the spiritual needs of its members. It is through the family that the religious inheritance is passed on to the next generation.

(4) The Recreational Functions: AT one time, recreation was largely family based. It fostered a close solidarity. Reading aloud, Hoisting relatives, family reunions, church socials, singing, dancing, playing indoor games etc., brought together the entire family. Elders would orgnise social gathering among themselves in each other’s homes. Children would organise their own recreations among themselves or together with other children. Often parents and children would join together in the same recreational activities. The effect of this on the cohesion of the family was considerable. Recreation is now increasingly orgnaized outside the family. Modern recreation is not designed for family – wide participation. Whether in the form of movies, sports events, plays, cricket, ‘Kabaddi’, Tennis, dinner parties or Yakshagana, it is designed for the couple or individual participation.

Glossary:

1. Family: A group defined by a sex relationship sufficiently specific and enduring to provide for the procreation and upbringing of children
2. Family: A group characterized by common residence, economic cooperation and reproduction is.
3. International Day of the Family: May 15th
4. Primary functions of a family are

• sex need,
• reproduction,
• procreation,
• rearing of child,
• provision of home,
• culture transmission,
• agent of socialisation,
• status ascribing affection.

5. Secondary functions of a family are

• economic,
• educational,
• religious and
• recreational.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Justify family as functional unit.
2. Explain the structure of a family.
3. Classify the functions of family.

MARRIAGE

According to Encyclopedia Britannica, “Marriage is a physical, legal and moral union between man and woman in complete community life for the establishment of a family.”

Marriage

• involves choice of mates.
• allows the social relationship in which sexual expression is expected to take place
• for the major purpose of procreation.
• is sanctioned by the society.
• provides the social systems within which social roles and statuses are prescribed.

Characteristics of Marriage:
Marriage may have the following characteristics:

(1) Marriage is a universal social institution. It is found in almost all societies and at all stages of development.

(2) Marriage is a permanent bond between husband and wife. It is designed to fulfill the social, psychological, biological and religious aims.

(3) Marriage is a specific relationship between two individuals of opposite sex and based on mutual rights and obligations. Relationship is enduring.

(4) Marriage requires social approval. The relationship between men and women must have social approval. Without which marriage is not valid.

(5) Marriage establishes family. Family helps in providing facilities for the procreation and upbringing of children.

(6) Marriage creates mutual obligations between husband and wife. The couple fulfill their mutual obligations on the basis of customs or rules.

(7) Marriage is always associated with some civil and religious ceremony. This social and religious ceremony provides validity to marriage. Though modern marriage performed in courts still it requires certain religious or customary practices.

(8) Marriage regulates sex relationship according to prescribed customs and laws.

(9) Marriage has certain symbols like ring, vermillion, special cloths, special sign before the house etc.

Types of Marriage:

• As a universal social institution marriage is found to exist in all societies and at all stages of development.
• Types or forms of marriage vary from society to society.
• Types or forms of marriage in different communities, societies and cultural groups differ according to their customs, practices and systems of thought.
• In some societies marriage is a religious sacrament whereas in others it is a social contract.

However, there are several types of marriage which is classified on different basis.

(A) On the basis of number of mates:

On the basis of number of mates marriage may be classified into three types such as Monogamy, Polygamy and Endogamy or group marriage. This can be known from the following diagram.

(1) Monogamy:

Monogamy is an ideal, widespread and rational type of marriage.

It is found in all civilized societies.

Monogamy refers to a marriage of one man with one woman at a time.

This type of marriage is normally unbreakable in nature.

It continues till death.

Today the principle of monogamy i.e. one husband and one wife is practised and emphasised throughout the world.

 (2) Polygamy:

Polygamy is a type of marriage in which there is plurality of partners.

It allows a man to marry more than one woman or a woman to marry more than one man at a time.

Polygamy is of three types such as

• Polygamy,
• Polyandry and
• Endogamy or group marriage.

(i) Polygamy:

• Polygamy is a type of marriage in which a man marries more than one wife at a time.
• In this type of marriage each wife has her separate household and the husband visits them in turn.
• It was a preferred form of marriage in ancient Indian society.
• But now it was not in practice among majority of population.
• But it is now found among few tribal’s such as Naga, Gond and Baiga.
• Economic and political cause was mainly responsible for polygamy.
• Besides man’s taste for variety, enforced celibacy, Barrenness of women more women population etc. are some of the cause of polygamy.

 (ii) Polyandry:

• Polyandry is a very rare type of marriage in present day.
• In this type of marriage a woman marries several men at a time.
• Polyandry is a form of union in which a woman has more than one husband at a time or in which brothers share a wife or wives in common.
• At present it is found among some of the tribes like toda, khasi and nayars.
• Polyandry is divided into two types such as fraternal polyandry and non-fraternal polyandry.

(a) Fraternal Polyandry:

• When several brothers share a common wife it is called as fraternal polyandry. Draupadi’s marriage to Pandabs is fine example of fraternal polyandry.
• The determination of father is associated with some rituals.
• At present time this type of marriage is practised by some tribals like toda and khasi.

(b) Non-fraternal Polyandry:

• It is just opposite of fraternal polyandry.
• In this type of marriage husbands of a woman is not necessarily brother to each other.
• This type of marriage is found among the Nayars of Kerala, Wife goes to spend some time with each of her husband.
• So long as a woman lives with one of her husbands, the others have no claim on her.
• This mainly happens due to scarcity of women.

(iii) Endogamy or Group Marriage:

• Endogamy is otherwise known as group marriage.
• In this type of marriage a group of men marry a group of women at a time.
• Every woman is the wife of every man belonging to the particular groups.
• This type of marriage is found among some tribes of New Guinea and Africa.

(B) On the basis of choice of mate or on the basis of rules of mate selection:

Marriage may be divided into two types on the basis of choice of mate or on the basis of the rules of choice of mate i.e.

• Endogamous and
• Exogamous marriages

Endogamy is divided into four sub types such as caste, sub-caste, varna and tribal endogamy.

Similarly exogamous marriage may be divided into four sub-types such as Gotra, Pravar, Sapinda and village exogamy.

All this can be presented in the following diagram.

(1) Endogamy or endogamous marriage:

• Endogamy or endogamous marriage refers to the marriage within one’s own group such as within one’s own caste, sub-caste, varna and tribe.
• In other words there are several types of endogamous marriage such as caste endogamy, sub-caste endogamy, varna endogamy and tribal endogamy.

 (ii) Exogamy or Exogamous marriage:

It is just opposite to the endogamy or endogamous marriage system.

It refers to a system of marriage in which an individual has to marry outside one’s own group such as gotra, pravara, sapinda or village.

This is a sound marriage system which leads to the creation of healthy and intelligent children.

Glossary:

Marriage:

• The social relationship involving choice of mates, sexual relationship, procreation sanctioned by the society.
• a universal social institution.
• a permanent bond between the husband and wife.
• requires social approval.
• establishes family.
• is a specific relationship between two individuals of opposite sex
• based on mutual rights and obligations.
• always associated with some civil and religious ceremony.
• regulates sex relationship according to prescribed customs and laws.
• has certain symbols like ring, vermillion, special cloths, special sign before the house etc.

1. Monogamy: A marriage of one man with one woman at a time.
2. Polygamy: A type of marriage in which there is plurality of partners.
3. Polyandry: A type of marriage a woman marries several men at a time.
4. Endogamy is divided into four sub types such as caste, sub-caste, varna and tribal endogamy.
5. Exogamy: a system of marriage in which an individual has to marry outside one’s own group.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Write the characteristics of marriage in a society
2. Compare the types of marriages existing in Indian society.

TYPES AND FORMS OF FAMILIES

The main functions of family are

1. Procreation- Reproduction is the main function of any society, either socially or in a biological way, or both.
2. Providing sustenance and care of dependants especially children and the aged.
3. It acts as an educative unit and a socio-cultural agency.

The importance of this aspect lies in the fact that children all over the world get their earliest instruction in the family beginning with language. Furnishing education for the young, thus passing down the accumulated knowledge, traditions, values and techniques.

Family plays an important role in transmission of the cultural traditions from one generation to another.

1. Furnishing status to the family members
2. It teaches the individual what situations to anticipate, how to behave and what behaviour to expect, by giving one the gifts of language and dress which integrate within one’s cultural ethos.
3. It facilitates adjustment to people and groups outside the family circle.
4. Providing cooperative interaction necessary for production or earning a living, Consumption, recreation, worship and companionship. 

Categorization of families 

1. According to blood relations living together
   Nuclear or primary family consisting of husband, wife and their unmarried Children.
   Joint family, which is an aggregation of more than one primary family, on the basis of close blood relationships and common residence. A number of generations may be living together.
2. According to stage of life
   Family of origin or family of orientation is the family in which one is born and gets initial orientation to the norms of the family and the society
   Family of procreation is the family which one sets up after marriage.
3. According to numerousness of husbands and wives
   Polygamous family is the family where a man marries more than one wife
   Polyandrous family where a woman is married to more than one man, usually several brothers.
4. According to rule of lineage
   Patri-lineal family, in which determination of descent and property inheritance take place along the male line
   Matri-lineal family, in which determination of descent and property inheritance take place along the female line
5. According to rule of residence
   Patri-local family is one where the married couple and their off springs put up with the husbands family or in a new household set up by the husband.
   Matri-local family is one where the husband goes to live with the family of his wife and the family line goes with the mother.

Because women are not educated and cannot hold a prestigious job, they take on the most physically difficult and undesirable jobs. A typical day for a woman in an agricultural position lasts from 4am to 8pm with only an hour break in the middle. Compared to a man’s day, which is from 5am to 10am and then from 3pm to 5pm. Most agricultural women are overworked with no maternity leave or special breaks for those who are pregnant. Plus women do majority of the manual labor that uses a lot of energy compared to the men who do mostly machine operated . Even though women work twice as many hours as men, the men say that “women eat food and do nothing.” This is mainly because the work the women perform does not require a lot of skill and are smaller tasks.

 CHANGING PATTERN OF RURAL FAMILIES

Structural changes

• Nuclearity is increasing and jointness is decreasing
• A new classification has emerged among the joint families as large, medium and small joint families
• Small joint families are, of typical rural families, while, large and medium are showing a complex nature.
• The proportion of nuclear families is almost that of number of joint families
• The radius of kinship within the circle of jointness is becoming smaller
• Higher caste groups are containing with joint families are continuing with joint families, while lower caste groups show higher incidences of nuclear families
• Compared to urban families, rural joint families are showing distinctive features, which are mostly situational
• Politics and economy are influencing rural family structure more significantly than any other factor
• Distant relatives are less important to the present generation than they were to their parents and grand parents
• Differential learning of brothers is creating tension in joint families
• System of social security, savings, extended earning opportunities are leading to nuclear families 

Interactional changes

• Power allocation to women in decision making is getting recognized
• Emancipation of wife/ women is coming to light
• Husbands are playing instrumental and wives expressive role
• The assumption of economic role and the education of wife are making women potential
• The source of power has shifted from culture to resource, where resource is anything that one partner may make available to the other, thus helping the later satisfy her/his needs.
• The authority of grandparents/ elders of the family is decreasing and they are not influential
• The relationship between daughter-in-law and Parents-in-law is changing, more significantly between DIL-MIL and less significantly between DIL-FIL
• Younger generation is clinging more towards individuality, but spirit of individualism is not growing
• Consanguineous relationship does not have any primacy over conjugal relationship
• Culture, ideology and resources are showing significant impact on relationship in -terms of awareness, knowledge and access

Development changes

• Education is gaining importance
• Mass communication media, especially newspaper, television and rural bulletins on agriculture and allied sectors are in use by vast majority of rural population.
• Migration in search of wage and gainful employment due to concentration of – industries and other business sectors, has become vulnerable feature of rural development.
• Mobility to towns and cities for higher education of children is increasing, thereby decreasing attention towards agriculture. Health consciousness and need for health care is also another factor for mobility.
• Diversification in rural livelihoods is rapidly occurring
• Political participation as well as awareness is increasing
• Every development issue of rural life is being tackled through some policy and programme. Thus, the participation of rural population in rural development programmes is
• Mortality and morbidity rates are in declining direction might be due to increased awareness and access to facilities.

GLOSSARY:

• According to blood relations living together families: Nuclear and Joint family.
• Family of procreation: The family which one sets up after marriage.
• Polygamous family: The family where a man marries more than one wife.
• Polyandrous family: Family where a woman is married to more than one man, usually several brothers.
• Patri-lineal family: Family of descent and property inheritance take place along the male line.
• Matri-lineal family: Family of descent and property inheritance take place along the female line.
• Patri-local family: The married couple and their off springs put up with the husbands family or in a new household set up by the husband.
• Matri-local family: The husband goes to live with the family of his wife and the family line goes with the mother.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Categorise the types of families according to various situations.
2. Explicate the trends in changes of the family system in India.

GROUP, COMMUNITY AND SOCIETY

GROUP
A group is unit of two or more people in reciprocal communication and interaction with each other and interaction with each other.

Why groups are formed?

People are associated as groups are formed because of

1. Common heritage
2. Territory shared in common
3. Similar body characteristics
4. Common interests

Characteristic features of groups

1. Promotion of group discipline
2. Existence of loyalty among the members
3. Adherence to group responsibility
4. Group or peer pressure.

Characteristics of the group:

1. A group always consists of at least two or more persons.
2. Each group must have a communication and interaction among its members.
3. The communication among the members should be always two ways. One way communication does not constitute the group interaction, which should influence each other.
4. The duration of the group exists only as long as there is reciprocal psychological interaction.
5. Continuity of a culture from one generation to other helps for the formation of a group.
6. Common interests, shared values and norms may be important constituents of a group.
7. The formation of group is affected by many forces i.e. blood, marriage, religion, caste, common possessions, common areas, common interacts, responsibilities and occupation etc.
8. Different groups have different durations and purposes. 

Factors in organizing groups
External factors

• A group may be organized when the individuals feel the need, that cannot be satisfied individually and when there is no other such group meeting the need
• A group may be organized when there is similar group existing elsewhere and not serving their interest
• A group may be organized with or without outside stimulus

Internal/Personal factors

1. A group may be organized when the members are obedient to each other and have channels to meet the needs and satisfy the interest.
2. A group may be organized when there is cooperation among members to hold them together to act as one unit.
3. A group may be organized when members are willing to compromise with each other and make decisions with consensus.

Classification of groups
Primary group and Secondary group

Primary groups are characterized by intimate face to face interaction, informal personal relationships and a strong we feeling on the part of the members. Primary groups have a set of permanency are small in size and have the responsibility to socialize the individuals.
Ex: Family

Secondary groups are characterized by formal, contractual, utilitarian and goal oriented relationships. Secondary groups are large in size and have little face to face communication and maintain more or less anonymous relationships.
Ex: Political party, Cooperative Society.

The specific characteristics of primary and secondary groups are compared as follows

Formal and Informal Groups
Formal groups are organized, have a membership roll, definite roles, rules or procedures of operation and rigidly enforced behavior of the members.
Ex: Panchayaths

Informal groups are not formally organized and rules and procedures are not rigidly enforced.
Ex: Friendship groups, play groups

Involuntary and Voluntary groups
Involuntary groups are those groups in which the individual has no choice or choice is not required for membership.
Ex: Membership by birth-family, community

Voluntary groups are those where the individual has membership with deliberate choice.
Ex: youth club.

In-group and Out group
An in group is

• one to which the person feel they belong and with which they identify themselves strongly.
• Not only they themselves, but others also feel them to be an integral part of the group.
• Matters of vital interest to the group are confined within the group.

An out group is

• one with which other individuals cannot identify themselves.
• The individuals feel themselves as outsiders to the group and the group also reciprocates the same towards the individual.
• Matters of vital interest are not shared with the out group members.

COMMUNITY
Community refers to

• groups of mutually dependent people,
• living in a more or less compact continuous geographical area,
• having a sense of belonging and
• sharing common values, norms and some common interests and
• acting collectively in an organized manner
• to satisfy their chief needs
• through a common set of organizations and institutions.

There are two dimensions in community

1. Territorial dimension- geographical area
2. Social dimension- group of people

Ex: Village, Town, City

Any area of common life like village, town, district, country or an even wider area may be considered as community.

SOCIETY
Society refers to people in a community with similar culture and civilization.

Structural elements of Society:
Identity: It refers to the characteristics that differentiate one society from the other.
Ex: Residence, caste, religion, progressiveness etc distinguishes society to society.

Composition: It refers to making up of the society.
Society is composed of male-female, educated-uneducated, rural-urban, traditional-modern etc.

Intergroup relation: It refers to relation between groups-relationship between villages, castes, classes.

Intra-group relation: It refers to the relationship within the group-relationship between husband and wife within the family or between families in a village.

Functional elements of Society
Objectives or ends: These refer to the changes or things which the members of the group are expected to be accomplished through their interaction and activities.
Ex: Attainment of higher productivity, increase in the production etc.

Norms: These refer to the rules or the guiding standards which prescribe what is socially acceptable or unacceptable. Norms govern the application of means in the attainment of goals. Determining the size of the family and methods by which it may be achieved, is generally guided by the norms of the society.

Leadership: It refers to the process through which a person directs guides and influences the thought, feeling and behavior of other members of the society. The nature of the leadership generally determines the behavior or level of achievement of the members of the society.

Resources: It refers to the various types of resources and potentialities a society possesses. Resources are important because they set the limit of achievement of the society.
Ex: Human resources, financial resources, natural resources etc.

Reference group
This is a group of persons whom an individual consult before taking an important decision.

Here, the members may be form primary, secondary, formal and informal groups. Sometime an individual may not have reference group, but may be consulting some experienced person in a society to seek the advice.

Cultural Interest Group
These groups are created for the development of special interest like economic, religious, political, educational, or recreational interest etc.

Temporary and Permanent Groups

Group for short period is called temporary group i.e. Crowd.

The groupings living in a common geographic area for longer period are called as permanent group i.e. Village, State, Religion, Tribe etc.

GLOSSARY:

1. A group: A unit of two or more people in reciprocal communication and interaction with each other and interaction with each other.
2. Primary groups: characterized by intimate face to face interaction, informal personal relationships and a strong we feeling on the part of the members.
3. Secondary groups: characterized by formal, contractual, utilitarian and goal oriented relationships.
4. Examples for primary group are Family.
5. Examples for secondary group are political party, cooperative society
6. Formal groups are characterized by formal, contractual, utilitarian and goal oriented relationships.
7. Example for formal groups is Panchayats.
8. Informal groups are not formally organized and rules and procedures are not rigidly enforced.
9. Example for Informal groups are friendship groups, play groups.
10. Involuntary groups are those groups in which the individual has no choice or choice is not required for membership.
11. Example for involuntary groups are members by birth in a family, community.
12. Voluntary groups are those where the individual has membership with deliberate choice.
13. Examples for voluntary groups are youth clubs.
14. Ingroup: Group to which the person feel they belong and with which they identify themselves strongly.
15. Outgroup: The group with which other members cannot identify themselves.
16. The territorial dimension of community is geographical area.
17. The social dimension of the community is group of people.

ASSIGNMENT

1. What is group in society? Write the characteristics of groups.
2. Classify different types of groups.

FUNCTIONAL CONCEPTS OF RURAL SOCIOLOGY

SOCIAL SYSTEM

• a set of interrelated units
• that are engaged in joint problem solving to accomplish a common goal.
• The members or units of a social system may be individuals, informal groups, organizations and subsystems.

SOCIALISATION
It is a process

• by which an individual is conducted into one’s social and cultural world.
• of learning which starts from the birth.
• The society, right from the mother and home, teaches the individual the rules and regulations of the society in which the individual is the member.
• involves the development of the personality, attitudes, habits and expected social roles.

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

• the arrangements of the individuals or groups of people
• into hierarchically arranged strata in a community.
• A community may appear as homogenous,
• ex: urban, rural etc, but there may be internal inequalities, divisions and distinctions.
• These distinctions become patterned and stabilized with unequal distribution of privileges, power and status positions.

SOCIAL INTERACTION

• dynamic interplay of forces in which contact between persons and groups
• result in modification of attitudes and behavior of the participants.
• The interaction processes have been classified on the basis of their cooperation and oppositional nature.

SOCIAL PROCESSES

• the interactions of groups and individuals with one another, and
• these may take four basic forms:

(a) Competition, where the object is to outdo another in achievement of a goal;

(b) Conflict where the object and goal is to “eliminate” the other;

(c) Cooperation where persons or groups unite efforts to achieve a common goal; and

(d) Accommodation, where a temporary or permanent termination of rival efforts occur and rival parties are able to function together.

Patterns of influence involving power structure and leadership are

• The networks of influence that weave through society influential in decision making,
  • urban or rural, and
  • radiate from individuals and groups
• These individuals and groups who serve from time to time in positions of leadership may often be difficult to identify, yet they are vital in decision making.
• Understanding of the patterns of influence, leadership, and power are invaluable in analysis of the social situation.

1. Social norms –

• techniques, folkways, mores, and laws are rules based on social values, that control and direct interpersonal relationships in society.
• Techniques are ways of doing things in which technical efficiency is the criterion of operation.
• Folkways are the socially acceptable ways of behaviour, the customary norms of society that do not imply moral sanction, e.g., good manners.
• Mores are the socially acceptable ways of behaviour that do involve moral standards violation may result in severe social action such as ostracism (e.g., inter dining of an orthodox high caste Hindu Brahmin with an outcaste Hindu Chamar).
• Laws are formalised norms with legal and/or political enforcement, such as acts and statutes of a nation or political state.

2. Social role is

• the expected behaviour of one member of society in relation to others.
• A single person in society may play a number of roles such as father, teacher, citizen, or rural sociologist.
• Some roles are temporary; others are more permanent; and some may conflict with others.

3. Conception of self is

• the idea that a person holds about himself or herself and depends largely on the way others act toward him or her.
• Accordingly, a person may develop an inferiority complex or become highly self-centered, depending on the behaviour of others toward him or her.
• A person’s attitudes toward himself or herself are built on how the person feels that he or she appears to others and how he or she feels that they interpret what they see in him or her.
• These evaluations from group contact are important to the person’s feeling of happiness and security and affect his or her social behaviour. 

GLOSSARY:

1. Functional Concepts- Socialization, Social system, Social stratification, Social institutions, Social interaction, Culture, Values and beliefs, Culture

1. SOCIAL SYSTEM: A set of interrelated units that are engaged in joint problem solving to accomplish a common goal.
2. Social norms – Techniques, folkways, mores, and laws are rules based on social values, that control and direct interpersonal relationships in society.

• Techniques: Ways of doing things in which technical efficiency is the criterion of operation.
• Folkways: The socially acceptable ways of behaviour, the customary norms of society that do not imply moral sanction, e.g., good manners.
• Mores: The socially acceptable ways of behaviour that do involve moral standards violation may result in severe social action such as ostracism (e.g., inter dining of an orthodox high caste Hindu Brahmin with an outcaste Hindu Chamar).
• Laws: Formalised norms with legal and/or political enforcement, such as acts and statutes of a nation or political state. Ex: Chid marriage act, Dowry act, Gield child protection act

3. Socialisation: The process by which an individual is conducted into his or her social and cultural world like the development of personality, attitudes, habits, and expected social roles.
4. Social role: The expected behaviour of one member of society in relation to others. A single person in society may play a number of roles such as father, teacher, citizen, or rural sociologist.
5. Conception of self: The idea that a person holds about himself or herself and depends largely on the way others act toward him or her.
6. Social stratification: The division of society into a series of levels indicating positions of individuals and groups in the value system existing in that society. For example, the Caste System in India.
7. Social processes: The interactions of groups and individuals with one another, and these may take four basic forms:

(a) Competition, where the object is to outdo another in achievement of a goal;

(b) Conflict where the object and goal is to “eliminate” the other;

(c) Cooperation where persons or groups unite efforts to achieve a common goal; and

(d) Accommodation, where a temporary or permanent termination of rival efforts occurs and rival parties are able to function together.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Explain the meaning of functional concepts of rural sociology.

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Social stratification refers to the arrangements of the individuals or groups of people into hierarchically arranged strata in a community.

• A community may appear as homogenous,
  Ex: urban, rural etc, but there may be internal inequalities, divisions and distinctions.

• These distinctions become patterned and stabilized with unequal distribution of privileges, power and status positions.

Functions of Stratification:

A. A means of accomplishing jobs in society:

• In society social stratification contributes as a essential mean to get some of its jobs
• by distributing different amounts of prestige and privilege to various strata.
• An example of stratification: An university is with clearly defined strata, each marked with visible symbols denoting status , specific roles and role expectations, norms and prescribed standards of behaviour and interrelationships – all clearly organised to do a job.
• The society gives rewards to serve as incentives to get the various jobs accomplished. These rewards are economic, aesthetic, materialistic and psychological.

B. Regulation and control of individual and group relationships:

• Stratification regulates and control human relationships in society by defining the roles and roles expectations.
• Whatever an individual’s position, whether high or low, social stratification regulates his participation in certain areas of social life.
• Social stratification tends to regulate participation of groups and individuals in the total life of society, giving them access to certain areas and restricting them to others.

C. Contribution to social integration and structure:

• Stratification in society has a strong integrative function,
• serving to co-ordinate and harmonise units
• within social structure because in stratified society
• members are dependent one another.

 D. Simplification:

• Stratification of society categorises people into different strata.
• Every status has its particular role.
• Thus role expectations simplify man’s world in respect to his relations with other people.

BASES FOR STRATIFICATION 

• In the system of stratification differential position or status of members are found in all societies all over the world from the most primitive to the most modern.
• Members differ in the roles and status ascribed to them by society.
• There are two different sources from which stratification is society has developed either ethnic, or social.
• Ethnic stratification occurs in society in which two ethnic or racial groups exist and one dominates the other over a long period of time.
• Social basis for stratification in society involves the growth of a system of ranked strata within society.
• The social factors that give status to individuals of groups are criteria socially determined, based on the value system and social values of society.
• The presences of the factors which are considered of social worth contribute to one’s prestige and high status varies from society to society.
• In some societies , occupation, income and wealth, education are considered; in other societies, ownership of landed property, ancestry and family name
• may be most important; in still others education, caste, creed and powder or influence with authorities may rank high as social values.
• The universal criteria for determinants of status are wealth, ancestry, functional utility of the individual, religion, biological characteristics.

THE DETERMINANTS OF STATUS

1. Wealth– its quantity and quality. Ex: Income, standard of living
2. Ancestry- nationality, ethnic background, length of residence in the area, family reputation
3. Functional utility of the individual– education, occupation, skill
4. Religion– the kind and degree of religion followed
5. Biological characteristics– male, female, age

FORMS OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION
Caste system and Class system represents basic forms of social stratification.

A. Social class is defined as

• Class Social classes are defined as abstract categories of persons arranged in levels according to social status they possess.
• There are no firm lines separating one category from the other.
• Classes are loosely organized groupings,
• whose members behave towards each other as social equals.
• It is ‘open class system’, democratic in nature and
• there is social mobility both up and down the ladder, depending on the socio-economic status.

The classes may be based on power, prestige, wealth or a combination of these and other factors.

1. Defined classes are culturally defined groups recognized as such by society.
   e.g. tribal and non-tribal classes

2. Economic classes are groups engaged in different economic activities or standing in different relationships to the means of production in a society
   e.g. business, service farmer and other classes.

3. Political classes are groups formed on the basis of political power
   e.g. Congress, BJP, and BSD.

4. Self identified classes are conceived in terms of the identification of their members.
   e.g. Rotary Club, Lions club etc.

B. Caste system is

• social classes whose membership is determined solely by birth and between there is no vertical social mobility.
• It is a ‘closed class system’,
• with clearly demarcated status and role for its members.
• unorganized group of people who become members by birth or by later entry into the group, who treat each others as approximate equals.
• Caste is a social category whose members are assigned a permanent status within given social hierarchy and whose contacts are restricted accordingly.
• It is the most rigid and clearly graded type of social stratification and has been often referred to as the extreme form of closed class system.
• An individual is born into the caste of his parents can rise no further, with few exceptions he cannot fall to a lower caste, but if he violates taboos and other mores of his caste, he may be expelled from his caste group.
• Personal qualities or ability have no part whatever in determining the caste of an individual, with lineage being the only criterion.

The following are the characteristics of rigid caste system.

1. Membership in the Caste system is hereditary and unchangeable for life.
2. Marriages must be made within the caste line.
3. There is a caste name and each caste has its particular customs.
4. Contacts with other castes or sub castes in all aspect of life are strictly regulated and limited by mores.
5. The hierarchy of caste is well understood and strictly enforced according to its local variations.

Difference between class and caste system:

I. Open vs. Closed

• Class is more open than caste.
• A man can change his class and status by his enterprise and initiatives but in case of caste system it is impossible to change one’s caste status.
• Once a man is born in a caste he remains in it for his life-time and makes his children suffer the same status.
• A caste is thus closed class.
• The individual’s status is determined by the caste status of his parents, so that what an individual does has little bearing upon his status.
• On the other hand the membership of a class does not depend upon heredity basis; it rather depends on the worldly achievements of an individual.
• Thus class system is an open and flexible system while caste system is a closed and rigid system.

II. Divine vs. Secular

• The caste system is believed to have been divinely obtained.
• In the Bhagavadagita the Creator is said to have apportioned the duties and functions of the four castes.
• An individual must do duty proper to his caste.
• Caste system in India would not have survived for so many centuries if the religious system has not made it sacred and inviolable.
• On the contrary, there is nothing sacred or of divine origin in the class stratification of society.
• Classes are secular in origin.
• They are not founded on religious dogmas.

III. Endogamous

• The choice of mates in caste system is generally endogamous.
• Members have to marry within their own castes.
• A member marrying outside his caste is treated as
• No such restrictions exist in class system.
• A wealthy man may marry a poor girl without being outcaste.
• An educated girl may marry an uneducated partner without being thrown out from the class of teachers.

IV. Class consciousness: The feeling of class consciousness is necessary to constitute a class but there is no need for any subjective consciousness in the members of caste.

V. Prestige: The relative prestige of the different castes is well established but in class system there is no rigidly fixed order of prestige.

GLOSSARY:

1. Social stratification: The arrangements of the individuals or groups of people into hierarchically arranged strata in a community
2. Social classes: Abstract categories of persons arranged in levels according to social status they possess.
3. Caste system: Social classes whose membership is determined solely by birth and between there is no vertical social mobility.
4. Defined classes are culturally defined groups recognized as such by society.
   Ex: Tribal and non-tribal classes

5. Economic classes: Groups engaged in different economic activities or standing in different relationships to the means of production in a society.
   Ex: business, service farmer and other classes.

6. Political classes: Groups formed on the basis of political power
   Ex: Congress, BJP, and BSD.

7. Self identified classes: Groups conceived in terms of the identification of their members.
   Ex: Rotary Club, Lions club etc.

9. Wealth-its quantity and quality.
   Ex: Income, standard of living
10. Ancestry-nationality, ethnic background, length of residence in the area, family reputation.
11. Functional utility of the individual – education, occupation, skill
12. Religion – the kind and degree of religion followed
13. Biological characteristics – male, female, age

ASSIGNMENT

1. Write about the functions and bases for social stratification
2. Explain the forms of social stratification.
3. Differentiate in between class and Caste systems in India

CHANGES IN SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

• Rashtriya Ekta Diwas (National Unity Day) is celebrated to pay tribute to Patel, who was instrumental in keeping India united.
• It is to be celebrated on 31 October every year as annual commemoration of the birthday of the Iron Man of India, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, one of the founding leaders of Republic of India.
• Patel was a key force behind the appointment of Dr.Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar as the chairman of the drafting committee, and the inclusion of leaders from a diverse political spectrum in the process of writing the constitution.
• Patel was a senior leader in the Constituent Assembly of India and was responsible in a large measure for shaping India’s constitution.
• Patel was the chairman of the committees responsible for minorities, tribal and excluded areas, fundamental rights and provincial constitutions.
• The caste system in its attempts to adjust itself to the changed conditions of life has assumed new roles.

Factors that have greatly affected the caste system such as

• Westernisation
• Industrialisation Urbanisation
• Sanskritisation,
• Reorganisation of Indian states,
• Spread of education,
• Socio-religious reforms,
• Spatial and occupational mobility and
• Growth of market economy

The influence of factors in changes in the role of caste:

1. Increase in the Organisational Power of Caste

• Education makes people liberal, broad-minded, rationale and democratic.
• Educated people are believed to be less conservative and superstitious.
• Hence it was expected that with the growth of literacy in India, caste-mindedness and casteism would come down.
• On the contrary, caste-consciousness of the members has been increasing.
• Every caste wants to safeguard its interests.
• For fulfilling the purpose castes are getting themselves organised on the model of labour unions.
• Today every caste wants to organised itself. Such caste organisations are on the increase.
• Mainly to cater to the educational, medical and religious needs of their members, these organisations are running hostels and hospitals, schools and colleges, reading-rooms and libraries, dharmashalas and temples and so on.
• These caste-based organisations are also trying to project the leadership of some of their members to serve as their spokesmen.

2. Political Role of Caste:

• Caste and politics have come to affect each other now. Caste has become an inseparable aspect of our politics. In fact, it is tightening its hold on politics.
• Elections are fought more often on the basis of caste. Selection of candidates, voting analysis, selection of legislative party leaders, distribution of ministerial portfolios etc., are very much based on caste.
• Caste at the ritual level is smaller unit than the caste at the political level.

3. Protection for Scheduled Castes and other Backward Classes

• The constitution of India has made enough provisions to protect the interests of Scheduled Castes and Tribes.
• They are offered more political, educational and service opportunities through the reservation policy.
• Seats are reserved for them from Mandal panchayat to Parliament and in all governnment departments.
• Though the reservation policy is against the declared goal of establishment of a casteless society, all political parties have supported it mostly, for political purposes.
• These provisions have made some of them develop vested interests to reap permanently the benefits of reservation.
• They are also tempting many other castes to bring pressure on the government to declare them as belonging to the category of Scheduled castes.

4. Sanskritisation and Westernisation

• The Sanskritisation refers to a process in which the lower castes tend to imitate the values, practices and other life-styles of some dominant upper castes.
• The Westernisation denotes a process in which the upper-caste people tend to mould their life-styles on the model of Westerners.

5. Backward Classes Movement

• The non-Brahmin castes today are getting themselves more and more organised to challenge the supermacy of the Brahmins and to assert their rights.
• The establishment of ‘Satyashodhak Samaj’ by Jyotirao Phooley in Poona in 1873 marked the beginning of such a non Brahmin movement.
• This movement against the Brahmin supermacy by the lower castes came to be known as Backward Classes Movement.
• In the beginning, the main aim of this movement was to limit the Brahmin monopoly in the two fields such as
  • education and
  • appointment to government posts.
• The Backward Classes Movement
  • has become a vital political force today.
  • Its influence has changed the political scenario of the country.
  • This movement has made the Brahmins politically weak and insignificant especially in Kerala and Tamilnadu.
  • This movement has also brought pressure on different political parties to create special opportunities for the lowest caste people enabling ten to come up to the level of other higher castes.
  • Due to this pressure, Backward Classes Commissions were estbalished at Central and State levels which recommended “reservation” for backward castes/classes.

6. Competitive Role of Castes

• Mutual interdependence of castes which existed for centuries and was reinforced by the institutional system of “jajmani”, is not found today.
• On the contrary, each caste looks at the other with suspicision, contempt, and jealousy and finds in it a challenger, a competitor.
• Excessive caste-mindedness and caste-patriotism have added to this competititon.
• The economic base of a caste and its hold over the political power virtually determine the intensity of this competitiveness.
• The competitive spirit further strengthens caste-mindedness.

7. New attempts to strengthen caste-loyalty, caste-identity, caste-patriotism and castemindedness.

• Today caste organisations are increasing and are making every attempt to obtain the loyality of their members and to strengthen their caste-identity and solidarity.

CAUSES FOR THE CHANGES IN CASTE SYSTEM

The caste system has undergone vast changes in modern times. Factors that contribute to the changes in the caste system are briefly examined here.

1. Uniform Legal System.

• The uniform legal system introduced by the British made the Indians feel that “all men are equal before the law”
• A number of legislations which the British introduced also struck at the root of the caste system. Independent India followed the same legal system.
• The Constitution of India has not only assured equality to all but also declared
• the practice of untouchability is unlawful [Articles 15and 16].
• Articles 16, 164, 225, 330, 332, 334, 335, 338 and the 5th 6th Schedules of the Constitution provide for some special privileges to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes to enable them to come up to the level of other upper- castes.

2. Impact of Modern Education.

• The British introduced the modern secular education in a uniform way througout India.
• In independent India educational facilities are extended to all the caste people.
• The lowest caste people are also entitled to avail themselves of these facilities.
• Modern education has given a blow to the intellectual monopoly of a few upper castes.
• It has created awareness among people and weakened the hold of caste over the members.
• It does not; however mean that the modern educated people are completely free from the hold of the caste.

3. Industrialisation, Urbanisation and Westernisation.

• Due to the process of industrials number of non-agricultural job opportunities were created. This new economic opportunity weakened the hold of the upper castes people who owned vast lands.
• People of different castes, classes and religions started working together in factories, offices, workshops etc. This was unthinkable two centuries ago.
• Growth of cities has drawn people of all castes together and made them to stay together ignoring many of their caste restrictions.
• The upper caste people started looking to the West for modifying their life-style on the model of the West. Thus they became more and more westernized without bothering much about caste inhibitions.

4. Influence of Modern Transport and Communication System.

• Modern means of transport such as train, bus, ship, aero plane, trucks etc, have been of great help for the movement of men and materials.
• Caste rules relating to the practice of purity and untouchability could no longer be observed.
• Modern means of communication, Mass media such as, newspapers, post, telegraph, telephone, radio, television etc., have helped people to come out of the narrow world of caste.

5. Freedom Struggle and the Establishment of Democracy:

• The freedom struggle waged against the British brought all the caste people together to fight for a common cause.
• Establishment of Democratic type of government soon after Independence gave yet another blow to the caste by extending equal socio-economic opportunities to all without any discrimination.

6. Rise of Non-Brahmin Movement.

• A movement against the Brahmin supermacy was launched by Jyothirao Pooley in 1873.
• This movement became popular in course of time particularly in the South.
• It created an awareness among the lower castes and instilled in them the feeling of “self-respect”.
• This movement which became a great political force, brought pressure upon the government to establish Backward Classes Commissions at Central and State levels.
• The recommendations made by these commissions and their implementation provided vast scope for the lower castes to achieve progress.

Other Important Causes

(i) Social Legislations:

• A series of social legislations introduced by the British as well as by the Indian governments [such as the Caste Disabilities Removal Act of 1872, The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955, The Untouchability Offences Act of 1956 etc.] directly and indirectly altered the nature of the caste system.

(ii) Social Reform Movements.

• Various social reform movements [such as Satyashodhak Samaj, Brahma Samaj, Arya Samaj, Sri Ramakrishna Mission etc.] launched during the second half 19th and
• the beginning of the 20th centuries have been able to remove the rigidity and some of evil practices associated with the caste system.

(iii) Impact of the West.

• Influence of the Western thought and
• particularly the ideas of rationalism, liberalism, humanitarianism, egalitarianism etc., made the educated Indians to come out of the clutches of the caste.

(iv) Threat of Conversion.

• Social disabilities imposed on the lower castes made some of them to get themselves converted to either Christianity or Islam.
• Pressure tactics and temptations further added to this conversion process.
• The threat of conversion compelled the upper castes to relax many of the caste rigidities so that they could hold back the lower caste people who were getting ready for conversion.

(v) Improvement in the Status of Women, Evolution of New Social Classes,

• working class, middle class and capitalist class] and radical changes in the system of division of labour especially in the rural areas have further loosened the roots of caste system.

GLOSSARY:

1. The Sanskritisation: A process in which the lower castes tend to imitate the values, practices and other life-styles of some dominant upper castes.
2. The Westernisation: A process in which the upper-caste people tend to mould their life-styles on the model of Westerners.
3. Sanskritisation: the narrower process of Brahminisation.
4. Westernization: The changes brought about in Indian society and culture as a result of over 150 years of British rule.
5. Humanitarianism: An active concern for the welfare of all human beings irrespective of caste, economic position, religion, age and sex.
6. Modernisation: A process which indicates the adoption of the modern ways of life and values.
7. Modernisation: Social change involving change in people’s habits and the elements of science and technology interventions.
8. Urbanisation: The process of growth and expansion of cities.
9. Industrialisation: The unprecedented growth and expansion of industries.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Write the causes for changes in the Indian social stratification.

SOCIAL MOBILITY

The term social mobility usually refers to the movement of individuals or groups from one strata of society to another or vertical mobility.

However, three types of social mobility have been identified:

1. Vertical.
2. Horizontal, and
3. Geographic.

Vertical social mobility is usually implied when one speaks of social mobility and refers to the two-way movement-up or down-of individuals and groups from one stratum in society to another.

Horizontal social mobility refers to movement of individuals and groups between positions in society which are roughly of the same social status. In other words, it is movement within the same stratum of society.

Certain occupations for example,

• may be ranked or rated as associated with the same social class such as a college professor and a research scientist or a lawyer (assuming the society classifies all three at par with another).
• Movement from one to another would be referred to as social mobility of the horizontal type.
• If on the other hand an individual moved from the position of college professor to vice chancellor of a university or
• to clerk in a business firm vertical social mobility would” be involved-upwards in the former ·and downwards in the latter instances
• provided the positions of vice chancellor and clerk are considered superior and inferior respectively to that of college professor.

Geographical social mobility

• differs from both vertical and horizontal mobility and refers to movement of a group from one geographic area to another.
• Such migration may also involve vertical or horizontal movement.
• Thus, a newly immigrated member of society may be ascribed social status that is higher or lower than he had in the society
• from which he immigrated or he may maintain the same status but may move horizontally to an occupation of equal social rating.
• Societies differ in the extent to which individuals and groups can move from one stratum to another.
• In societies that have an open-class system of stratification, movement up and down the social ladder is by and large unrestricted.
• In societies with a closed system of stratification there is no upward or downward movement of individuals and groups except by default or illegitimate manipulation.
• This is the basic difference between class and caste.
• Whereas,
• in the more open class system upward movement of individuals and groups is possible,
• in the closed class or caste system such vertical movement is not possible.
• Under the latter system there are restrictions also on horizontal movement.

FACTORS INFLUENCING MOBILITY

Several factors serve to restrict social mobility as follows:

1. Racial differences and religious beliefs

• in respect of status in society are important factors and make for a closed class or caste system of stratification.
• Hindu religious beliefs established and supported the Caste System in Hindu Society.
• While different from the Hindu Caste System, in the U.S.A., racial differences between Negroes and White Americans gave rise to what closely approached a caste or closed class system in society.

2. Class discrimination

• in an open class system serves as a barrier to upward mobility,
• as evidenced by restricted membership to certain organizations.
• Such discrimination may be conscious and/ or unconscious and exercised in rather subtle ways, nonetheless, its presence cannot be denied.

3. The fact that social classes act as sub-cultures

• within which individuals are reared from infancy and socialized;
• Serves as an important obstacle or deterrent to upward mobility.
• A middle class child has been brought up to “fit” into his class with known roles, role expectations, values and norms.
• This process of learning and socialisation tends to hold him in his class position.

4. Taken in its negative aspect, the lack of wealth may restrict opportunities for the individual necessary for social advancement

• to develop and
• acquire the materials

5. Sexes differ in various societies in prestige, power, social status, and opportunities.

• They also differ in social mobility.
• In most societies, man is dominant and tends to be socially more mobile than a woman.
• However, woman takes on the social status of her husband when she marries, but in general, the reverse is not the case,
• Marriage thus serves, among other purposes, a means for social mobility for women rather than for men,

There are several other factors that condition social mobility in various ways. Some of the more important of these are:

1. Changing social conditions:

• The class or caste structure in societies may itself change under the impact and influence of external and internal forces of change.
• The rapid advance of technology and the urbanisation of rural areas are two such conditions which increase mobility and may cause ideological changes in society itself, giving rise to a new system or stratification.
• Frequently, changes in the class structure or stratification system in society are brought about when societies are disturbed by economic, social and political revolution.
• Such conditions provide fertile ground for reorganisation or replacement of an old system of social stratification with one that is different or entirely new.
• Static conditions in society, on the other hand, impede social mobility and serve to crystallise the existing class structure.
• When such conditions persist over long periods,
• status positions tend to become fixed and rigid
• to be transmitted from generation to generation,
• Moving increasingly towards the closed-class or caste type end of the continuum of stratification.

2. Territorial expansion and population movement:

• Conditions of rapid territorial expansion-where population moved into “new territories” on a reasonably large basis
• have proved conducive to flexibility of the stratification structure and social mobility.

3. Limitation of communication:

• Any situation that limits communication between various strata of society, preventing interchange of knowledge and experience between them,
• will serve to strengthen inter strata dividing lines and discourage social mobility.
• Free and effective communication and education, which cut across all strata boundaries, will serve to stimulate social mobility and weaken class barriers.

4. Division of Labour:

• The extent of social mobility will be negatively influenced by the degree of division of labour that exists in society.
• If the division of labour is high and specialised involving specific well trained skills, social mobility will be low,
• for it will be difficult for individuals to move easily from one strata to another.

5. Differential fertility rates:

• High reproduction rates of lower classes serve to restrict and hamper opportunities for family members to rise socially because of economic stringency and consequent low levels of living.
• The lower classes appear to have a scarcity of everything except children.
• High fertility rates of low income classes deprive family members from a higher level of living, development and opportunities for moving upward in the social scale in most societies.
• On the other hand, upper classes tend to have fewer children and hence do not reproduce themselves in society.
• The upper classes create a ‘social vacuum’ within society when they do not reproduce themselves.
• People from lower strata have an opportunity to move their positions and advance in the social scale.

EFFORTS TOWARDS UPWARDS MOVEMENT

Acquisition of the criteria that define social status by individuals and groups may enable them to move upward in status position in society; these criteria may well be considered elevators of social status, more so in the open class societies rather than the closed class societies.

However, in order to move upward to the higher strata of both societies, people innovate and improvise in various ways-evolving techniques to attain such elevations.

The following are some of the techniques commonly employed toward this end in various societies of the world.

1. Change in standard of living:

• An increased income in itself does not give increased status;
• increased income should reflect a higher standard of living, or
• keeping with upper class standards.
• Example: Income of a Professor, Managing Director

2. Change of area of residence:

• The social climber may move to an area where he or she is not known and
• organise living standards and behaviour in accordance with an upper class or caste.
• Example: Migrating to a near by city and live on par with the upper class or caste

3. Change in behaviour to match upper class behaviour:

• The individual seeking to move upward socially must acquire and practise the form of behaviour and the conduct of the upper class
• to which he or she aspires in membership-including not only behaviour
• also dress, customs, vocabulary, speech, accent, recreational and other interests.
• In all ways the individual must associate with the upper class to which he or she would belong.

4. Change of name.

• Within certain societies, a name identifies the social position of an individual.
• Upward movement may be possible by migration to another area together with assumption of a new name.
• Example: Patels, Sharmas, Reddys, Choudharys in India

5. Marriage:

• Marriage with a mate of higher social status is another means used for social climbing.
• As indicated earlier, in general it is the woman who takes on the social status of the man and hence upward movement is usually effected when a lower class woman marries an upper class man rather than vice versa.

6. Affiliation with Associations.

• Membership in certain associations and organizations carry with them prestige and social status.
• Example: Member of Lion’s club, Nizam club, Rotary club
• An individual can move to higher strata in society by securing membership and associating with upper class people who are members of these associations.
• Further, membership in one association may open doors to membership in others slightly higher, thus leading an individual to even higher strata in society.
• The most useful device is to secure membership in an association whose membership overlaps two or more class levels.
• The social climber then uses upper status members of an association per clique to gain entree into higher status groups in which he or she has hitherto not been accepted.

• These and many others are techniques improvised by individuals to raise themselves socially from their class or caste to higher strata in society.
• Although the techniques, methods and devices may be numerous and devious, they are nonetheless used sometimes with considerable effort, patience and effectiveness.
• An individual is normally aware of the status that he or she holds in society.
• The degree of awareness that persons have of their common status in society is referred to as class consciousness.
• Class consciousness exists irrespective of the type of stratification systems in society.
• In a caste system it is high and may be intensified when any changes in social order, from whatever sources, threaten those in superior positions.
• In open class societies, the strength of class consciousness depends on the extent to which the class is open.
• It is weak where the class structure is wide open and upward movement is relatively easy and becomes stronger as openness of the class system is reduced.

GLOSSARY:

1. Social mobility: The movement of individuals or groups from one strata of society to another or vertical mobility.
2. Vertical social mobility: The two-way movement-up or down-of individuals and groups from one stratum in society to another.
3. Horizontal social mobility: The movement of individuals and groups between positions in society which are roughly of the same social status.
4. Geographical social mobility: The movement of a group from one geographic area to another.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Explain the types of social mobility.
2. Discuss the factors influencing social mobility
3. Describe the ways to upward social mobility.

SOCIAL CONTROL
Social control is the pattern of influence the society exerts on individuals and groups to maintain order and establish rules in the society. Social control helps in maintenance of desired social values.

The means of social control are as detailed below

Folkways- They are the informal ways of behaviour based on habits and traditions, mostly found in usages. Violations of folkways are viewed seriously by the society. Ex: Dressing, eating habits etc.

Mores- They are socially acceptable ways of behaviour which involves moral standards. They are the group shared understandings of what to do and what not to do in a situation. They exert some amount compulsion and violations leads to social action. They are more powerful than folkways in controlling the behaviour of the individual.
Ex: Removing chappal while entering into the house

Taboos- The word taboo in a strict sense refers to prohibition of types of behaviour because of some magical, supernatural or religious sanction. Generally the term more use for the positive action i.e. things ought to be done and taboo in for a negative action i.e. things ought not to be done.
Ex: Muslim girls should not go to mosque.

Ritual – Ritual may be defined as a pattern of behaviour or ceremony which has become the customary way of dealing with certain situations, or is the pattern that has been established by law as in the case of governmental affairs or is a part of the rules of a particular organization. Many of the ritualistic rights in primitive cultures are a part of the religion or magic of that group.
Ex: Ceremony of naming the baby

Norms- They are established behaviour patterns for the members of a social system. The members are expected to follow them. A member who deviates them is considered as deviant of the system.
Ex: Creating by the elder ones – Namaskaram

Laws- They grow from mores. As the society becomes larger and more complex, codification of mores takes place for strict adherence and compliance.
Ex: Prohibition on dowry, child labour, child marriages etc.

VALUES AND NORMS

Norms are the accepted and approved forms of behaviour that are based on and consistent with dominant social values in society.

Norms are closely associated with values but area clearly differentiated from them. While it has been stated that values are the attitudes, held by individuals, groups or society as a whole, as to whether material or non-material objects are good, bad, desirable or undesirable, the rules that govern action directed towards achieving values are called norms.
Society has a set of agreed-upon values.

Expected behaviour in accordance with these values and to achieve maintain and Support them is referred to as normative behaviour.

EXAMPLES:

A Value: Religious worship and respect to God usually is considered

The norms of society: The observance of religious festivals and performance of rituals and worship and other relevant activities

Thus, values and norms go together.

A set of social values will always have an accompanying set of social norms or rules that uphold and support values.

CHARACTERISTICS OF VALUES

1. Values are constructs of society created through the interrelationships of its members. They are socially created rather than determined biologically or inherited.
2. Values are socially shared.

• While individuals in society may have individual values,
• the set of values that constitute the value system of society are shared and transmitted among members, and accepted by them.
• This agreed-upon value system forms the basis for action and functioning in society.

3. Values are learned.

• They are acquired and not inherited.
• The process of learning and acquisition of social values commences from childhood in the family and through the process of socialisation.
• Values can be transmitted from one group to another within a society through various other social processes, and from one society and culture to another through acculturation, diffusion, borrowing, etc.

4. Values are abstract.

• Attitudes and assumptions on which there is social consensus about the relative worth of objects in society.
• These values are conceptually abstracted from various valued items or objects in society.

5. Values are gratifying to people and have an important part in meeting social needs.

• Three elements involved in consideration of social values have been identified.

1) the object itself;

2) the capacity of the object to satisfy social needs; and

3) the appreciation of the people for the object and for its capacity to provide the desired satisfaction.

• The object-given value by society must prove gratifying to members of society and must possess the capacity to provide the desired satisfaction and elicit appreciation from them.

6. Values tend to be linked together harmoniously to form patterns; these patterns form the value system in the society. When harmonious integration of values in society does not exist, social problems arise.
7. Value systems vary from culture to culture in accordance with the relative worth attributed by each culture to its patterns of activity and its goals.

• Thus cultures vary in their practices, customs and forms of living and functioning.
• The farmer in India seated cross legged on the floor, may await his evening meal served by his wife first to him as head of the household and then to other male family members,
• while the farmer in the USA prefers to sit at a table and eat his meal along with his wife and other females members of his family, using a knife and fork.
• Implicit in these two situations are basic values of each culture involved.

8. Values frequently represent alternatives and value systems consist of ranked alternatives.
   Values therefore compete with one another, and behaviour is determined by the ranked position or priority level of the value.
   For example: A college student

• may not have sufficient income to feed himself adequately in the college cafeteria and pay his tuition and other dues.
• On the basis of his values, he may decide to forego all except one meal a day and meet his other necessary college expenses.
• A different priority in this value system may cause him to give up his college education in order to meet his immediate needs of adequate nourishment.

9. Values may differ in their effects upon the individual and society as a whole.
   The values of a sub-group within society may be in conflict with those of society as a whole and work against welfare.
   For example:
   Organised theft, movement of contraband narcotics and bribery may be considered desirable means to an end in some subgroups of society, but have damaging effects on society as a whole and are contrary to its interests.
   On the other hand, such values may have extremely positive beneficial effects on society.
   For instance:
   Nonviolent fighters of the freedom movement in pre-independence India suffered untold physical and mental hardship, but won national independence for society as a whole.

10. Because of their importance to individuals and society, values involve emotions, and people often sacrifice and even enter into conflict to uphold them.
    For example, the fighting for “a cause” involves values charged with emotion.

11. Values exert strange influence on the development of individuals and society in at least two important ways:
    First, by making it easy or difficult for rural people to accept new practices, to form new types of organisations and operate in new ways.

• The difficulty of acceptance of a low caste occupation however financially profitable, by a high caste Hindu;
• the case of adoption of home sanitation is an illustration of the strong influence of values.
  Second, by influencing the scientific findings of the rural sociologist and other social scientists.

• The rural sociologist not only has personal values but is also subject to conformity with the values of the society within which he or she lives.
• This will influence not only the individual’s scientific findings and attitude towards these findings, but also the use that the individual can make of them.
• The involvement of personal values may prove an impediment to objectivity.

12. While values and norms are learned, many become internalised and form a part of the subconscious of the individual.

• As a result, some reactions of individuals based on such values are virtually automatic.
• Examples of such automatic responses: Values of chivalry and respect for women and the aged .

13. Values are stable and deep-rooted but are subject to change.

• While values deeply influence human behaviour and are deeply imbedded in the mores and culture of rural society,
• As a relatively stable characteristic of the social structure, they are subject to change through passage of time, conditions and circumstances.
• The tempo is, however, slow compared with that of other aspects of society, although it varies from culture to culture.
• Thus in India, traditions and religious beliefs and customs such as the caste system interwoven with values inherent within it,
• has persisted for centuries as an integral part of Hindu society until with national independence, important constitutional changes were made and implemented.
• It persists now to a large extent, but in a somewhat different form, reflecting a significant change in values.

THREE TYPES OF VALUES:

1. Ultimate values.

• Every society has a unique set of ultimate values
• which forms the general framework within which the behaviour of individuals and groups is controlled or influenced.
• Often referred to as dominant values, they constitute the core of society’s value system.
• Ultimate values express the general views of society toward matters such as the nature of the universe and one’s relation to it and to other people.
• Hence, these values are found most easily in social institutions
• such as religion, government, and the family-each of which contains some important social values,
• e.g.the democratic procedures expressed in the system of government.
• Accompanying these ultimate or dominant values in society are dominant social norms to support and uphold the values.
• Ultimate values are abstract and often not attainable.

2. Intermediate values.

• Intermediate values are derived from ultimate values and
• are actually ultimate values that have been rephrased into more reasonably attainable categories.
• They exist and operate within the framework of ultimate values
• are implemented through norms or socially prescribed rules that serve to support and uphold them.
• Within the framework of social institutions such as religion, government, and education are intermediate values such as freedom of speech, adult franchise, religious freedom, free public education, non-discrimination, adequate housing, etc.

3. Specific values.

• The sub-divisions of intermediate values are called specific values and are almost unlimited in number.
• Specific values must be in conformity with the total value system of which they form the smallest unit.
• They constitute the personal and group preference expressed in daily life.
• To a farmer, the intermediate value of adequate housing, in terms of specific values, may be represented by a brick construction with a flat slab roof, wide verandah and large courtyard with provision for livestock housing.
• Specific values in regard to public education may be expressed in terms of the preference of type of school, classroom and other facilities and content of courses of instruction.
• Taken together, specific, intermediate and ultimate or dominant values form the value system in society, which serves as a basic determinant of human behaviour.
• An understanding of the value system of a society is essential to promote change in that society.

FUNCTIONS OF VALUES

Values are not ends in themselves and do not serve as objectives or goals towards which social action is directed.

They serve to indicate direction toward, and give relative importance to goals and objective in society.

The following have been identified as the general functions of social values:

(a) Values provide a readymade means for judging the social worth of persons and pluralities.

They make possible the whole system of stratification that exists in every society. They help the individual himself to “know where he stands” in the eyes of his fellow men.

(b) Values focus the attention of people upon material cultural items that are considered desirable, useful and essential.

The item so valued may not always be “best” for the individual or group, but the fact that it is a socially valued object makes it worth striving for.

(c) The ideal ways of thinking and behaving in any society are indicated by values. They form a kind blueprint of socially accepted behaviour so that people can almost always discern the “best” way of acting and thinking.

(d) Values are guideposts for people in their choice and fulfilment of social roles. They create interest and provide encouragement so that people realize that the demands and expectations of the various roles are functioning toward worthwhile objectives.

(e) Values act as a means of social control and social pressure. They influence people to conform to the mores, encourage them to do the “right” things, and give them a feeling of merited esteem. On the other hand, they act as restraints against disapproved behaviour, indicate certain prohibited patterns, and make intelligible the feelings of shame and guilt coming from social transgressions.

(f) Values function as a means of solidarity. It is an axiom among social scientists that groups cluster around and are united by common shared values of a high order. People are attracted to others who cherish the same values; and it may be said that common values are among the most important of the factors that create and maintain social solidarity”

RURAL URBAN DIFFERENCES IN VALUES
While rural-urban differences in values vary from culture to culture in societies all over the world, there are uniformities underlying the characteristics of rural life.

1. Monogamous marriage
2. Freedom of the individual in ideal and in fact
3. Education and Practicality
4. Monotheistic religion: Emphasis on religion and its great influence in national life
5. Democracy (belief and faith in it) and Local government
6. Equality as a fact and right, Prosperity and general material well-being
7. Uniformity and conformity
8. Disregard of law: “direct action”

GLOSSARY:

1. Social control: The pattern of influence the society exerts on individuals and groups to maintain order and establish rules in the society.
2. Folkways: The informal ways of behaviour based on habits and traditions, mostly found in usages.
   Examples of folkways: Dressing, eating habits etc.

3. Mores: Socially acceptable ways of behaviour which involves moral standards.
   Examples for Mores: Removing chappal while entering into the house

4. Taboos: Prohibition of types of behaviour because of some magical, supernatural or religious sanction.
   Examples for taboos: Muslim girls should not go to mosque.

5. Ritual: A pattern of behaviour or ceremony which has become the customary way of dealing with certain situations,
   Examples of rituals: Ceremony of naming the baby

6. Norms: Established behaviour patterns for the members of a social system.
   Example of norms: Wishing the elder ones – Namaskaram

7. Laws: Codification of mores takes place for strict adherence and compliance.
   Example for laws: Prohibition on dowry, child labour, child marriages etc.

8. Values: Constructs of society created through the interrelationships of its members.
9. Ultimate values: Dominant values which constitute the core of society’s value system.
10. Examples for Ultimate values: The democratic procedures expressed in the system of government.
11. Intermediate values: Ultimate values that have been rephrased into more reasonably attainable categories.
12. Examples for intermediate values: Freedom of speech, adult franchise, religious freedom, free public education, non-discrimination, adequate housing, etc.
13. Specific values constitute the personal and group preference expressed in daily life.
14. Intermediate and ultimate or dominant values form the value system in society.
15. Values provide a readymade means for judging the social worth of persons and pluralities.
16. Values focus the attention of people upon material cultural items that are considered desirable, useful and essential.
17. Values: The ideal ways of thinking and behaving in any society
18. Values: Guideposts for people in their choice and fulfilment of social roles.
19. Values act as a means of

• social control and
• social
• solidarity

ASSIGNMENT

1. What is social control? Explain the means of social control.
2. Write the functions and types of values in the society.

RELIGION

Definition of Religion
Durkheim in his book the Elementary forms of Religious life defines religion as a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things “that is to say things set apart and for bidden”.

Osborn defined “Religion is an attitude towards super human powers”.

Mac Iver and Page have defined religion “as a relationship not merely between man and man but also between man some higher power”.

In simple words, we can define “religion is a system of beliefs, rituals and values concerned with the sacred or divine forces”.

CHARACTERISTICS

• Religion is not a phenomenon of recent emergence. The institution of religion is universal and dateless. Its beginning is unknown.
• Religion is found in all the societies past and present.
• Religion is a powerful instrument of social control. i.e. Laws, customs, conventions and fashions are not the only means of social control. Over riding those all are religion and morality.  They are not only the most influential forces of social control but also the most effective guides of human behaviour.
• Religion is man’s faith in super natural forces
• Religion is a concrete experience which is associated with emotions, especially with fear.
• Religion represents one of the main social facts of man. Religious aspect is considered more important and influential in human social life.
• A society like ours religious dogmas have influenced and conditioned economic endeavors political movements, property dealings, educational tasks and ideological favors.
• Religion which is based on the cultural needs of men has added new dimensions to human life and human development.
• Many societies have a wide range of institutions connected with religion and a body of special official forms of worships, ceremonies and sacred objects and like.
• In modern civilized societies, religious leaders have developed elaborated theories to explain man’s place in the universe.
• Well established religions: Hinduism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Sikhism, Jainism, etc. are really centers of elaborate cultural systems that have dominated the whole societies for centuries of religious groups in India.

Religion minded rural India
Thinkers in all times and at all places have agreed in regarding Indians as a religious minded people. Religion is still the alpha and the omega of Indian’s life. Besides being religious Indians are also professed to be of a philosophical propensity.

Most thinkers consider Indians as a people who contemplate interminably upon religion and philosophy the after – world heaven, hell and salvation.

REGIONALISM, COMMUNALISM, SECULARISM

COMMUNALISM: Communalism is an ideology which states that society is divided into religious communities whose interest differ and are, at times, even opposed to each other. The antagonism practiced by the people of one community against the people of other community and religion can be termed as ‘communalism’.

SECULARISM: Secularism, along with a commitment to the ideals of democracy, equality and freedom were some of the fundamental principles that inspired a large section of our people to fight against British colonialism. After independence, these values were enshrined in the Constitution, thus enjoining the state to uphold these principles.

REGIONALISM: Regionalism is a feeling or an ideology among a section of people residing in a particular geographical space characterized by unique language, culture etc., that they are the sons of the soil and every opportunity in their land must be given to them first but not to the outsiders. It is a sort of Parochialism (a limited or narrow outlook, especially focused on a local area; narrow-mindedness). In most of the cases it is raised for convenient political gains but not necessarily.

Role of Religion in Indian Societies

• History of mankind proved that man is not only a social animal but also a spiritual being.
• From time immemorial religion is a major concern of human thought.
• Religion is one of the oldest universal permanent and perennial interests of man.
• Beside Biological economic and social needs man has religious needs.

He has religious quest which makes him to become restless even beyond the satisfaction of his basic physical needs.

CULTURE
It is a complex whole of knowledge, belief, art, morals, laws, customs, and other capabilities and habits acquired by the people as member of society.

It is social heritage, inclusive of material & non material aspects.

Material aspects: House, food, clothing, tools, equipments and other material items

Non material aspects: Family, kin group, caste group, education, political organizations, government, economic system, religion etc.

Characteristics of culture

• Culture is learned through process of socialization, communication and training.
• Culture is transmitted from generation to generations and it is learned from parents and through to children
• Culture is universal and unique- there is culture everywhere, but every society has its own culture.
• Culture is static as well as dynamic- it has permanence, but at the same it changes over the years.
• Culture is integrative- different aspects of culture may pull in different directions. Still there is consistency and integration so that the society is held together
• Culture builds conformity-the patterns of behavior in a culture are considered as ideal towards which people are expected to strive.
• Culture is relative- there is nothing like good culture or bad culture. It is interpreted according to a person or society’s own experience.
• Culture is diverse- culture varies from country to country and different areas in the same nation. Ecological diversity is an important source of cultural difference.

Implications of culture

Ethnocentrism– the tendency to consider their own culture is of high value and superior to all others. This exists worldwide.

Cultural change– Culture changes based on two factors- i) Internal- discovery and invention within the culture. ii) External- diffusion and borrowing from outside the society.

Cultural lag– some parts of the culture of people change at faster rate than the other parts.

Traditional culture is the foundation of indigenous knowledge and technology systems.

VALUES AND BELIEFS

Values refer to what people considered as valuable and desirable. It can be defined as expressions of preferences. Values are learned and tend to be linked together amicably to form patterns. It varies from culture to culture in accordance with relative worth given to them by each culture.

Constraints in the change of values

Familism– subordination of individual goals to family

 Fatalism- value for fate than in spite individuals abilities

Conservation– emphasis on the past to preserve and continue it are many a times constraints in changing the values.

Beliefs are closely related to values. They are the mental convictions one has about the truth of something. They can be referred as to what people believe as true.

GLOSSARY:

1. Religion: A system of beliefs, rituals and values concerned with the sacred or divine forces.
2. Communalism: An ideology which states that society is divided into religious communities whose interest differ and are even opposed to each other.
3. Regionalism: A feeling or an ideology among a section of people residing in a particular geographical space.
4. Regionalism is characterized by unique language, culture etc.,
5. Secularism: A commitment to the ideals of democracy, equality and freedom as fundamental principles.
6. Culture: The social heritage, inclusive of material & non material aspects.
7. Culture: A complex whole of knowledge, belief, art, morals, laws, customs, and other capabilities and habits acquired by the people as member of society.
8. Material aspects: House, food, clothing, tools, equipments and other material items
9. Non material aspects: Family, kin group, caste group, education, political organizations, government, economic system, religion etc.
10. Ethnocentrism: the tendency to consider their own culture is of high value and superior to all others. This exists worldwide.
11. Cultural change: Culture changes based on two factors- i) Internal- discovery and invention within the culture. ii) External- diffusion and borrowing from outside the society.
12. Cultural lag: some parts of the culture of people change at faster rate than the other parts.
13. Traditional culture: The foundation of indigenous knowledge and technology systems.
14. Familism: Subordination of individual goals to family
15. Fatalism: Value for fate than in spite individuals abilities
16. Conservation: emphasis on the past to preserve and continue it are many a times constraints in changing the values.
17. Beliefs: The mental convictions one has about the truth of something.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Explain the concept of religion and changes in it today.
2. What is culture? Discuss the implications of culture.
3. What are the characteristics of religion and culture.
4. List and write the meaning of concepts in culture and beliefs.

ECONOMY OR MAINTENANCE
Economy is an institution that provide basic physical subsistence for society and meet basic needs for food, shelter, clothing and other necessities.

The economic institutions are of

• production-agriculture, industry, and the distribution, exchange, and consumption of commodities, goods and services necessary for human survival.
• Secondary institutions included major economic institutions are credit and banking systems, advertising, cooperatives, etc.
• Means of livelihood show wide variety both in themselves and in associated functions and relationships not only in various parts of the world but within societies.

So, an economy  is an area of the production, distribution, or trade, and consumption of goods and services by different agents in a given geographical location.

Understood in its broadest sense, ‘The economic is defined as a social domain that emphasizes the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with the production, use and management of resources’.

CHANGING STRUCTURE OF RURAL ECONOMY IN POST INDEPENDENT INDIA

At independent economy was predominaly agrarian.  India  has  been  predominatly  an  agricultural – based country  and  it  was  the  only  source  of  livehood  in  ancient  time.  Agricultural is  the  main  stay  of  the  India  economy,  as  it constitutes  the  backbone  of  rural  India  which  inhabitants  more  than  70%  of  total  India population. The  rural  economy  of  India,  with special  emphasis  on  its  agricultural  production base  and  the  role  of  agricultural  in  its  overall  development.

Today, the  rural  economy  in  India  and  its  subsequent    productivity  growth  is predicated  to  a  large  extent  upon  the  development  of  its  whole  rural population.

SIZE AND STRUCTURE OF THE RURAL ECONOMY

In rural India, agriculture is the main occupation   of   the people   and that provides   them    livelihood   as   well   but   in  addition  there   are   several  other   occupations which   keep   the   people   busy   and  engaged.  India’s  economy  can  be  thought  of  as comprising  two  main  sectors,  namely,  the  rural  sector  and  the  non  rural  sector.

The  rural sector  is,  in  turn,  composed  of  two  main  sub  sectors.  i.e. the

• Agricultural sub sector and
• Non agricultural sub sector: The  non  agricultural  sub  sectors  consist  of  economic  activities relating  to  industry,  business  and

The  size  of  the  rural  sector  could  be  measured in  terms  of  the  rural  population,  the  population  of  livestock,  the  extent  of  land,  forest  and other  natural  resources.

Indian  economy  agricultural  system  which  is  the  back  bone  of Indian       economy  has  its  own  features.

NEW ECONOMIC POLICIES – LIBERALISATION, PRIVATISATION, GLOBALISATION
In 1990s the govt. of India in order to come out of the economic crisis decided to devite from its previous economic policies and learn towards privatization. In July 1991 when the devaluation of Indian currency took place the govt. started announcing its new economic policies one after another. Though these polices pertained to different aspects of the economic field they had one thing in common. The economic element was to orient the Indian system towards the world market it is in this context the govt. launched its new economic policy which consisted of among other things three important features.

• Liberalisation,
• Privatization and
• Globalisation.

Main objectives of New –Economic Policy – 1991

The  main objectives behind the launching of the new –economic policy (NEP) in 1991 by the union finance minister Dr. Man Mohan singh, could be stated as follows:

• The main objective was to plunge Indian economy in to the arena of ‘Globalisation and to give it a new thrust on market orientation.
• The NEP intended to bring down the rate of inflation and to remove imbalances in payment.
• It intended to move towards higher economic growth rate and to build sufficient foreign exchange reserves.
• It wanted to achieve economic stabilization and to convert the economic in to a market economy by removing all kinds of unnecessary restrictions.
• It wanted to permit the international flow of goods, services, capital, human resources and technology, without many restrictions.

LIBERALISATION

The recent wave of economic policy reform in the developing world has been seen as a necessary consequence of a changed world economic system. The key feature of the changed world economy is the clement of the heightened economic globalisation which provides new external challenges as well as opportunities for development.

MAIN FEATURES OF THE POLICY OF LIBERA LISATION

1. Lessened Government control and freelance to private Enterprises.
2. Capital Markets opened for private Entrepreneurs
3. Simplification of Licensing policy
4. Opportunity to purchase foreign exchange at market prices
5. Right To Take Independent Decisions Regarding The Market
6. Better opportunity for completion
7. Widened Liberty in the Realm of Business and Trade

The liberalisation process has helped the free movement of goods and services it has led to better industrial performances. Industrial organizations have now become more efficient and market responsive. Country’s exports are on the increase. Sectors such as information technology and computer soft ware here registered tremendous progress.

The Deficiencies
Liberalisation process has its deficiencies also.
The economic reforms including liberalisation were introduced all on a sudden and proper background was not created to take their full advantage and to face their consequences.

PRIVATIZATION
Privatization is a managerial approach that has attracted the interest of many categories of people academicians, politicians, government employee players of the private sector and public on the whole. Privatization refers to any process that reduces the involvement of the state, public sector in economic activities of a nation.

The privatization process in a mixed economy such as of India includes:

• Decentralization the transfer of the ownership of productive assets to the private sector.
• Entry of private sector industries into the areas exclusive reserved for the state sector or which are considered exclusive monopolies of state.
• Limiting the scope of the public sector or no more diversification of existing public sector understandings.

MAIN OBJECTIVE OF PRIVATIZATION

1. The process of privatization has been triggered with the main intention of improving industrial efficiency and to facilitate the inflow of foreign investments
2. It also wants to make the public sector undertakings strong able efficient companies. It recommends a change in the role of the government from that of the “owner manager” to that of a mere “controller” or “regular”.
3. It also intend to ensure efficient utilization of all types of resources including human resources.
4. Privatization insists on the government to concentrate on the area such as education administration and infrastructure and to give up the responsibility of looking after business and running industries. It is expected to strengthen the capital market by following appropriate trade policies.

ADVANTAGES OF PRIVATIZATION

• Efficiency, Absences of political interference, Quality service, Systematic marketing Use of freedom technology.
• Accountability.
• Innovation.
• Research and development.
• Infrastructure.

DRAW BACKS:

• Profitablity
• Protection of weaker section inerests
• Price fixing polocy

GLOBALIZATION
Globalization  represent one of the aspects of the new economic policy lunched in the decades of 1980 and 1990s. The new economic policy has also made the economy outwardly oriented such that its activities are now to be governed both by domestic market and the world market.

The general usages of the terms globalization can be follows ,

• Interaction and interdependence among countries
• Integration of world economy
• Deterritorisation

STEPS IN GLOBALISATION

• Need for corporate sector to go global: The Indian corporate sector has to take lead and initiative in  bringing about the globalization of the economy. To go global a corporate must consciously .
• Needs to promote competitiveness of Indian producers: to succeed in global market , competitiveness of Indian producers has to be improved .
• Need to adopt new strategies: the changes realities of the global environment detect that the Indian firms must in order to survive.
• Need to create favorable environment: world class companies need to undergo a change.
• Need to set up new institutions Need for a rules and regulations : if we  want make our companies  world – class we also need rule and regulations that are in leave with global corporate and financial norms .

ADVANTAGES OF GLOBALAISATION

• Better and faster industrialization: the flow of industrial units from developed countries to developing countries gives speed of industries helping global industrialization. Helps overall balanced development.
• Flow of capital: moves from to surplus countries to the needy in globalization. Investors get advantage of better returns for his capital.
• Speed of production facilities throughout the world: the production units give cost competitive and wider availability and manufactured gods.
• Flow of technology: the advanced level of technology flow from developed country to less developed countries .
• Increase in conception: due to technology and the spared up gradation the demand increases for manufactured good.
• Attitude: thinking globally in major plus point in globalization

DISADVANTAGES OF GLOBALIZATION

• Globalization discourages domestic industry and business: with sophistication in technologies and large scale production felicities of other countries domestic trade and industries is hit.
• Problem on the labor front: the process of globalization needs to job layoffs and exploitation of human recourses. This is especially applicable to under developed countries.
• Widening rich and poor divide: the unemployment and decline of in income level in lower strata of society widen the gap between the rich and poor more and more.
• Transfer of national recourses: the developed countries tend to establish factories in underdeveloped countries may lead to commercial exploitation.

Today globalization is being challenged around the world. In effects of globalization, in India, to the path of developmental at a more rapid rate than ever before. It is true that globalization brings in its wake great enquiry, mass impoverishment and misery. It is almost irreversibly widens the gap between the developed and the developing nations. What we learn from this process of globalization is that it is more harmful for the developing and the under developing countries. The choice for the devolving countries like India lies not in total global integration, but less of global integration and more of self relines and self sustenance with an emphasis on indigenous and traditional production and knowledge system.

EDUCATION – SOCIAL INSTITUTION

• Educationis the process of facilitatinglearning, or the acquisition of knowledge, skills, values, beliefs, and habits.
• Educational methods include
  • storytelling,
  • discussion,
  • teaching,
  • training, and
  • directed research.
• Education frequently takes place under the guidance of educators/ teachers, but learners may also educate themselves.
• Education can take place informal or informal settings and any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts may be considered educational. The methodology of teaching is called pedagogy.
• Education is commonly divided formally into such stages as
  • preschool or kindergarten,
  • primary school,
  • secondary school
  • then college,
  • university, or
  • apprenticeship.

 Educational theory

• Individual purposes for pursuing education can vary. Understanding the goals and means of educational socialisation processes may also differ according to the sociological paradigm
• The early years of schooling generally focus around developing basic inter personal communication and literary skills.
• This lays a foundation for more complex skills and subjects.
• Later, education usually turns toward gaining the knowledge and skills needed to create value and establish a livelihood.
• People also pursue education for its own sake to satisfy innate curiosity, out of interest in a specific subject or skill, or for overall personal development.
• Education is often understood (Sargent 1994) as
  • a means of overcoming handicaps,
  • achieving greater equality, and
  • acquiring wealth and status for all
• Education is also often perceived as a place where children can develop according to their unique needs and potentials, with the purpose of developing every individual to their full potential.

History of Education
Education in ancient India had a deep impact in the upliftment and advancement of the early society and over all development.
India is with a rich tradition of knowledge and learning from the earliest days of Indian civilization.

The ancient education system:

• There are several literary sources, such as the Vedas and other Hindu texts and scriptures, which offer references about education system of the ancient societies.
• In this period, the following objectives were ascribed to education.

1. Self control,
2. Development of character,
3. Generation of sociability or social awareness,
4. Integral development of personality,
5. Propagation of purity,
6. Preservation of knowledge and culture.

• Education in Ancient India originated with the Gurukul system.
  • This type of ancient Hindu school in India was residential in nature with the Shishyas or students and the Guru or teacher living in proximity within the same house.
  • The students resided together irrespective of their social standing.
  • Though, the Vedic education was not transmitted to people of low strata, yet the Vedic system inspired the modern day education system.

Medieval Indian Education

• The period under review covers the system of education in India from about the 10th century A.D. to the middle of the 18th century, i.e. before the British rule.
• Arab and Central Asian peoples brought Muslim educational models to the subcontinent in both the medieval and early modern periods.
• Medieval period witnessed a radical transformation in the Indian subcontinent. The country was invaded by various foreign rulers and several traders from around the world came and settled in the country.
• The tradesmen and the invaders brought with them their own cultures and intermingled with the people of the each district of the state.
• Besides, religion, society and culture, Education in medieval India also experienced a new perspective.
• The introduction of modern education is started by the middle of the 19th Century.
• The imperial Government decided to introduce European literature and science in India.
• Education was thrown open to all sections of people, irrespective of caste and religious barriers.
• New branches of knowledge such as science, technology and the British educationists who have first devised a classification of the educational institutions into
  • primary,
  • middle school,
  • high school and
  • University levels.
• The British Govt. constituted various committees from time to time to find out the deficiencies of the existing system of education.
• Some of them were the
  • Indian Education commission (1882),
  • the Universities Commission (1902),
  • the Calcutta University Commission (1917) and
  • Abott Wood Committee (1937)
• The Govt. of India in their resolution in the year 1913 announced that government had decide to assist local Govt.s by large grants. The policy outlined in the resolution of 1913, encouraged educational progress  and the developments foreshadowed were in many cased delayed by the great war.
• The results of the transfer were the rapid increase in enrolment. There was a nationwide enthusiasm for the education for the children.
• In 1935, Govt. of India Act was passed.
• In1937, Mahatma Gandhi initiated discussion on an independent scheme of national education.
• He convened an All-India national education conference at wardha and conference drew up a scheme of basic education known as Wardha Scheme.
• It provided seven years free and compulsory education with mother tongue as medium of instruction, craft as the centre of teaching and correlation as the technique instruction.
• It emphasized the activity principles, the imbibing of Indian culture and Indian philosophy and curriculum suited to the rural and the urban masses.
• In 1939, Central Advisory Board of education (C.A.B.), appointed a committee on Adult education, and the committee reported at length regarding the need for removal of mass illiteracy, and the methods to be adopted.
• After independence, and adult education movement changed its character and its scope was so extended that adult education was renamed as social education.
• Social education meant for the complete man, which included literacy and all- round.
• Sergeant commission (1944).
  • The next landmark in the history of Indian education was the report of Sergeant commission
  • on ‘post War stages of education development in India.’
  • The commission dealt at length all the stages of education
    ( primary, secondary, and university),
    • various aspects of education,
    • examination reform ,
    • teacher training,
    • health education,
    • education of the handicapped and
    • recreational and social activities.
• It drew up a plan for educating each Indian child, which would take 40 years.

POST INDEPENDENT INDIA

• With the attainment of Independence the character and objectives of Indian education started changing.
• During the British period education had not reached the masses.
• In the villages and even in towns other than the metropolitan cities, schools were few and far –between.
• Out of hundred in 1947, only 15 could read or write.
• A national Policy Education was yet in its evolution in the Nehru era.
• The Educational Commissions appointed by the Nehru government in 1948 and 1952 anyhow
  • contributed to that evolution as well as the general development of education in the first two decades of Independence.
  • The first milestone in the development of education in independent India was the enactment of Indian constitution which defined a number of matters concerning education.
  • The provision for free and compulsory education for all
  • Children until they complete the age of fourteen, has been made directive principles of state policy.
  • Again the state shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people, and in particular of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, and
  • shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation.
  • In part of the constitution, Hindi has been declared as the official language of the union.
  • Hence progressive use of Hindi language for the official purposes of the union, and
  • the regional languages for the internal administration in each state has been recommended.

RADHAKRISHNAN COMMISSION (1948-49)
One of the earliest educational decisions  of the Nehru Government  was to set up a University Education Commission under the chairmanship of Dr. S. Radhakrishnan in 1948.

SECONDARY EDUCATION COMMISSION UNDER MUDALIAR (1952-53)

• The reorganisation of Secondary Education was a pre-condition to the proper development of University Education.
• This aspect was stressed by the University Education Commission under Radhakrishnan.
• But the Govt. could not take up the problem immediately.
• The Commission remarked that since India has accepted democracy and socialism as its objectives,
• education in the country must be so organized as to promote broad national consciousness and secular outlook among the students.

UNIVERSALISATION OF PRIMARY EDUCATION

• Free and compulsory education for all children in the age group of 6-14 was a cherished ideal of our nationalist movement.
• The Karachi session of Indian National Congress (1931) had accepted this ideal its resolution.
• Hence, the importance of Primary education was recognized by the Independent government right from the beginning.
• It also reflected in the Constitution accepted in 1950. Article 45 of the Constitution in the form of Directive Principle of State Policy enjoins the state to Endeavour education for all children until they complete the age of 14.
• As the Central and State Governments had formulated special programmes for the promotion of the education of women, the number of school going girls also started rising.

TEACHING OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

• A significant achievement of the post Independence period was the development of research, especially scientific and technological research. This was very pertinent for the socio economic development of the country.
• The national scientific policy led to the development of research in all sectors.
• The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research(CSIR) came to conduct a number of National Laboratories and promote Research several important areas.
• The Department of Atomic Energy created after Independence had several achievements to its credit.
• Independent India gave much attention to Science and Technology.

UNIVERSITY GRANT COMMISSION

• On the recommendation of Radhakrishnan commission the central government set-up University grant commission in1953,
• with the objectives of determining coordinating and maintaining the standard of education in the colleges and Universities, and
• also sanctioning financial grants for their development.

NATIONAL COUNCIL OF EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AND TRAINING (NCERT)

• The All India council of Secondary Education was further widened in its scope, NCERT was set up in September 1961, with a dozen wings.
• The main functions of NCERT are
  • promotion and coordination of educational research,
  • organizing in service training,
  • disseminating information,
  • production of material and equipment, and
  • maintain international contact.

RESOLUTION ON NATIONAL POLICY IN EDUCATION

• In July 1968, a Resolution on Educational policy in India was framed according to which was reaffirmed to accomplish the aims and objects of the constitution.
• The major recommendations of Indian Education Commission were accepted viz.
  • liquidating illiteracy,
  • providing vocational education and
  • linking education to national requirements.

INDIAN EDUCATION SYSTEM TODAY

• The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, which represents the consequential legislation envisaged under Article 21-A,
• means that every child has a right to full time elementary education of satisfactory and equitable quality in a formal school which satisfies certain essential norms and standards.

INDIAN VILLAGE GOVERNANCE
Local self-government is nothing new in the Indian history.

A “Chaupal” has always been an integral part of village life where people, generally elderly, would sit together and discuss current local affairs.

All community matters would get decided in these meetings which in the recent the centuries came to be known as village Panchayats.

A “Panch” means a prominent local personality and the “Panchayat” refers to the gathering of “Panchas.”

HISTORY

Vedic Period:

• Ever since the Vedic period, local villagers participated in the collective decision making.
• Sabhas (gatherings) were the popular platforms through which the common people had a direct say and control over the local affairs.
• The village was always a more or less self-dependent unit. It generated its own resources, had its own functionaries and its own functional domain.
• Village and State functions were supplementary and rarely conflicted; the State performed only those functions which the village could not perform itself.
• This naturally evolved system persisted in the ancient period under the Mauryas, Guptas and Harshavardhan.

Mughal era:

• Things began to change in the early medieval period, with the arrival of invaders and their foreign concept of governance.
• The system is divided into Revenue Administration and Police Administration between Patwari and Muqaddam.
• The Mughals introduced middlemen – called Zagirdars – to collect Revenue from the villager for the State.
• This introduction of Zagirdari system created new power centers at the local level and weakened the self-governing Panchayat system of the village community.
• This also adversely affected the village economy due to loss of financial autonomy of the Village Panchayats.
• But despite the weakening influence of the Zagirdari system, village Panchayats continued to play significant role even during the Mughal era.

British era:

• But the British rule gave a severe blow to the local independence of the village Panchayats.
• They changed the Revenue system that reduced the self-sufficient villages to the status of dependent units.
• Their centralized system of governance gave a severe blow to the rather autonomous indigenous socio-economic system of Indian villages.
• Since their main aim was to exploit the natural resources as well as people of India to strengthen the British Empire, they systematically destroyed all forms of local independence.
• Thus, they put in place a system of delegation where power flowed from the Central command and reduced the local people to the status of non-entities.
• In spite of the systematic damage done to the village governing bodies by the British, Mahatma Gandhi had full faith in the village Panchayat system of ancient India.
• In his vision of “Gram Swaraj” village assemblies were the basic building blocks for governance of a future democratic India, from where all power will flow to the top.
• Thus, he strongly advocated strengthening of village Panchayats throughout the country so as to have a vibrant all-inclusive grass-root democracy.
• But, unfortunately after transfer of power from the White to the Brown rulers in 1947, the well-being of the villages where most Indian population lived did not become an important national political issue and the colonial system of governance continued.
• Yet, the spirit of local self-governance did not die.

Post Independence:

• The Panchayat system was inducted in the Constitution in the Article 40 by the Special Constituent Assembly.
• The 64th Amendment Bill and then the 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act of Indian Constitution provided the Constitutional status to the Panchayati Raj Institutions all over the country except the Tribal dominated Fifth Schedule areas.
• Therefore, another Act namely the Panchayat Extension to the Scheduled Areas Act (PESA), 1996 was passed by the Parliament so that even the tribal population gets a chance to govern its own affairs in its own traditional ways through the Gram Sabhas.
• Again, sixty five years after the so-called independence, it was Anna Hazare who tried to put the village Panchayats at the center-stage during his fight for a strong Lokpal Bill to curb the widespread corruption in the country.

Actually, Good governance demands

• respect for human rights,
• rule of law,
• strengthening of democracy,
• promoting transparency and
• capacity in public administration.

• The responsiveness of the state and its institutions to the needs and aspirations of the people, and inclusive citizenship are imperative to good governance.
• Democracy depends upon the equality of all human beings, their right to participate in social and political transformation and the right to development, to live in dignity.
• Panchayat Raj is a system and process of good governance.
• Villages have always been the basic units of administration in India since ancient times.
• The Gram Sabha can become the cornerstone of the whole Panchayat Raj institutional set-up, thereby the Indian democratic system.
• So, in this paper focus is on Gandhian concept of Panchayat Raj.
• This is useful to development of India.
• So in 21st century this concept becomes powerful in the Nation.

Importance of Democratic Decentralization:

• Panchayati Raj or village Swaraj: Gandhi’s concept of democratic decentralization bears the stamp of his passionate belief in non-violence, truth and individual freedom.
• He wants to see each village
  • a little republic,
  • self-sufficient in its vital wants,
  • organically and non-hierarchically linked with the larger spatial bodies and
  • enjoying the maximum freedom of deciding the affairs of the locality.
• Gandhi wanted political power to be distributed among the villages in India. Gandhi preferred the term ‘Swaraj’ to describe what he called true democracy.
• This democracy is based upon freedom. Individual freedom in Gandhi’s view could be maintained only in autonomous, self-reliant communities that offer opportunities to the people for fullest participation.

Village Panchayats

• The vehicle that was most ideal to initiate both political and economic democracy at the grassroots level was the Panchayat Raj system.
• Mahatma Gandhi’s tours all across the country reinforced his convictions that India would benefit if the villages were governed by Village Panchayats based on the principal of “simple living and high thinking”.
• These were village republics which were self-contained and self-reliant and having all that people want.
• These were the institutions where minimum standard of living could be accorded to all human beings.
• An individual had maximum freedom and opportunity to develop his personality to the greatest extent.
• In these republics, there would be a shrinking of the state and the roots of democracy deepened. According to him centralization cannot be sustained as a system without adequate force.
• The affairs are to be managed by Panchayats consisting of five persons elected annually.
• Gandhi aimed at the individual the centre of the local administration.
• People are expected to take personal interest and turn up in large numbers at the meeting to deliberate problems of common interest such as village industries, agricultural production, obligation and planning.

Recommendations of Balwant Rai Mehta Committee:

• The Balwant Rai Mehta Committee was a committee appointed by the Government of India in January 1957 to examine the working of the Community Development Programme (1952) and followed by the National Extension Service (1953) and to suggest measures for their better working.
• The recommendations of the committee were approved by National Development Council(NDC) in January 1958 and this set the stage for the launching of Panchayat Raj Institutions throughout the country.
• The committee recommended the establishment of the scheme of ‘democratic decentralization’ which finally came to be known as Panchayat Raj.

Establishment of a 3-tier Panchayat Raj system:

• This system was adopted by state governments during the 1950s and 60s, as laws were passed to establish panchayats in various states.
• It also found backing in the Indian Constitution, with the 73rd amendment in 1992 to accommodate the idea.
  • contains provision for devolution of powers and responsibilities to the panchayats
  • for the preparation of economic development plans and social justice,
  • for implementation in relation to 29 subjects listed in the eleventh schedule of the constitution.

The 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act
The idea which produced the 73rd Amendment Act was not a response to pressure from the grassroots, but to an increasing recognition that the institutional initiatives of the preceding decade had not delivered, that the extent of rural poverty was still much too large and thus the existing structure of government needed to be reformed.

It is interesting to note that this idea evolved from the Centre and the state governments.

It was a political drive to see PRIs as a solution to the governmental crises that India was experiencing.

The Constitutional (73rd Amendment) Act, passed in 1992 by the Narasimha Rao government, came into force on April 24, 1993.

It was meant to provide constitutional sanction “to establish democracy at the grassroots level as it is at the state level or national level”.

Its main features are as follows:

• The or village Gram Sabha assembly as a deliberative body to decentralised governance has been envisaged as the foundation of the Panchayati Raj System.
• 73rd Amendment of the Constitution empowered the Gram Sabhas to conduct social audits in addition to its other functions.
• A uniform three-tier structure of panchayats at
  • Village (Gram Panchayat — GP),
  • Intermediate or block (Panchayat Samiti — PS) and
  • District (Zilla Parishad — ZP) levels.
• All the seats in a panchayat at every level are to be filled by elections from respective territorial constituencies.
• Not less than one-third of the total seats for membership as well as office of chairpersons of each tier have to be reserved for women.
• Reservation for weaker castes and tribes (SCs and STs) have to be provided at all levels in proportion to their population in the panchayats.
• To supervise, direct and control the regular and smooth elections to panchayats, a State Election Commission has
• The Act has ensured constitution of a State Finance Commission in every State/UT, for every five years, to suggest measures to strengthen finances of panchayati raj institutions.
• To promote bottom-up-planning, the District Planning Committee (DPC) in every district has been accorded to constitutional status.
• An indicative list of 29 items has been given in Eleventh Schedule of the Constitution.
• Panchayats are expected to play an effective role in planning and implementation of works related to these 29 items.

Eleventh Schedule

There are 29 functional items placed within the purview of panchayats:

1. Public distribution system.
2. Social welfare, including welfare of the handicapped, and mentally retarded.
3. Family welfare.
4. Market and fairs
5. Libraries
6. Technical training and vocational education
7. Poverty elevation program
8. Rural electrification, including distribuation of electricity.
9. Fuel and fodder
10. Rural housing
11. Small scale industries, including food producing industries.
12. Social forestry and farm forestry.
13. Animal husbandry, dairying, and poultry.
14. Land improvement, implementation of land reforms, land consolidation and soil conservation.
15. Maintenances of community assets
16. Welfare of the weaker sections, and in particular, of the scheduled castes and the scheduled tribes
17. Women and child development.
18. Health and sanitation including hospitals, primary health centers and dispensaries.
19. Cultural activities
20. Adult and non formal educatio
21. Education including primary and secondary school
22. Non convention energy sources.
23. Roads, culverts, bridges, ferries, waterways, and other ways of communication
24. Drinking water
25. Khadi, village and cottage industries
26. Minor forests products
27. Fisheries
28. Minor irrigation , water management, and watershed development.
29. Agriculture including agricultural extension.

FUNCTIONS:
All municipal acts in India provide for functions, powers and responsibilities to be carried out by the municipal government.

These are divided into two categories –

• Obligatory
• Discretionary

Obligatory functions

• supply of pure and wholesome water
• construction and maintenance of public streets
• lighting and watering of public streets
• cleaning of public streets, places and sewers
• regulation of offensive, dangerous or obnoxious trades and callings or practices
• maintenance or support of public hospitals
• establishment and maintenance of primary schools
• registration of births and deaths
• removing obstructions and projections in public streets, bridges and other places
• naming streets and numbering houses

Discretionary functions

• laying out of areas
• securing or removal of dangerous buildings or places
• construction and maintenance of public parks, gardens, libraries, museums, rest houses, leper homes, orphanages and rescue homes for women
• public buildings
• planting and maintenance of roadside and other trees
• housing for low income groups
• conducting surveys
• organizing public receptions, public exhibitions, public entertainment
• provision of transport facilities with the municipality
• promotion of welfare of municipal employees

Some of the functions of the urban bodies overlap with the work of state agencies.

The functions of the municipality, including those listed in the Twelfth Schedule are left to the discretion of the state government.

Local bodies have to be bestowed with adequate powers, authority and responsibility to perform the functions entrusted to them by the Act.

However, the Act has not provided them with any powers directly and has instead left it to state government discretion.

Social Audit:

• The Ministry of Panchayati Raj has issued specific guidelines to make Gram Sabha as a vibrant forum for promoting planned economic and social development of the villages in a transparent way.
• The guidelines are a part of the proceedings to observe the year 2009-10 as year of Gram Sabha and relates to the social audit for the effective implementation of Mahatma Gandhi NREGA.
• According to the guidelines, the Gram Sabha as a Key to the self-governance and transparent and accountable functioning are a forum that ensures direct, participative democracy.
• It offers equal opportunity to all citizens including the poor, the women and the marginalized to discuss and criticize, approve or reject proposals of the Gram Panchayat and also assess its performance.
• Hence, the States may, by law, endow the Panchayats with such powers and authority as may be required to enable them to function as institutions of self-government under them,
• Article 243G read with the Eleventh Schedule stipulates such laws may also endow powers and responsibilities upon Panchayats for the preparation and implementation of plans for economic development and social justice including in relation to the 29 matters listed in the Eleventh Schedule.
• This lead to the enactment of Gram Panchayat Acts by various States; these were no more than half-hearted attempts for the creation of rural local government institutions.

SOCIAL INTERACTION

A fundamental process in any society is INTERACTION,
Social interaction is “society in action”.
It is defined as the

• dynamic interplay of forces
• in which contact between persons and groups
• results in a modification of the attitudes and behavior
• of the participants.

If an individual,

• cannot be satisfied
• with certain needs personally,
• formal organizations, institution and bureaucracies may result.
• These interactions are in turn governed by societal norms
• in which social roles, status and values are involved.

 For instance, If society is considered a playing field,

• society members are players,
• norms are the rules of the game, and
• expected roles are the position of each player
• All together comprise the framework or structure of society
• When the game is played within this framework, it constitutes social interaction- the dynamic element of society.

These interactions may take place

• at trade centers or markets,
• in the village home,
• in the farm fields,
• in village meetings,
• in intimate primary groups, cliques, informal and formal groups.

The contact, awareness and reciprocal communication are through interaction without it cannot take place.

ASPECTS OF SOCIAL INTERACTION
Four important aspects of social interaction:

A. Social Contact.

• Without social contact, interaction is not possible.
• Physical contact has no social significance by itself,
• For example, Individuals may travel together in a crowded bus or railway train in close physical proximity without social contact and social interaction.
• Social contact, as distinct from physical contact, exists when there is reciprocal response and “an inner adjustment of behaviour to the actions of others”.

B. Communication:

• people cannot react to one another through communication.
• communicate a message and meaning;
• The means may be
• verbal,
• non-verbal,
• written or non written
• Symbols may be in language, in dress, in banners, signs and in other forms.
• A symbol is merely a summary of experience.

C. Social Structure.

• The context for social interaction is the structure of society, be it rural or urban.
• involves social norms, roles, status, and values which determine behaviour during interaction or specify the “rules of the game”

D. Forms of Interaction

• Social interaction is the foundational process in society.
• It can take place only when social contacts take place between people;
• Symbols are the medium for communication and summaries of experience which provide a basis for common understanding of present situations.
• The context within which social interaction takes place is the social structure with its norms, roles, values which regulate human behaviour.

Social Processes or Forms of Social Interaction
Social Process is Social interaction which assumes a repetitive pattern in a specific direction.
Social processes then refer to

• repetitive forms of behaviour
• which are commonly found in social life

MAJOR BASIC SOCIAL PROCESSES
The interaction processes have been classified on the basis of their cooperation and oppositional nature.

The major basic social processes to varying degrees with varying emphasis placed on one or the other are:

1. Cooperation,
2. Competition,
3. Conflict,
4. Accommodation,
5. Assimilation

Social processes have been classified on the basis of their being of

Cooperative or oppositional nature: Those which have an opposite effect so that people are pushed apart with less solidarity as in conflict and competition.
Even conflict may include cooperation.
For Example:

• Two football teams may compete with each other on the playing field, but cooperate in agreeing to abide by the rules of the game.
• When in warfare there is agreement on prohibition of certain types of weapons and on rules in respect of treatment of prisoners of war.

Conjunctive or disjunctive nature: refer to those patterns of social interaction which result in interaction.
Example: Cooperation, accommodation and assimilation.

A. Cooperation.

• working together toward common objectives or goals.
• where two or more individuals or groups work or act together jointly in pursuit of a common objective,
• Examples: In the giving of land for a village road or a school or in marriage arrangements.
• Closely related is secondary group cooperation, as in deliberately organised cooperatives,
• Such as consumers’ cooperatives, credit cooperatives, multipurpose cooperatives, etc.
• Cooperation may be brought about by several motivating factors and by situations involving such factors listed as follows:

1. Personal gain:

• Cooperative action is probably motivated largely by personal gains that would accrue through cooperative effort.
• We work together for the personal benefit and our own security depends upon cooperating with others.

2. Common purpose.

• Another motivating factor in subscribing to cooperative effort is dedication to a common purpose,
• Ex: perhaps the construction of a village road, a village school, a community centre, a village clinic or similar “public works”

3. Altruistic motives.

• Individuals and groups working together may be motivated by a genuine desire to help others in need.
• Such motivation gives rise to charitable and humanitarian organisations that involve cooperative effort on the part of all concerned.

4. Situational necessity.

• During emergencies cooperative action is necessary.
• After a flood, and before measures for rescue and relief are implemented by non-village agencies, village people of all classes, creeds, etc;
• organise themselves to remove women, children, livestock and belongings to higher ground.

5. Achievement of goals of greater values.

• Two rival factions in a village may on occasion “bury their differences” to work cooperatively to achieve a common goal of mutual value,
• Such as the establishment of a medical centre or village protection squad.
• In each case, the welfare of the total village is involved, and the solution rests in cooperative action on the part of all the community, not merely by one segment of it.

FORMS OF COOPERATION:

Forms of cooperation are

1. Cooperation that results from loyalty or adherence to the same objective.
2. “Opposed Cooperation” often occurring in labour disputes when management and labour agree to discuss differences. Even with opposing objectives, both sides are mutually dependent on one another and hence realise the necessity of working out cooperatively a mutually acceptable arrangement.
3. Cooperation that results from mutual dependence. Interests may vary without antagonism, yet because the nature of social structure involving interdependence, cooperation in division of labour or exchange of services is unavoidable and becomes largely unconscious.
4. Cooperation that results from efforts to compete with others in order to achieve the goal before them. In order to do this individuals and groups may work cooperatively so that they have better prospects for success in competing with others for a common goal.
5. Cooperation that is enforced as a result of subordination. A Conquered nation usually has no alternative but to cooperate with the conquering power. Another example illustrative of this type of cooperation is that of a citizen adhering to the laws of the country.
6. In addition to the above there are three other types of cooperation, based on differences in group attitudes and group organisation.

(a) Primary Cooperation:

• The group and individual fuse so that the group engulfs all or nearly all of the individual’s life.
• Identification of individual, group and task to be performed are interlocked.
• Rewards are shared by the group as are tasks and assignments.
• An example of such cooperation is the daily routine of life in a monastery, where cooperation is itself considered a value.

(b) Secondary Cooperation:

• Such cooperation, characteristic of modern western society, is highly formalised and specialised and occupies only part of an individual’s life.
• Attitudes tend to be more individualistic – each person performs an assigned task and in doing so helps others to do the same so that fruits of cooperative efforts can be enjoyed separately.
• Examples of such secondary cooperation are a business office, an industrial concern or a factory.

(c) Tertiary Cooperation:

• Tertiary cooperation is insecure
• because of hidden conflict underlying it.
• Common means of achieving separate goals by two antagonistic parties are involved.
• Thus, two otherwise antagonistic political parties may cooperate to oppose a third party. Once the party is defeated, their cooperation may cease.
• Today’s political parties in Parliament should work for the nation’s citizens, but only for the party’s motives.
• Whatever may be the type or form, cooperation is goal oriented, and is the most pervasive and continuous of the social processes.
• It surrounds individuals, often in ways of which they are not aware, exerting its influence on everyday behaviour in relation to others in society.

B. Competition.

Competition is

• the social process or form of social interaction
• in which two or more individuals or groups
• strive against each other
• for the possession or use
• of some material or non-material good.

The focus is primarily on the achievement of the objective desired by both and secondarily on each other.

There is competition in nature among plants and animals, and “survival of the fittest” is based on competition for commodities that are in short supply.

Those commodities may be

• material such as money, beads, land, wives, residences, or
• non-material as those that have prestige value, or
• give status and power, such as the executive position in government or industry, national champion, captain of a team, president or director of a corporation, member of parliament or office bearer of a leading political party etc.

Competition, like cooperation, is a process that is continuous and universal.

Forms of Competition,

1. Absolute and Relative Competition.
   Absolute competition exists when the goal is sure that it can be achieved or secured by one competitor only at a time, and he is declared the victor.
   Example:

• There is hence only one winning team in a football tournament;
• one Olympic winner, one person who can be elected president of a country.
• All other competitors must be eliminated before one can claim victory.

Relative competitions, on the other hand, are based on the degree to which a goal or objective may be achieved by competitors.
Example:

• competition for money,
• for other forms of wealth or for prestige,
• yet competitors do not expect to achieve all the money, wealth or prestige,
• but do strive to outdo others in securing more of these commodities.

2. Personal and Impersonal Competition.

• In personal competition the focus of attention of each competitor is on other competitors whom the individual strives to eliminate as well as on the goal.
• Such personal competition often approaches conflict with rather a narrow dividing line.
• Impersonal competition, on the other hand, has no personal focus on individual rivals, striving instead to reach a goal rather than to defeat an opponent.

For example, in a labour management dispute, each side competes over wages-labour seeking the maximum and management the minimum.

Functions of Competition:

• Serves specific functions as an important social process in society.
• Competition also serves to mould the attitudes of competitors in a particular way.
• Normally unfriendly and unfavorable attitudes towards one another develop when individuals or groups compete.
• On the other hand, cooperation tends to foster friendly attitudes.
• Competition serves as a means of maximum stimulation of individuals and groups provided it is culturally accepted and encouraged, competition can serve effectively to increase productivity in business, in industry and in agriculture.

Competition does have limitations:

In its stimulative effect, however,

• people may decide not to operate on a competitive basis and, instead,
• operate by fixing work quotas, enforce promotion through seniority of service and
• use other means that enable them to avoid the rigors, tension and insecurity involved in competition.
• serves to stimulate in only some kinds of activity, where the quantity of output is of great importance and the tasks are’ relatively routine and uncomplicated.
• In intellectual or technical tasks, cooperation seems to be more stimulating than Competition.
• Personal competition, as indicated earlier, also tends to develop into conflict; to be a “good loser” is not always easy and intense competition can easily lead to conflict.

C. Conflict.

Conflict refers to
the struggle in which competing parties,
attempting to reach a goal,
strive to eliminate an opponent by making the other party weak or by total destruction.
Winner is at the expense of the opposing party.
Conflict has been defined as “the process of seeking to monopolise rewards by eliminating or weakening the competitors”.
The difference between conflict and competition lies chiefly in the focus and manner of achieving the goal.,

Even in such conflict as warfare, as in respect of type of warfare, weapons, treatment of prisoners-of-war, etc. Conflict and competition are sometimes difficult to distinguish, both being forms of rival behavior:

Forms of Accommodation:
Accommodation may be achieved in various ways and take several forms.

1. Compromise.

• In a compromise, each antagonist party agrees make concessions that allow them to reach an agreement.
• This “give and fake” continues until all parties are satisfied.
• In sharp conflicts between farmers over farm field boundaries and encroachment, a compromise is frequently sought, and illustrations of compromise in labour management disputes are numerous.

2. Conversion.

• In this form of accommodation, one of the interacting parties accepts and adopts the religious beliefs and views of others are referred to as converts.

3. Tolerance.

• In this form of accommodation, interacting parties agree to disagree.
• Each party holds its own position, but respects the fact that the other party has an opposing viewpoint.
• They “tolerate” each other, despite the fact that the basic issue is not eliminated.
• Such a form of accommodation sometimes succeeds when compromise and conversion fail.

4. Arbitration. (Settlement)

• When contending parties do not settle differences among themselves, arbitration is frequently employed-the problem is submitted to a mutually agreeable third party who acts as a mediator, capable of studying the issue objectively.
• The procedure is frequently followed in reaching a compromise, and arbitration, therefore, may serve as a prelude to compromise.
• The United Nations Organisation frequently serves in the role of arbitrator at an international level.
• Arbitration may be formal, such as in a court of law, and conflict may be terminated on the basis of the court decision.

5. Truce (Treaty):

• A truce is an agreement to cease rivalrous interaction for a definite or indefinite period of time.
• The purpose is usually to give both parties time to review the issue in the light of proposals or suggestions for settlement.
• Illustrations of the use of this form of accommodation are plentiful in various battles and wars.
• Settlement of issues is not implied in a truce; all it does is give time for both parties to explore possibilities for such settlement and to discuss terms of peace.
• Like some others, this form of accommodation is temporary, usually giving way to a more permanent form.

6. Subordination and Superordination:

• Subordination as a form of accommodation serves to structure relationships between a winner and the conquered at the end of a conflict.
• Accommodation by subordination is effective under two conditions:
• The first condition is that the dominant party be so strong as to force the other to submit. This is seldom final accommodation, for the conquering party must be constantly prepared for rebellion from the conquered.
• The second condition under which subordination as a form of accommodation may be successful is that relationships of subordination be socially sanctioned as a part of the social structure and heritage of society.
• The hierarchical structure of military organization, with clearly defined superior and subordinate ranks, is such an example.
• Temporary subordination–superordination arrangements may in some cases operate as a form of accommodation. If one party achieves advantages which make its ultimate victory inevitable, an arrangement similar to compromise-differing in that it is clear to both parties that one party is dominant over the other-may be agreed upon.
• This form of accommodation is temporary and is an intermediary stage before issues are finally settled.
• As an example, illustrations in World War II and other battles are not uncommon.

7. Displacement.

• Displacement involves termination of one conflict by replacing it with another.
• For instance, the threat of war may unify parties within a country.
• Deliberate use of displacement as a technique is a standard strategy adopted by dictat.ors and to s.ome extent known in democracies.
• Use of a “scapegoat” is a displacement technique; the problems of a nation or a village may be blamed on an individual, on a minority or on “imperialists” or “colonial policy”, etc.

8. Institutionalised “Safety valves for release of hostility”.

• The structure of various societies may provide institutionalised means for release of tensions, which may serve as a form of accommodation in bringing about termination of aggressive relationships.
• Examples are community sports, wrestling and other amusements, special feast days, religious and other festivals at various times of the year to release tensions, thus easing pressures that lead to conflict.

E. Assimilation.

• the fusing or blending process, whereby cultural differences tend to disappear and individuals and groups once dissimilar become similar.
• Assimilation implies complete merging of divergent cultural groups within a society and
• has been defined as a “process of mutual cultural diffusion through which persons and groups become culturally alike”.
• Complete assimilation, however, is difficult to achieve, and complete union of divergent cultures is net effected until distinguishing, characteristics of race and nationality are eliminated.
• Through imitative actions, dress, language, and habits, the immigrant strives to identify with the new culture.
• Physical racial characteristics, however, may stand as obstacles to complete assimilation.
• Assimilation is a two-way process; entrants to the culture contribute to as well as receive from the dominant culture.
• Thus modification and change in the existing culture result, and the outcome of assimilation actually may be a fusion of two or more cultures.
• For instance, the culture of a country like the USA consists of a fusion of many cultures, largely from European countries.
• As assimilation of sub-cultures within India occurs, with increased contact and communication, evidence of varying degrees of fusion are increasingly identifiable.

Retarding and Conducive Factors of Assimilation: Various factors both facilitate and retard the process of assimilation as described below:

1. Retarding Factors

(a) Extreme differences in cultural background: When two cultures share many common elements, assimilation is accelerated; the absence of such factors acts as a barrier to the process. Two cultural groups may live in physical proximity, but remain socially far apart with nothing or little in common

(b) Prejudice: Stereotypes and ethnocentrism both can operate as barriers to assimilation. Prejudices may run through all activity with which the alien cultural group or individuals associate themselves and may create a social distance between them and the dominant culture. This distance may persist despite advantages that would accrue by fusion of interests of the cultural groups and individuals involved.

(c) Physical differences: Discrimination on the basis of physical differences presents a formidable barrier to assimilation. Physical differences are extremely visible and can be eliminated only by generations of intermarriage between the culture groups concerned. When physical differences arise as a barrier, cultures may live together in a symbiotic relationship.

2. Conducive Factors. Assimilation is accelerated by the absence of the above retarding factors and the presence of all such conditions and factors that favor and facilitate contact and participation by individuals and groups in common social and cultural life in society

Forms of Assimilation:

Three kinds are listed below:

1. A socialised individual in one culture may later move to another culture. In course of time he becomes assimilated into this second culture.
2. Two cultures merge into a third culture which, while somewhat distinct, has features of both merging cultures. In western countries chiefly but also in developing countries to some extent, rural and urban cultures which were radically different are, with rapidly increasing communication, merging as differences continue to disappear although they still exist.
3. 3. In small groups-even in the family between husband and wife assimilation may bring about a similarity of behaviour. The tendency is to conform to the other’s behaviour pattern and differences in time may largely disappear.

LAND RELATIONS – TOPOGRAPHY, OWNERSHIP PATTERNS
           Many species of plant and animal life are interdependent for their sustenance, growth and development.

Such mutually beneficial interdependence is called a symbiotic relationship.
Symbiosis: The various kinds of interdependent relationships, fostering a balance in nature, are collectively termed.
Plants and animals sharing a symbiotic relationship also share physical locations or regions conducive to their mutual sustenance and maintenance. Having adapted and modified themselves to the certain conditions of a locale, their existence would be threatened if the mix of conditions were somehow changed, climate, sources of food, etc. Hence it is possible to demarcate on maps regions or areas which indicate the spatial distribution and habitat of both plants and animals of varying types in a country and in the world.

Such spatial patterning can also be observed among human beings based partly (but not solely), on symbiotic relationships. Associating in varying degrees and forms of inter-related organisation with others in society; human beings distribute themselves in relation to land areas in such a way as to create land-based relationships or units called ecological entities. Similarly, the pattern of spatial distribution of service establishments, industry, residential arrangements, wholesale and retail trade and commerce establishments, regulatory, educational services and other such establishments depend on the inter-relationships among them.

Human Ecology is the study of “the symbiotic relationships and the resulting spatial patterning of human beings and human institutions in the community”.

The land based units of operation that human beings create are of two types:

(1) Natural unplanned units with indefinite boundaries – regions, communities and neighbourhoods, and

(II) Deliberately units with c1early defined fixed boundaries purposefully created to fulfill certain functions – towns, cities, paragana, tehsil, districts or countries and states.

NATURAL, UNPLANNED ECOLOGICAL ENTITIES
REGION

The term region refers to an area of sufficiently homogeneous physical features to distinguish it from another region. It has also been defined as “an area within which the combination of environmental and demographic factors has created homogeneity of economic and social structure”.

Another definition describes it as “an area within which historical and environmental factors have combined to create a relatively homogeneous social structure and a consciousness of individuality”.

 The essential features of a region are

(a) Homogeneity of physical environment as well as cultural and economic uniformity,
(b) Uniqueness and distinctiveness of which people are aware and which distinguishes it from other regions
(c) Presence within it of a distinctive core, and
(d) The presence of indistinct boundaries which constitute the overlapping of two or more distinct core-centred regions.

Regions have been classified on the basis of three distinguishing criteria.  

A. NUMBER OF INDICES USED IN DELINEATION: Four types of single factors regions have been identified:

1. Natural regions:
   Differentiated from one another on the basis of a single geographic characteristic such as soil, rainfall, topography, forest, irrigation.
   An example is the division of alluvial and sedimentary regions, further division of each of the regions into heavy clay or light sandy loam soil.

2. Cultural Regions:
   “A cultural region is an area in which society is characterised by a sufficient homogeneity in patterns of behaviour, including ways of living, values, beliefs and social organisations, to differentiate it from other areas”.

 Illustrations are the rural settlements of aboriginal tribes in India. Boundaries of these cultural regions can be demarcated without difficulty because they stand out as “cultural islands” amidst a sea of sharply differing cultural regions. In addition, sharply pronounced changes in soil and topographical factors can create different living and agricultural patterns of behaviour.
For example, there will be differences in agricultural and living patterns between people living in mountainous regions and those living on the plains, not more than 50-100 miles from each other, because of the different topographical conditions.

3. Agricultural Regions:
   Based on the type of farming practiced in various areas, climate, soil and other factors influencing a central crop and/or livestock production.
   Examples are certain wheat growing regions, sheep raising regions, citrus growing regions, etc.

4. Service Regions: Man-made regions formulated for administrative purposes by government and non-government agencies.

Regions based on the delineation of a number of factors are referred to as Composite Regions. Composite regions are demarcated on the basis of a combination of characteristic factors-economic, historic, geographic and social.

 B. SUBORDINATE OR SUPER-ORDINATE RELATIONSHIP:
Smaller units, within larger homogeneous units or major regions, often display sub-regional heterogeneity and must be recognised and identified, usually as a sub-region. By a “major region is meant a societal division of the nation delineated and characterised by the greatest possible areal homogeneity. A sub-region or minor region is a sub-division of a major region representing some variation within larger framework of the homogeneity of the major region”.

C. POLITICAL BOUNDARIES BETWEEN REGIONS:
While political boundaries often do not consider economic and cultural factors the advantage in using political boundaries accrues from the availability of analytical data periodically collected and analyzed by the political bodies concerned, and the ease of establishing administrative functions.

 D. Other Aspects:

1. A region consists of a large territorial area which is made up of smaller units that functions interdependently and organised in a twofold pattern:

(a) A metropolitan centre surrounded by subcentres and
(b) The surrounding area or supporting hinterland that includes communities, neighbourhoods and open country.

The metropolitan centre functions primarily in processing, distributing and financing the economic activities of the region. At these centres are located the major financing agencies, banks, corporations, insurance, etc.

The supporting locality is comprised of smaller ecological forms, e.g. cities or towns that serve as links between rural producers and urban consumers; villages, market centres, hamlets, neighbourhoods and other locality units for trading and other activities of rural population, and farm lands, forests, mines, grazing lands to produce the basic materials.

The region can be considered as a constellation of small ecological entities all of which constitute an interrelated land-based system.

Small Ecological entities as interrelated land based system

2. Regions based on various factors may expand or contract-disappearing under certain conditions-or develop in other ways.
For instance, the development of synthetic dyes in Europe and other Western countries displaced the indigo industry, causing termination of agricultural production of the crop and the disappearance of indigo producing regions.

3. Regions have cultural uniformity attained through a process of evolution. A wide initial range of social and cultural backgrounds and the introduction of new ideas influence the patterns of behaviour and living of people on a region; however, in time the differences tend to diminish with inter-play and a cultural uniformity evolves.

4. Some forces are significant in producing the ecological entity of a region: Firstly geographic forces such as the natural elements and environment; secondly, historic forces creating regional identity and shared experiences; and thirdly, shared cultural experiences and new ideas, borrowed or invented and accepted.

THE COMMUNITY
The term community popularly has been used loosely to refer to groups such as “a community of nations” or “a community of musicians”. It has also been referred to groups belonging to a common interest sufficient to commune or talk together on a friendly basis. particular creeds and religious faiths such as the Hindu Community and the Muslim and Christian Communities. It has been further applied to very large areas, e.g., “Global community”, or reference to the United Nations Organisation (UNO) as an international community.

Sociologists have defined several components essential to the concept of the community:

1. A group of people:

• There can be community with people who interact on mutual dependence and concern.
• In their interaction they come together to satisfy their needs in the chief concerns of life.
• This does not imply that a community consists of one social group, mutually dependent groups of people who act together.

2. A continuous geographical area:

• The people in a community live fairly close together in a more or less compact continuous but limited geographical area.
• Where communication facilities are elaborate a much larger geographical area is involved than where such facilities are few.
• Thus, the size of a rural community in developing countries may be smaller than in more advanced western countries.
• Thus, technological advances increasing communication most likely will aid an isolated compact community to extend over a larger geographical area as its people interact frequently with other villages and area surrounding their villages.

3. A sense of belonging or identification:

• The chief factor in delimiting the geographical boundaries of a community can be referred to as “community feeling”, “community consciousness”.
• People in a community have a strong sense of belonging to each other and to that particular geographical area.

4. Common social values, norms, and other aspects of culture:

• Every community has a common set of social values which gives a hierarchy of items in the community.
• This may vary from one society and culture to another. For instance, ownership of farmland, length of residence, religion, cash in the bank, financial investments and education and position in government service all may be considered of high importance.
• Of importance to understanding of the concept of the community is that, whatever the values, they are commonly shared along with other aspects of the culture among members of the community.

5. Common set of organisations and institutions.

• A community is in a large sense a self-contained group exhibiting a considerable sense of self-sufficiency.
• People in a community come together to meet their chief needs through a common set of institutions and organisations.
• Thus, supply and service agencies are available and shared as are schools, dispensaries, medical and other facilities.
• Community feeling is largely influenced by facilities available, for this affects contacts and interrelations with various people.
• These agencies, institutions and organisations are looked upon as “belonging” to the community and are woven into the fabric of inter-personal relationships.

6. Some common interests:

While individual interests of members of a community may differ, there are always common interests that unite the community and develop in it a sense of oneness.

Often in times of crises this is its own preservation and community members unite to be of mutual assistance and support in marked and significant ways according to the need of the situation.

During normal periods a community is characterised by sharing several common interests and working together to fulfill these interests and satisfy needs.

“Community”, then, refers to groups of mutually dependent people, living in a more or less compact continuous geographical area, having a sense of belonging and sharing common values, norms, and some common interests, and acting collectively in an organised manner to satisfy, their chief needs through a common set of organisation and institutions.

A community

• has both a territorial dimension and a social dimension; the former being its geographical area, and the latter being the groups themselves.
• The community may be rural or urban. It may develop within cities and towns, or in the open country areas or regions.
• The community is a functioning unit. It is not static but operates in accordance with prescribed laws, rules, and procedures.
• It is governed by these, which are themselves in keeping with norms and values of the society. While it may consist of members who differ from one another, the community is natural – bound by ties based on human relationships.
• Interaction and the feeling of belonging are vital to its unity or cohesiveness. Although it may be stratified and segmented it still holds together and stands organised to meet many of its needs. It is true that the degree, strength or intensity of this feeling of belonging may vary among members of a community, but it nonetheless exists in sufficient extent to make members identify with the community. Communities change with changing social conditions.
• A community may grow in size, with increased contact through improved communication facilities.
• A community may also reach a peak in growth and then decline while others keep growing and develop into a town or a City.

Locating boundaries of a community:

• The boundaries of a community are not easy to demarcate.
• With improved communication, increase in contacts and urbanization,

Two methods have been employed by rural sociologists to locate community boundaries:

A. The first is to ask local residents where they go to meet their supply and service needs such as purchase of groceries, clothes, etc., school, medical and other needs; as one progressively moves away from the community centre the boundary of the community will be demarcated when residents report going in some other direction to another centre to meet their needs.

B. Another method used is to directly ask informants in the community where in their opinion the boundaries of their community are.

The rural-urban continuum of community organization

Although differences between rural and urban subcultures are often viewed as a dichotomy, in real life the different types of communities probably range on a continuum from extreme urban to extreme rural. Most suburban and rural-urban fringe communities probably occupy some sort of mind-way position on the field.

The exact location of a particular community on this range depends mainly upon:

(1) the population size of the community;

(2) the population density of the community; and

(3) the degree to which the community members observe rural or urban norms.

Modifications of the above methods and evolution of new ones doubtless are necessary for effective use in developing countries where very different cultures are involved. Legal boundaries do exist but these seldom correspond with community boundaries, and since, in such countries planning and implementation of programmes of rural community development are based on the former, much is left to be desired in terms of utilisation of potential effectiveness of working with the latter as a base.

NEIGHBOURHOOD

Neighbourhoods have been described as “limited geographic areas in which the individuals and families are known to each and carryon intimate associations together”

(a) a locality group of people,

(b) limited geographical area,

(c) frequent face-to-face contacts and intimate association with one another,

(d) frequent participation in common activities such as visiting, inter-dining, borrowing and exchanging and other forms of mutual aid, and

(e) presence of some service or supply agency, organization or institution.

The neighbourhood is a smaller unit than the community; a community often is composed of several neighbourhoods.

Neighbourhoods are hence more sociability entities based on the personal relationships than are communities, which are based on social and economic requirements of residents and the satisfaction of them.

Neighbourhoods usually have homogeneity. There exists a physical closeness of dwelling places and greater inter-personal contacts among those living in the same neighbourhood. Thus, the neighbourhood is important because of the effects of the interpersonal relationships and social interaction on the decision making process, both in the families and the community.

Identification of Neighbourhoods: At least three methods have been utilised by sociologists to delineate neighbourhoods. The first and most common is to simply ask each family whom they consider to be their neighbours. A second method asks each person the name of his neighbour and each response is plotted on a map. A third method, developed more recently, involves identification of neighbourhoods by the interests or by the activities that are common to a group of families in the neighbourhood.

Common to the three natural ecological entities, the region, the community, and the neighbourhood, then, is the indefiniteness of their boundaries.

The boundary of a neighbourhood is determined by area of personal associations and relationships of a group of families living adjacent one to another. These boundaries are easier to define than those of a community which are based more on economic and social services in the area.

The areas served by a school, a health centre, an agricultural or community development centre, a market centre (retail and wholesale) may vary considerably. To demarcate the boundary of the community a composite line to collate these areas is drawn. The line is approximate, however because persons on the periphery of community may relate themselves to other community areas or to interstitial areas between communities.

PLANNED ECOLOGICAL ENTITIES

Planned ecological entities are those land based units that are purposefully created by man in order to fulfill specific functions and meet definite needs.

In India, Units such as villages, towns, cities, districts, Countries, states, etc., are usually based for convenience of operation on the population of the area are established by government to meet regulatory and administration functions including revenue collection, police protection and maintenance of law and order. A government can establish new units from time to time depending on the purpose to be served.

For example,
With national independence in India, a massive nationwide programme of community development was launched in rural areas.

The national extension service, established for this purpose, geographically demarcated development blocks of approximately 100 villages of approximately 61,000 to 75,000 population within the framework of units already established.

Boundary inflexibility can create problems. Differences in legal regulations, for instance, may allow fugitives from the law to seek refuge across boundary lines where the particular violation of the law does not apply.

LAND REFORMS IN INDIA 

Land is precious for any country and used by people for productivity and as a source of food, for place to live, for wood, for place to work.

In India, before colonial rule the land used to be in the hands of the community as a whole. However during the British Raj, this was changed. Lord Carnwallis had introduced Permanent Land Settlement for Bengal, Bihar and Orissa in 1793.

According to this the tax farmers appointed by the British rulers was converted as various Land Lords. Under this rule they had to pay fixed commission to East India Company. Thus, these intermediaries were formed and called as Jagirdar / Jamindar.

Emergence of Tenants: Following the Land Settlement Act, 1793, the farmers purchase lands from the Land Lords and hire it for their agricultural use. These people who hired the land were called tenants.

Variations in Tenency: 
Cash Tenents: They pay a fixed tax for the use and occupy of the land.
Share – cash Tenants: They pay part of their rent in cash and other part as share of the crop.
Crop – share Tenants: They pay a share of crops only.
Croppers: They pay crop of the share. But they were not independent and work under the landlord.
Other unspecified tenants:
Land Lord – Tenant Relationships
Land lord – Tenant
Landlord – Agricultural Labour

Land reforms:

• In India, there was a practice of land holdings from historic times and it was distributed in a highly unequal manner and have always been used as a source of social power.
• To get secure access to land for the poor and landless, policies of land reform were implemented to benefit poorer section of society since independence.
• After that a number of land reforms have been done by the government such as
  • abolition of ‘Zamindari’ or middlemen as revenue collectors,
  • imposing ceiling on landholdings and
  • awarding of the surplus land’s rights to landless, and
  • tenancy reforms (Mearns, 1998).
• Land reform is described as redistribution of land from the rich to the poor.
• More broadly, it comprises of regulation of ownership, operation, leasing, sales, and inheritance of land (indeed, the redistribution of land itself requires legal changes).
• In an agricultural economy such as India with great dearth, and an unequal distribution, of land, coupled with a large mass of the rural population below the poverty line, there are enthralling financial and political opinions for land reform.
• Purpose of land reforms is
  • efficient use of scarce land resource,
  • redistributing agricultural land in favour of the less privileged class in general &
  • cultivating class in particular.

Historical review of Land Reforms in India: Land program in post-Independence India has evolved through different phases.

During the Mughal period,

• Before the arrival of the British there were numerous changes in the system of land taxation or revenue.
• Peasants continued to enjoy customary rights over land they occupied and generally could not be evicted unless they failed to pay the required land revenue (land tax) to the state.
• The task of collecting land revenue was assigned to a class of agents called zamindars (Bhaumik, 1993).

When the East India Company (EIC) established in the Seventeenth Century,

• The agricultural structure underwent fundamental change.
• The EIC first purchased the right to receive the collected land revenue
• Later, under the Permanent Settlement introduced in 1793, declared the Zamindars to be proprietors of land in exchange for the payment of land revenue fixed in perpetuity.
• Zamindars, or those to whom they sold their proprietary rights, typically delegated revenue collection to a series of middlemen.
• The increasing layers of intermediaries meant that there was considerable increase in rent extracted from the tillers and
• Lead to failure to pay this increased amount
• resulted in large-scale evictions, widespread disturbance, and declining agricultural production
• The British sought to stabilize the situation through legislated tenancy reform.
• The Bengal Rent Act of 1859 placed restrictions on the power of landlords’ to increase rent or evict tenants.
• However, the Act only protected fixed-rent tenants and did not protect bargadars or agricultural labourers.
• But, it only protected those fixed-rent tenants who could prove they had cultivated the land for 12 consecutive years.
• Constant cultivation was difficult to prove due to poor records and the Act resulted in an increase in evictions by Zamindars to prevent tenants from possessing land for the required time period.
• The 1885 Bengal Tenancy Act also sought to protect long-standing tenants, and was similarly ineffective.
• During this period, another form of landholder emerged in Bengal. The Jotedars were a rich class of peasants who reclaimed and gained control of large quantities of uncultivated forests and wetlands outside the territory governed by the Permanent Settlement (Bhaumik, 1993).
• The Jotedars refined some of this land through the direct supervision of hired labour or servants. Nevertheless, the bulk of the Jotedars’ land, like much of the land in Bengal, was cultivated by Bargadars.
• Rural tensions over the dilemma of Bargadars were common in the decades prior to and after Independence.
• In the 1940s, the Tebhaga movement called for a smaller crop share payment and also created the slogan, “He who tills the land, owns the land.”
• The movement is given credit for shaping post-Independence land reform legislation in West Bengal (Datta, 1988).
• At the time of Independence, this matter was of great significance. In the decades following independence India passed a significant body of land reform legislation.

After India Independence, the 1949 Constitution,

It was left to state governments regarding the adoption and implementation of land and tenancy reforms.

This led to a lot of dissimilarity in the implementation of these reforms across states and over time.

The government took major step to eradicate the systems of Jamindaris and Jagirdari, to remove intermediaries between state and peasant.

This was the first legislature taken by almost all the states called as Abolition of Jamindari/ Jagirdari systems Act.

The main objectives of the Land Reforms:

1. To make redistribution of Land to make a socialistic pattern of society. Such an effort will reduce the inequalities in ownership of land.
2. To ensure land ceiling and take away the surplus land to be distributed among the small and marginal farmers.
3. To legitimize tenancy with the ceiling limit.
4. To register all the tenancy with the village Panchayats.
5. To establish relation between tenancy and ceiling.
6. To remove rural poverty.
7. Proliferating socialist development to lessen social inequality
8. Empowerment of women in the traditionally male driven society.
9. To increase productivity of agriculture.
10. To see that everyone can have a right on a piece of land.
11. Protection of tribal by not allowing outsiders to take their land.

Land reform legislation in India is categorized in to four main sections that include

• abolition of intermediaries who were rent collectors under the pre-Independence land revenue system,
• tenancy regulation that attempts to improve the contractual terms faced by tenants, including crop shares and security of tenure,
• a ceiling on landholdings with a view to redistributing surplus land to the landless and
• lastly, attempts to consolidate disparate landholdings.

Landowners naturally resisted the implementation of these reforms by directlyAbolition of intermediaries is generally established to be effective land reforms that have been relatively successful. The record in terms of the other components is mixed and varies across states and over time.

• using their political influence and also by using various methods of evasion and coercion,
• registering their own land under names of different relatives to bypass the ceiling, and
• shuffling tenants around different plots of land, so that they would not acquire incumbency rights as stipulated in the tenancy law.

The success of land reform was driven by the political will of particular state administrations, the prominent achievers being the left-wing administrations in Kerala and West Bengal.

TENANCY SYSTEMS:

At the time of independence, there existed many types of proprietary land tenures in the country.

RYOTWARI:

• It was started in Madras since 1772 and was later extended to other states.
• Under this system, the responsibility of paying land revenue to the Government was of the cultivator himself and there was no intermediary between him and the state.
• The Ryot (tenant farmer) had full right regarding sale, transfer and leasing of land and could not be evicted from the land as long as he pays the land revenue.
• But the settlement of land revenue under Ryotwari system was done on temporary basis and was periodic after 20, 30 or 40 years.
• It was extended to Bombay Presidency.

MAHALWARI:

• This system was initiated by William Bentinck in Agra and Oudh and was later extended to Madhya Pradesh and Punjab.
• Under this system, the village communities held the village lands commonly and
• it was joint responsibility of these communities to make payments of the land revenue.
• The land ownership is held as joint ownership with the village body.
• The land can be cultivated by tenants who can pay cash / kind / share.

JAMINDARI:

• Lord Cornwallis gave birth to Zamindari system in India.
• He introduced this system for the first time in 1793 in West Bengal and was later adopted in other states as well.
• Under this system, the land was held by a person who was responsible for the payment of land revenue.
• They could obtain the land mostly free of charge from the government during the British rule and it is called estate.
• Landlords never cultivated the land they owned and rented them out to the cultivators.
• The amount of land revenue may either be fixed once one for all when it was called permanent settlement or settlement with regard to land revenue may only be temporary
• Therefore, be revised after every 30-40 years, as the practice may be.
• The Zamindari system is known as absentee landlordism.
• Under this system the whole village was under one landlord.
• The persons interested can work in the Jamindar’s land as tenant / labourer based on the agreement with the jamindar.
• The jamindari system was known to be more exploitive, as the jaminder used to fix / hike the prices of land according to his desire.

JAGIRDARI:

• It is similar to Jamindari system.
• The jagirdar is powered to control the unproductive masses of village by engaging them in agricultural activities.
• Because land is controlled by state in India and the relationship between production and land tenure varies from state to state, the national policy recommendations resulted in differing tenancy reform laws in each state.

Tenancy is completely banned in some states but completely free in others.

Punjab and Haryana have not forbidden tenancy whereas Karnataka has a near complete ban on tenancy.

Some states have discussed ownership rights on tenant cultivators except for sharecroppers, whereas West Bengal chose to provide owner-like rights only to the sharecroppers.

Tenancy reforms may have indirect effects in the form of reduced tenancy shares if poorly implemented.

Most tenancy reform laws also contained provisions concerning the ability of tenants to surrender the land back to the landlord voluntarily.

These provisions were used by landlords to wane the impact of the laws.

In most states the surrender of land falls under the jurisdiction of the revenue authorities.

LAND POLICY FORMULATION THROUGH PLANNING PERIOD

Outcomes of Land reforms:

1. Abolition of Jamindars and Jagirdars:

• The powerful Jamindars and Jagirdars have become inexistent.
• The abolition of intermediaries has stopped exploitation.
• Transfer of land to peasants from intermediaries has reduced disparities.
• The new proprietorship has given scope for innovation in Land Reforms.
• The ex-jagirdars and ex-Jamindars have engaged themselves actively in other work thus contributing for National Growth.
• The abolishment of these systems has increased to the new land owners thus adding revenue to the state governments.

2. Land Ceiling:

• Land is a source of Income in rural India land and it provides employment opportunities.
• Therefore it is important for the marginal farmers, agricultural labourers, and small farmers.
• The concept ‘ceiling on land holdings’ denotes to the legally stipulated maximum size beyond which no individual farmer or farm household can hold any land.
• The objective of such ceiling is to promote economic growth with social justice.
• Land Ceiling should be imposed on all kinds of lands such as Fallow, Uncultivable, irrigated and Cultivable land. All the mentioned are inclusive of ceiling Act.
• The ceiling act varies from state to state on ceiling on two crops a year land. However in most of the places the ceiling is 18 Acres.

3. Land Possession and social power:

• It is observed that the land is not only the source of production but also for generating power in the community.
• In the Indian system, the land is often transferred from one generation to another generation.
• However all this lack the documentation of possession of land.
• In this framework, the government had made it mandatory to register all tenancy arrangements.

Land reform is the major step of government to assist people living under adverse conditions.

It is basically redistribution of land from those who have excess of land to those who do not possess with the objective of increasing the income and bargaining power of the rural poor.

The purpose of land reform is to help weaker section of society and do justice in land distribution.

Government land policies are implemented to make more rational use of the scarce land resources by affecting conditions of holdings, imposing ceilings and grounds on holdings so that cultivation can be done in the most economical manner.

Jagirdari: It is similar to Jamindari system. The jagirdar is powered to control the unproductive masses of village by engaging them in agricultural activities. Because land is controlled by state in India and the relationship between production and land tenure varies from state to state, the national policy recommendations resulted in differing tenancy reform laws in each state.

Tenancy is completely banned in some states but completely free in others. Punjab and Haryana have not forbidden tenancy whereas Karnataka has a near complete ban on tenancy. Some states have discussed ownership rights on tenant cultivators except for sharecroppers, whereas West Bengal chose to provide owner-like rights only to the sharecroppers. Tenancy reforms may have indirect effects in the form of reduced tenancy shares if poorly implemented. Most tenancy reform laws also contained provisions concerning the ability of tenants to surrender the land back to the landlord voluntarily. These provisions were used by landlords to wane the impact of the laws. In most states the surrender of land falls under the jurisdiction of the revenue authorities.

POVERTY – DEFINITION, MANIFESTATIONS AND CAUSES

Outline
Definitions
Dimensions

• Social and Economic Dimensions
• Political Dimensions
• Environmental dimensions

Indicators of poverty
Poverty line

Definitions
The word poverty comes from old French poverté (Modern French: pauvreté), from Latin paupertās from pauper (poor).

The English word “poverty” via Anglo-Norman povert. There are several definitions of poverty depending on the context of the situation it is placed in, and the views of the person giving the definition.
Planning commission (1979, 1993), Government of India equates poverty with the tangible dimensions of deprivation, i,e., lack of access to food, nutrition, clothing, shelter, water and basic education, and uses “Food deprivation” in particular to identify the poor from the non poor.

However, The Human Development Report, 1997, brought out by the UNDP, questions such a narrow equation of poverty with material deprivation. It argues the need for broadening the definition of poverty to include deprivation in terms of creativity, freedom, dignity, self- esteem and the respect of others (UNDP, 1997). Others, like Chambers (1998), draw attention to few additional intangible dimensions of deprivation: vulnerability, powerlessness and isolation.

Income Poverty: A family’s income fails to meet a federally established threshold that differs across countries.

United Nations:
Fundamentally, poverty is

• the inability of having choices and opportunities, a violation of human dignity.
• lack of basic capacity to participate effectively in society.
• not having enough to feed and clothe a family,
• not having a school or clinic to go to,
• not having the land on which to grow one’s food or a job to earn one’s living,
• not having access to credit. It means insecurity, powerlessness and exclusion of individuals, households and communities.
• susceptibility to violence,
• implies living in marginal or fragile environments,
• without access to clean water or sanitation.

World Bank:
Poverty is pronounced

• deprivation in well-being, and comprises many dimensions.
• low incomes and the inability to acquire the basic goods and services necessary for survival with dignity.
• encompasses low levels of health and education, poor access to clean water and sanitation, inadequate physical security, lack of voice, and insufficient capacity and opportunity to better one’s life.

It measured as either absolute or relative (the latter being actually an index of income inequality).

Absolute Poverty

• When Income of a person is not sufficient
• to provide the basic necessities of life,
• he/she is said to be in absolute poverty.

Relative Poverty

• Relative poverty occurs when
• a comparison of the standard of living or
• income distribution of various income groups is undertaken in a country.
• The income inequalities between different groups are a reflection of relative poverty.

In India people living below poverty line are

• quite high as compared to other Asian countries like Malaysia, Thailand and China.
• According to the projections of the Planning Commission poverty is expected to decline to 18 per cent in 2002 and further to 4 per cent in 2012.

Measurement of Poverty
The Planning Commission set up a Study Group in July 1962 to examine the question of poverty in the country.

The Study Group suggested a private consumption expenditure of

• 20 per capita per month as a basic minimum requirement of life, below which are regarded as poor.
• The poverty line so defined was Rs. 49.10 for rural areas and Rs. 56.60 for urban areas per capita per month.
• The same poverty line was updated for subsequent years using stable indicators of changes in cost of living.

International Poverty Line
World Banks estimates suggest that the percentage of people living

• below $1.25 a day in 2005 (which, based on India’s PPP rate,
• works out to Rs 21.6 a day in urban areas and Rs 14.3 in rural areas in 2005 )
• decreased from 60% in 1981 to 42% in 2005.
• Even at a dollar a day ( Rs 17.2 in urban areas and Rs 11.4 in rural areas in 2005 )
• Poverty declined from 42% to 24% over the same period.

Social and Economic Dimensions
Economic and social development is necessary for achieving poverty reduction.

Sustained high rates of economic growth are a prerequisite to this end.

The creation of an institutional environment that is conducive to economic and social development is an indispensable part of any strategy for poverty alleviation.

This requires a framework in tune with economic and social realities and needs whilst flexible enough to change and adapt to new circumstances.

• Crucial elements are sound macroeconomic policies;
• An institutional and legal framework that meets the needs and interests of all segments of the economy and society; and
• Transparent governance with effective safeguards against corruption.
• Ensuring secure property rights, not least for the poor, and removing barriers to graduation from the informal to the formal sectors of the economy deserve particular attention.
• Increase in employment and labour productivity provides the main link between economic growth and poverty reduction.
• In order to reduce poverty, it is essential both to enhance the capacity of the economy to generate productive employment and decent working conditions, and
• to strengthen the ability of the poor to access these opportunities.
• A pro poor growth in rural areas necessitates a mutually supportive development of agriculture and nonfarm activities.
• The existence of small and medium scale enterprises as well as equitable access to
  • appropriate technologies,
  • markets,
  • extension services and
  • credits plays a key role in this regard.
• Education and health are central to a meaningful life. They are also part of the social and economic rights that should be guaranteed to all people.
• There is a need to elaborate options for social security that are not exclusively tied to family relations and that foster cohesion, redistribution and gender equality.
• Cultural specificity is an important factor in poverty reduction, both in the broad sense (in terms of how people’s lives are understood and organised by themselves) and in a more narrow sense (how their understanding and views are expressed).
• The recognition of pluralism is an essential element in the creation of conditions for improved and sustainable living conditions.
• Social inequalities – regardless of if their basis is found along gender, ethnicity, disability, age or other lines – hinder the achievement of a pluralistic society.
• Gender based inequalities deprive women of their basic rights (including sexual and reproductive rights), disempower them and constrain their access to resources, opportunities and security.

 Political Dimensions

• The determination and capacity of the state to guarantee human rights and freedoms for all inhabitants is of central importance. These include political and civil rights, such as
  • freedom of thought and speech;
  • right to a fair trial, to liberty and security; and
  • protection against cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.
  • Economic and social rights, such as those to food, housing, health and education.
• The right to social security and protection against exploitation and abuse is essential for children.
• The ability to exercise such rights requires democratic space.

Environmental Dimensions

• Poor people are particularly – and directly – dependent on natural resources for their survival (e.g. because of their limited assets and greater dependence on commonly held resources for their livelihoods).
  • Good quality soils, productive forests and aquatic systems, and
  • Clean water and air are necessary assets for ensuring food security, energy, shelter and good health. HIV/AIDS exacerbates existing development problems such as food insecurity.
  • Sustainable use of natural resources and protection of the environment is therefore a prerequisite for effective poverty reduction.
  • Overuse of natural resources and environmental degradation not only reinforces today’s poverty, but also put the sustainable livelihoods of future generations in peril.
  • Environment related stress – such as drought, soil erosion and floods, which cause famine and create refugees – contributes to impeding the mental and physical health of poor people, not least children.
  • Poverty, health and the environment often interact in a vicious circle: poor people are less capable of coping with stress of various kinds and they lack the means to reduce stress,
• For instance, the cash and labor power needed to prevent soil erosion.
• Vulnerability increases: Diminished agricultural output results in decreasing incomes, poor nutrition and growing health risks; disease and malnutrition make people less able to work.

INDICATORS OF POVERTY are

• Lack of food and deprivation from food
• Low income and no income
• Lack of physical health
• Lack of opportunities for psychological health – creativity, dignity, freedom, self esteem,
• Respect for others, etc.
• Lack of social opportunities for social health – vulnerability, powerlessness, isolation etc
• Lack of knowledge and illiteracy
• Lack of ownership of assets
• Basic amenities and lack of access to them forms one significant dimension of poverty

Poverty line
Recently the government of India accepted the Kelkar Committee’s definition of poverty line that is somewhat broader – it also considers health and education.

Though critics are still not pleased, it does offer some improvement. Using this definition, the 2010 data reveal that 32.7% people live in poverty. It only meant that the number of “officially poor” increased to 405 million in March 2011 compared with 370 million in 2005.

Other Poverty Lines
The World Bank estimated that 42% people were surviving on less than 1.25 dollars a day in 2005; compares it with Asian Development Bank’s estimate of 55% based on the 1.35 dollar benchmark. These are significantly higher than the new official estimate of 37% of the population in poverty for the same year. In fact, rural poverty of 41.8% closely matches with the World Bank’s estimate of 42%. Incidentally, a 2 dollar a day poverty line makes over 75% Indians poor. However, regardless of which number is used to define the poverty line, one only gets an idea of the number of poor and learns nothing about the nature of their poverty or suffering.

Composite Poverty Indices
Income based approach to poverty cannot tell anything about other forms of deprivations poor go through. Poverty is basically a denial of a range of material needs such as nutritious food, safe drinking water, shelter, healthcare, education, etc. Therefore, multidimensional poverty measures provide better understanding of the nature of poverty – at local, regional, national, and world level.

Global Hunger Index (GHI)

• The Global Hunger Index (GHI) is basically a measure of malnutrition and hunger – two biggest enemies of the poor. It is focused on three measures weighted equally:
  • Proportion of people who are undernourished.
  • Proportion of children under five who are underweight.
  • Child mortality rate.
• In the recent Global Hunger Index 2010, India is among 29 countries with the highest levels of hunger, stunted children, and poorly fed women. It ranked 67^th out of 84 developing countries and was way behind China (9^th) and Pakistan (52^nd).

Human Poverty Index (HPI)
The UN’s Human Poverty Index (HPI) is another widely used poverty indicator. It is calculated differently for developing (HPI-1) and developed (HPI-2) countries and the two are not comparable. It focuses on lack of three basic dimensions of poverty:

• Longevity
• Knowledge
• Standard of living

For the developing countries, the first deprivation relates to survival – the likelihood of death before the age of 40.

The second relates to education – those who are excluded from reading and communication (the level of illiteracy).

The third dimension incorporates a measure of standard of living – percentages of people without lack of safe drinking water and undernourished children.

• Of the 182 countries ranked in 2009, India was located at the 134 position much behind China at position 92.
• From 2010, HPI has been replaced by a better and more comprehensive poverty measure, the multidimensional poverty index (MPI) which is described below.

Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)
In July 2010, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the UK based Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) came up with a new measure of poverty, called Multi dimensional Poverty Index (MPI), which will replace the HPI. The new measure attempts to go beyond income poverty and gives a broader understanding of different types of deprivation the poor may face. It is more comprehensive than the HPI and incorporates ten weighted indicators that measure education, health and standard of living.

The Indicators used are:

• Education: Years of schooling and child enrollment (education) (each with 1/6 weight-age);
  Health: Child mortality and nutrition (each with 1/6 weight-age);
  Standard of Living: Electricity, flooring, drinking water, sanitation, cooking fuel and assets (each with 1/18 weight-age).
• The MPI reflects both the extent of poverty and its intensity and throws up some new light on Indian poverty. A person is poor in this index if he is deprived on at least 30% weighted indicators. By this definition, 55% of India is poor, twice the official figure of 27% (which now stands revised to 32.7% for 2010 data and new poverty line definition), and almost 20% of Indians are deprived on 6 of the 10 indicators.

FAILURES LEADING TO POVERTY

• Endowment failures
• Production failures
• Exchange failures

The main cause of poverty are the shortfalls in the ownership entitlements, endowments, production and exchange options of the poor and different poverty groups due to their weak bargaining power within existing social relations and institutions (Murthy and Rao, 1997).

Endowment Failures

• Lack of/ inadequate productive assets
• Lack of control over physical labour power
• Lack of low status /membership
  in household and community
• Lack of citizenship in the residing
  Country
• Low status of country
  vis – a- Vis global bodies                         

POVERTY – THE VICIOUS CYCLE

• Poverty is a vicious cycle. It shows hazardous impact on the life of individuals.
• A poor person has a low income status, due to which the family members can not have adequate food to meet both the dietary as well as nutritional requirements.
• Consequently, the members are vulnerable and are easily prone to ill health. In ill health the productivity is low.
• In order to meet the expenditure of the family, the individual is compelled to take some kind of loan.
• Due to lack of institutional credit, he/she depends on local money leader or any other non institutional credit sources.
• These sources demand bonded labour, mortgaging or selling of assets, which makes him poorer.
• Due to pressures there is also a danger of habituated to mal practices, which increases poverty further.
• Poverty is experienced more severely by poor women than poor men with the resultant feminization of poverty due to less access to food, education and health care, unequal inheritance rights, lack of equal opportunities, etc.
• Poor women’s ability to overcome poverty is much lower (i,e., shortfalls from what is required for survival are often more for women than for women)

LIVELIHOODS – MEANING AND PROMOTION
Livelihood scenario and evolution of rural development programmes
The rural development programmes in India are surrounded around the major livelihoods, namely Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and related subsidiary activities.

The following is the livelihood scenario around which the rural development programmes are planned.

Elements of   Livelihoods:

Outcomes

• Improved Resource Management
• Increased production
• Increased well being
• Decreased vulnerability

The rural development programmes are planned around every element that contributes to the development

The five assets in rural development programme

   The five capitals in rural development programmes

1. Human capital- energy, indigenous knowledge, skill, experience, interest etc of human beings, who are the partners of development
2. Natural capital-natural resources
3. Financial capital- money, materials, support etc.
4. Physical capital- infrastructure, implements, machinery etc
5. Social capital- culture, social systems, groups, social relation etc, existing among the human beings

Relation between capitals and development process

When there are adequate structures and processes…..

• the vulnerability context and needs can be taken care of
• livelihood strategies can effectively implemented
• expected livelihood outcome can be attained
• assets can be strengthened

The concept of Sustainable Livelihood (SL) is an attempt to go beyond the conventional definitions and approaches to poverty eradication. These had been found to be too narrow because they focused only on certain aspects or manifestations of poverty, such as low income, or did not consider other vital aspects of poverty such as vulnerability and social exclusion. It is now recognized that more attention must be paid to the various factors and processes which either constrain or enhance poor people’s ability to make a living in an economically, ecologically, and socially sustainable manner.
The Sustainable Livelihood concept offers a more coherent and integrated approach to poverty. The sustainable livelihoods idea was first introduced by the Brundtland Commission on Environment and Development, and the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development expanded the concept, advocating for the achievement of sustainable livelihoods as a broad goal for poverty eradication.
A person’s livelihood refers to their “means of securing the basic necessities -food, water, shelter and clothing- of life”.
            Livelihood is defined as a set of activities, involving securing water, food, fodder, medicine, shelter, clothing and the capacity to acquire above necessities working either individually or as a group by using endowments (both human and material) for meeting the requirements of the self and his/her household on a sustainable basis with dignity. The activities are usually carried out repeatedly. For instance, a fisherman’s livelihood depends on the availability and accessibility of fish.
Occupation in Indian villages reflects the base of the socio-economic culture prevalent in rural areas of the country. The main occupation types in Indian villages comprise of agriculture, fishing, weaving, cottage industry, handicrafts etc. Since the ancient period, Indian villagers have been involved in various occupations out of which, agriculture is the principal one. Apart from agriculture, the villagers are also involved in other occupations like fishing, farming, cottage industry, pottery, business, various small, medium or large scale industries, carpentry, etc. In the contemporary period, the evolution and advancement in different industrial and technological sectors in India have opened new job opportunities for the Indian villagers.

Traditional Occupations in Indian Villages 

Agriculture remains the principal occupation in Indian village society from the ancient period. The climatic conditions in most parts of India are suitable for agricultural activities and hence, India has become one of the leading producers of agricultural products in the world. In the changing time agriculture has been replaced by other occupations in different parts of India in the contemporary period. In the villages of hilly areas, the principal occupations include agriculture and gardening. Agriculture is still the major source of income in the northern and eastern Indian villages.  Other occupation in Indian villages includes the priests, carpenters, blacksmiths, barbers, weavers, potters, oil pressers, leather workers, sweepers, water bearers, toddy-tappers and many others.

Non-Traditional Occupation in Indian Villages
However, most of the modern day Indian villages present a different scenario with villagers taking up the non-traditional occupations. They are involved in academics as teachers; truckers, clerks or getting engaged with various cottage industries, regardless of which caste or class they belong to. Different types of occupations are found in the modern Indian villages apart from agriculture or farming or the traditional occupations. The climate and location influence occupation in Indian villages to a large extent. Several villagers in the South Indian states like Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and others have taken fishing as the main source of income. This is mainly because of the coastal location of the states.

Cottage Industry in Indian Villages
Another major occupation in Indian villages is the cottage industry. Cottage industry has emerged as a major source of employment in Indian villages over the period of time. Many villagers are occupied in various kinds of art and crafts works. The villagers produce different types of handicrafts products and many of them are earning their livelihoods by marketing them. The occupations like artisan in pottery, wood, cloth, metal and leather have been in existence in Indian villages, since the ancient period and are found even in the modern times. Many Indian villagers are dependent on these occupations to earn their livelihoods.

The women in the rural areas, too are actively getting involved in different industries like matchbox and firework industries, Bidi making, agate and slate industries, coffee and tea industries, brick industry, construction industry, electronics industry, spice industries, etc. Among these, the Bidi, slate or brick making industries are the most well spread industries in Indian villages. Apart from these industries, the Indian villagers have also become sweepers and scavengers.

Tourism Industry in Indian Villages
Tourism in India in the Indian villages has emerged as one of the chief occupations in Indian villages, in the contemporary period. Villages in most parts of India are endowed with natural beauty and have a rich tradition and cultural heritage.

The rich cultural diversity in the villages attracts many tourists from all over the world every year. This has encouraged many villagers to get involved in various tourism related occupations. The villagers work as tourist guides or run different kinds of business in the famous tourist spots or even provide accommodation facilities to the tourists to earn their livelihoods. Other than the occupations mentioned above, there are several other means of livelihood in rural India such as community, social and personal services; mining and quarrying; real estate; post and telecommunication; health and social work; educational services; public administration and national defence; wholesale and retail trade; utilities supply and other activities.

The occupation scenario in Indian villages has changed mainly due to the changing economical scenario of the villages of India. The invention of new technologies has encouraged the Indian villagers to take up new occupations. Apart from that, decline in the fertility of lands in many villages has also forced many villagers to give up their traditional occupation of agriculture. Many of these villagers have moved to the nearby urban areas in search for alternative occupation and sources of income.

Need for Entrepreneurship Development

• Every country, whether developed or developing, needs entrepreneurs.
• Whereas, a developing country needs entrepreneurs to initiate the process of development, the developed one needs entrepreneurship to sustain it.
• Entrepreneurship promotes small business in the society. Government has accepted the fact that small firms have a crucial role to play in the economic development of the country and are an essential part of our future economic prosperity
• Most economists today agree that entrepreneurship is a necessary ingredient for stimulating economic growth and employment opportunities in all societies.
• Entrepreneurship can really take India to the heights of becoming a super economic power.
• The quality of dynamism originates in the inherent nature of the enterprise.
• The structure of small and medium enterprises is less complex than that of large enterprises and therefore facilitates quicker and smoother communication and decision- making.
• This allows for the greater flexibility and mobility of small business management.
• Small business promotion needs relatively low investment and therefore can be easily undertaken in rural and semi-urban areas.
• This in turn creates additional employment in these areas and prevents migration of people from rural to urban areas.
• Since majority of the people are living in the rural areas, therefore, more of our development efforts should be directed towards this sector.
• In India, the government policies, political and economic environment greatly encourage the establishment of new and small
• Self- employment and small scale industry schemes have been further liberalized during the last decade.
• Small enterprises use local resources and are best suited to rural and underdeveloped sector.
• This in turn will also lead to
  • dispersal of industries,
  • reduction in concentration of economic power and
  • balanced regional development.
• Business enterprises need to be innovative for survival and better performance.
• It is believed that smaller firms have a relatively higher necessity and capability to innovate.
• An increased number of small firms are expected to result in more innovations and make the Indian industry compete in the international market.

 Need for motivating rural families:

• “Rural folk especially youth in the rural areas have little options”.
• This is the reason that many of them either work at farm or migrate to urban land.
• The need is to set other options in the minds of rural youth and women. Entrepreneurship could be the best option.
• If planted and nurtured in the minds of farm families and youth, it could result in revolutionizing the Indian economy.
• It should be emphasized that the projects undertaken by these entrepreneurs should not be constrained by its location in rural area.
• It should enjoy all the advantages of the location.

Livelihoods Promotion focuses on stabilizing and promoting existing livelihoods portfolio of the poor through its three pillars –

• ‘vulnerability reduction’ and ‘livelihoods enhancement’ through deepening/enhancing and expanding existing livelihoods options and tapping new opportunities in farm and non-farm sectors;
• ‘employment’ – building skills for the job market outside; and
• ‘enterprises’ – nurturing self-employed and entrepreneurs (for micro-enterprises).

Areas of Micro-Enterprise Development for farm families
Depending on number of factors the areas of micro-enterprises also differ from place to place ranging from

• landholdings,
• subsidiary occupations,
• agro climatic conditions and
• socio-personal characteristics of the farm families

The micro enterprises are classified under three major heads:

1. Micro Enterprise development related to agriculture and allied agricultural activities like cultivating organic vegetables, flowers, oil seeds and seed production are some of the areas besides taking up mushroom growing and bee –keeping. Some more areas can be like dehydration of fruits and vegetables, canning or bottling of pickles, chutneys, jams, squashes, dairy and other products that are ready to eat.
2. Micro-Enterprise development related to livestock management activities like diary farming, poultry farm, livestock feed production and production of vermi composting using the animal waste can be an important area in which they can utilize both their technical skills and raw materials from the farm and livestock to earn substantial income and small scale agro-processing units. 

3. Micro – Enterprise development related to household based operations like knitting, stitching, weaving, embroidery, bakery and flour milling, petty shops, food preparation and preservation.

Advantages of Entrepreneurship among farm families
Entrepreneurship not only enhances national productivity, generate employment but also help to develop economic independence, personal and social capabilities among farm families.

Following are some of the personal and social capabilities, which were developed as result of taking up enterprise are

• Economic empowerment
• Improved standard of living
• Self confidence
• Enhance awareness
• Sense of achievement
• Increased social interaction
• Engaged in political activities
• Increased participation level in gram sabha meeting
• Improvement in leadership qualities
• Involvement in solving problems related to women and community
• Decision making capacity in family and community

Economic empowerment of farm families by entrepreneurship led to the empowerment of farm families in many things such as

• socio-economic opportunity, property rights, social equality, personal right,
• political representation, market development,
• family development, community development and at last the nation development.

Extension Strategies to Promote Entrepreneurship

• Creating Awareness:
  • Awakening of farm families to the possibilities of the easily accessible enterprises is the foremost task.
  • The government, semi- government and non government organizations should create awareness among the most productive age group of farm families
  • through various means like exhibitions, melas, campaigns.
  • The printed media can be effectively put to use for the purpose.
• Motivating Entrepreneurs:
  • Psychological stimulation is the prerequisite for putting any idea virtually into action.
  • For proper motivation of farm families, the economic, social and health benefits of various possible enterprises should be highlighted.
  • The use of farm visits, video film shows , dramas, puppet shows, group meeting etc. will help in motivating the potential group.
• Expertise Development:
  • After awakening and motivating the next step in development and success of an enterprise is the acquisition of knowledge and skill up-gradation and polishing of existing knowledge and skills are the basic requirements.
  • Lectures, printed material, discussions, institutional and non institutional skill trainings for imparting first hand technical knowledge in production, processing, procurement and management should be provided to farm families who are interested or already engaged in various enterprises.
  • Education in direct and indirect marketing of the produce and finance management should be in-built component of future training programmes for women.

• Continuous Follow-up:
  • Constant follow- up should be ensured for the sustainability of any enterprise.
  • During this phase various constraints such as personal, social, economic, marketing etc. faced by entrepreneurs should be addressed.
  • Possible help in the form of knowledge, technical skills and inputs should be provided to enable them to solve their problems.

POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROGRAMMES IN INDIA

The poverty alleviation programmes in India can be categorized based on whether it is targeted for rural areas or urban areas. Most of the programmes are designed to target rural poverty as the prevalence of the poverty is high in rural areas. Also targeting of the poverty is challenging in rural areas due to various geographic and infrastructure limitations.

The programmes can be mainly grouped into

1) Wage employment programmes,

2) Self-employment programmes,

3) Food security programmes,

4) Social security programmes and

5) Urban poverty alleviation programmes.

The five year plans immediately after independence tried to focus on poverty alleviation through sectoral programmes. The first five-year plan focused on agricultural production as a way of addressing poverty while second and third plans focused on massive state led investments for employment generation in public sector. While these policies did some policy generation, they did not have enough strength to affect a sweeping effect.

Jawahar Gram Samridhi Yojana (JGSY)
This scheme is the restructured, streamlined and comprehensive version of the erstwhile Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY). It was started on 1st April 1999. The main aim of this programme was development of rural areas. Infrastructure like roads to connect the village to different area, which made the village more accessible and also other social, educational (schools) and infrastructure like hospitals. Its secondary objective was to give out sustained wage employment. This was only given to BPL (below the poverty line) families and fund was to be spent for individual beneficiary schemes for SCs and ST’s and 3% for the establishment of barrier free infrastructure for the disabled people. The village Panchayath were one of the main governing body of this programme.

National Old Age Pension Scheme (NOAPS)
                This scheme came into effect on 15th August 1995.As the name suggests this scheme provides pension to old people who were above the age of 65[‘Now 60’ ]who could not feed for themselves and did not have any means of subsistence. The pension that was given was Rs 200 a month. This pension is given by the central government. The job of implementation of this scheme in states and union territories is given to Panchayaths and municipalities. The state’s contribution may vary depending on the state.
The amount of old age pension is Rs. 200 per month for applicants aged 60–79. For applicants aged above 80 years, the amount has been revised in Rs. 500 a month according to the (2011–2012) Budget.

National family Benefit Scheme (NFBS)
            This scheme was started in August 1995 by the Government of India. This scheme is sponsored by the state government. It was transferred to the state sector scheme after 2002-03. It is under the community and rural department. This scheme provides a sum of 20000 Rs to a person of a family who becomes the head of the family after the death of its primary breadwinner. The breadwinner is defined as a person who is above 18 who earns the most for the family and on whose earnings the family survives.

National Maternity Benefit Scheme (Janani Suraksha Yojna)
            This scheme provides a sum of Rs 500 to a pregnant mother for the first two live births. The women have to be older than 19 years of age. It is given normally 12–8 weeks before the birth and in case of the death of the child the women can still avail it.

The NMBS is implemented by states and union territories with the help of panchayats and municipalities. It is for families below the poverty line. The scheme was updated in 2005-06 into with Rs 1400 for every institutional birth.

Annapurna (National Old Age Pension Scheme… NOAPS)
            This scheme was started by the government in 1999–2000 to provide food to senior citizens who cannot take care of themselves and are not under the National Old Age Pension Scheme… (NOAPS), and who have no one to take care of them in their village. This scheme would provide 10 kg of free food grains a month for the eligible senior citizens. The allocation for this scheme as off 2000-2001 was Rs 100 crore.

Integrated Rural Development Program (IRDP)
            IRDP in India is among the world’s most ambitious programs to alleviate rural poverty by providing income-generated assets to the poorest of the poor. This program was first introduced in 1978-79 in some selected areas, but covered all the areas by November 1980. During the sixth five-year plan (1980–85) assets worth 47.6 billion rupees were distributed to about 16.6 million poor families. During 1987-88, another 4.2 million families were assisted with an average investment of 4,471 per family or 19 billion rupees overall.

The main objective of IRDP is to raise families of identified target group below poverty line by creation of sustainable opportunities for self-employment in the rural sector. Assistance is given in the form of subsidy by the government and term credit advanced by financial institutions (commercial banks, cooperatives and regional rural banks.) The program is implemented in all blocks of the country as centrally sponsored scheme funded on 50:50 basis by the center and the states. The target group under IRDP consists of small and marginal farmers, agricultural laborers and rural artisans having annual income below Rs. 11,000 defined as poverty line in the Eighth Plan. In order to ensure that benefits under the program reach the more vulnerable sectors of the society, it is stipulated that at least 50 per cent of assisted families should be from scheduled castes and scheduled tribes with corresponding flow of resources to them. Furthermore, 40 per cent of the coverage should be of women beneficiaries and 3 per cent of physically challenged persons. At the grassroots level, the block staff is responsible for implementation of the program. The State Level Coordination Committee (SLCC) monitors the program at state level whereas the Ministry of Rural Areas and Employment is responsible for the release of central share of funds, policy formation, overall guidance, monitoring and evaluation of the program.

Rural Housing-Indira Awaas Yojana (IAY) (initiated in 1985)
            This scheme aimed at creating housing for everyone. It aimed at creating 20 lakh housing units out of which 13 lakhs were in rural area. This scheme also would give out loans to people at subsidized rates to make houses. It was started in 1999–2000.

National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)
            The NREGA bill notified in 2005 and came into force in 2006 and further modified it as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) in 2008. This scheme guarantees 150 days of paid work to people in the rural areas. The scheme has proved to be a major boost in Indian rural population’s income. To augment wage employment opportunities by providing employment on demand and by specific guaranteed wage employment every year to households whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work to thereby extend a security net to the people and simultaneously create durable assets to alleviate some aspects of poverty and address the issue of development in the rural areas.

The Ministry of Rural Development (MRD) is the nodal Ministry for the implementation of NREGA. It is responsible for ensuring timely and adequate resource support to the States and to the Central Council. It has to undertake regular review, monitoring and evaluation of processes and outcomes. It is responsible for maintaining and operating the MIS to capture and track data on critical aspects of implementation, and assess the utilization of resources through a set of performance indicators. MRD will support innovations that help in improving processes towards the achievement of the objectives of the Act. It will support the use of Information Technology (IT) to increase the efficiency and transparency of the processes as well as improve interface with the public. It will also ensure that the implementation of NREGA at all levels is sought to be made transparent and accountable to the public. Now 100 to 150 days work for all is provided.

SOCIAL CHANGE

Meaning:
Social change is

• the process
• by which alteration occurs
• in the structure and function
• of a social system.
• provided by the various individual and group statuses which compose it.

The functioning element within this structure of statuses is

• the role or actual behaviour of an individual in a given status.
• Status and role reciprocally affect one another.
• Cultural change is implied as it is part of society.
• Social change occurs in all societies.
• It is slow in primitive and in folk societies and rapid in complex modern societies.

The aspects of social change are

• Structural change: It involves
  • changes in roles,
  • emergence of new roles,
  • changes in class and caste institutions
  • such as the family, the Government or the educational systems etc.
• Functional change: it refers to
  • changes in the interactional process between persons and groups.
  • Changes may be frequency of social contact,
  • a shift from primary to secondary group relationships, informal personal to formal contractual relationships, cooperative to competitive forms of relationships etc.
• Cultural changes: It refers to
  • changes in the culture of society through discovery, invention, adoption and
  • diffusion of new technology, culture, borrowing etc.

CATEGORIES OF SOCIAL CHANGE:
Immanent and contact change
One of the more useful ways of viewing social change is to focus on the source of change.
When the source is from within the social system under analysis, it is imminent change.
When the source of the new ideas is outside the social system, it is contact change.
Immanent change occurs when the members of a social system with little or no external influence create and develop a new idea, then spreads within the system.
Immanent change is a within system phenomenon.
Contact change occurs when sources external to the social system introduce a new idea.
Contact change is a between system phenomenon.
depending on whether the recognition of the need for change is internal or external.

• selective
• directed,

Selective contact change

• results when the members of a social system are exposed to external influences and adopt or reject a new idea from that source on the basis of their needs.
• The exposure to innovations is spontaneous or accidental,
• the receivers are left to choose, interpret and adopt or reject the new ideas.
• An illustration of selective contact change
  • occurs when school teachers visit a neighbouring school that is especially innovative.
  • They may return to their own classroom with a new teaching method,
  • but with no pressure from school administrators to seek and adopt such innovations.

Direct contact change or planned change

• is caused by outsiders who, on their own or as representatives of change agencies,
• intentionally seek to introduce new ideas in order to achieve goals they have defined.
• Examples: Many government sponsored development programmes designed to introduce technological innovations in agriculture, education, health and industry.

LEVELS OF CHANGE

Basically change occurs at two levels at

• individual level
• social system level.

Individual level:

• Many changes occur at individual level, i.e. the individual is the adopter or rejecter of the innovation.
• Change at this level has variously been referred to as diffusion, adoption, modernization, learning or socialization.

Social system level:

• Change at this level can diversely term as development, specialization, integration or adaptation.
• Here our attention is centered on the change process at the social system level. 

FACTORS ASSOCIATED WITH THE ACCEPTANCE OF CHANGE

Need for change: Unless a need for change is recognized by the society as significant sand important the likelihood of its acceptance is less.

• The need for change must be perceived by the society as a felt need.
• To be accepted, the changed must be perceived by society as contributing towards the achievement of its goal.

Desirable innovation:

• The innovation should satisfy the felt need; hence the society derives benefit from it.
• The benefit may be in terms of material or non material, like higher yield, effective functioning of an institution, time saving etc.
• Compatibility of the innovation with the culture of the society is an essential condition for its acceptance.

Proper communication:

• Social change cannot take place without communication.
• The method should be appropriate, timely and easily accessible.

PATTERNS OF CHANGE
Stable equilibrium:

It occurs when almost no change in the structure or functioning of a social system.

Ex. Completely isolated and traditional system in which the rate of change is almost zero.

Dynamic equilibrium:

• When the rate of change in a social system is proportionate with the system’s ability to cope with it, then it is called as dynamic equilibrium.
• Change occurs in a social system in dynamic equilibrium, but it occurs at a rate that allows the system to adopt to it.
• In extension it is always desirable to achieve a state of dynamic equilibrium.

Disequilibrium:

• When the rate change is too rapid or undesirable to permit the social system to adjust, such situation is called s disequilibrium.
• Social disorganization accompanies disequilibrium and
• marks it as a painful and inefficient way for change to occur in a system.

FACTORS AFFECTING CHANGE

• Change takes place in all human societies and all times.
• Sometimes it is sudden as when a revolution occurs to replace the older.
• At other times it is gradual and hardly noticeable.
• If change does not occur on its own, it may be induced by certain factors.
• This is known as change proneness
• Social change occurs due to various factors that quicken or slow the changes, which can be classified as
  • Endogenous Internal/Inside and
  • Exogenous/ External/outside 

Internal factors:

• Social change occurs due to interaction and conflict
• caused by different values of the old and young, the literate and illiterate, the urban and rural folk.
• These factors relate to the characteristics of each individual

External factors

• Such forces in a society are termed as external factors
• which are beyond human control
• like natural disasters and unexpected development in technology

Demographic factors

• Change in population –both in numbers and composition and change in economic, social, cultural and political life
• Swift and steady decline of birth and death rate lead to social transformation with visible change in social attitudes and beliefs.
• Close relationship between the growth of population and the level of physical health and vitality of the people.
• Increased poverty, unemployment , urbanization, nuclear families and social relation ships

Technological factors

• Technology changes society by changing the environment. This change is usually in material environment and the adjustment which we make to these changes often modifies customs and social institutions.
• Importance to capital instead of labour
• Rise of factories as units of production than families
• Use of steam, electricity and atomic power instead of human and animal power
• Use of machines in place of human and animal labour
• Production for exchange in the markets and profits, but not for domestic consumption
• Development of world market than local market
• Improved means of transport and communication and currency based economy.
• Finally production relationships and industrial relationships increased.

Cultural factors

• Conflict between the new and old values, lead to the creation of new value system which subsequently results in culture.
• Diffusion and adoption of innovation results in cultural change
• Moral code, which is one of the attributes of religion, leads to capitalism. This ultimately results in social change. 

Political factors

• Law acts as an instrument of socio-economic and political changes in the society. Since laws are backed by the state and have a coercive nature, individuals conform to them.
• Public opinion is a stronger means of social change, because laws alone can not change traditions and belief system.
• Sociologists referred laws as an indicator of change, initiator of change and integrator of change.

Economic factors

Economic factors influence the quantity and direction of social change.

• Karl Marx, the chief architect of the economic theory believed that social change is basically the result of economic factors.
• The mode of production determines the social, cultural, religious and political aspects of society.
• The industrial revolution
  • which stated during 17th century in Europe,
  • slowly entered the entire globe now resulted in movement of production from home to factories.
  • It further resulted in nature of work force from agrarian to industrial labour and
  • the pace of industrialization accelerated.
• Green revolution focused on boosting of farm yields.
  • To achieve this credit, machines, high yielding seeds, irrigation facilities etc were extended as critical inputs, along with land.
  • Relationships based on land, gave way to an employer-employee relationship, commonly seen in industries.
  • As green revolution was confined to only to certain states, seasonal migration occurred from the uncovered states. Inequality among states, and between land and landless widened

Education factors

Education fulfills two goals of the society-

(i) to socialize, shape and develop the individual according to the social needs,

(ii) to fulfill society needs concerning human resources such as training for the specialized skills in industry and technology of the modern economy.
Thus, education plays key role in

• socialization,
• social control,
• development of human resources and
• stratification and
• political education.

THEORIES OF SOCIAL CHANGE
            Society exists in a universe of dynamic influences. This, in turn affects institutional structures as they take on new components thus altering their functioning. The impact of the modern social forces is evident in the change of family structure. This change is also illustrative of structural change in the role of family members. This is indicative of functional change. However, as a result of competitive economy and spread of education in India we expected a total transition from the caste system to the class system. There is freedom now to take up any occupation. This no longer decided by one’s position in the caste hierarchy.
In view of the above scenario, the characteristics of social change:

1. Social change is Universal –

• Every society follows the patterns of behaviour, social institutions, and culture in one way or the other according to the necessities and external conditions.
• Social change usually follows a pattern and is universal and inevitable.
• It is not a modern phenomenon, some kinds and degrees of change are universal in huma existence.
• However, in contemporary society change occurs rapidly and frequently.

2. Change is not uniform –

• Although social change occurs in all societies its rate varies from place to place and time to time.
• Social change is relative in terms of time, space and context.
• It, in fact, depends on the nature of the society itself and upon the readiness of the people to adopt to new innovations and emerging social institutions and structural social change is deliberate.

3. Social change is deliberate –

• Many dimensions of social change are deliberately encouraged.
• People began as fruit gatherer in the primitive sometimes moving slowly towards shifting cultivation and finally graduated to irrigated and multicropping agriculture.
• New technologies expand the range of human possibilities like anything in the world.

4. Duration of the change varies –

• It implies change can be rapid or gradual, continuous or abrupt, long or short.
• Thus, by the definition it occurs over a period of time.
• Some changes within a shorter time, while others take centuries together to atleast notice them.
• Green revolution popularised multicropping and high yielding variety of seeds within a decade. Whereas, spread of female education and change in the information technology has brought rapid changes.

5. Social change is value neutral –

• Social change is a value neutral phenomenon.
• As it is not understood in terms of good or bad, desirable or undesirable.
• Good and bad are subjective notions and are based on different criteria used by different individuals, groups and societies.
• For example, there has been some change in the Indian society after independence such as industrialisation, pollution, and so on so forth.
• Since social change is considered to be value neutral such subjective preferences of different people are not given importance in the study of social change.

There are some terms associated with social change such as
Evolution: It means growth. Growth actually implies a change in size or quality in a desired direction. Example: Human beings from food gatherers to domestication of animals, agrarian stage, horticulture stage and subsequently to the industrial stage today
Revolution: It is form of sudden and abrupt overthrow of existing social order and system. It is also characterised by a change that comes about in a short period of time. Example: Green revolution, French revolution
Progress: It is a term that sees the present in comparison to the past. It is relativistic notion. Progress refers not so much to social change as to the direction which human beings deliberately give to that change. It is a change in a certain direction, always towards some desired goals like cherished values, which are desirable. For example: The growing complexity of any organisation or elaborate division of labor would show progress to many dimensions such as different diversification of the products to be produced.
Development: It refers to a change in the desired direction. It is a stategy of planned social change in a direction that is considered by the members of a society.It is contextual and relative in nature. It includes progress in various fields and many policies and programmes are launched, aimed at the development of rural people, scduled castes, scheduled tribes, women, urban people, agricultural workers and industrial workers etc.

PATTERNS OF SOCIAL CHANGE:

Stable equilibrium:
It occurs when almost no change in the structure or functioning of a social system.
Ex. Completely isolated and traditional system in which the rate of change is almost zero.

Dynamic equilibrium:

• When the rate of change in a social system is proportionate with the system’s ability to cope with it, then it is called as dynamic equilibrium.
• Change occurs in a social system in dynamic equilibrium, but it occurs at a rate that allows the system to adopt to it.
• In extension it is always desirable to achieve a state of dynamic equilibrium.

Disequilibrium:

• When the rate change is too rapid or undesirable to permit the social system to adjust, such situation is called s disequilibrium.
• Social disorganization accompanies disequilibrium and
• marks it as a painful and inefficient way for change to occur in a system.

Taking into consideration the concepts, there are three main theories for social change.

1. Evolutionary theory
2. Cyclical theory
3. Functional theory
4. Conflict theory

1. Evolutionary theory: It is believed that societies like organisms which evolve in the same manner as Darwin’s notion of biological evolution i.e. survival of the fittest. In other words, societies go through series of stages based on increasing complexity towards higher and more advanced and developed state of existence. This theory favours a notion that each new stage of development is more advanced than the one before. Evolution describes a series of related changes in a system of some kind. It is a process in which hidden or latent characters or a ‘thing’ reveals themselves. The change must occur within the changing unit as the manifestation of the forces operating it.

2. Cyclical theory: This theory is founded on the belief that societies have predetermined life cycle of birth, growth, maturity and decline. Like waves in the ocean the great culture emerge, rise to heights, only to subside which others raise in their turn. Repeating the set of activities is that forms a cyclical pattern like rhythms of nature, like cycle of night and day and seasons.

According to the Hindu mythology. Modern society is in the last stage in which Satyug will again start after Kalyug is over. It is also evident from the growth of various civilisations including Egyptian, Greek and Roman. They passed through cycles of birth, maturity and death. It is seen that societies also pass through periods of political vigor and decline, which repeat them in cyclical fashion.

3. Functional theory: According to this theory, societies change but they also tend to move towards equilibrium. Any disturbance in the system is easily accommodated within the existing structure. The endogenous and exogenous sources of change take the system from one stage of equilibrium to another stage. The structural differentiation and associated development of patterns and mechanism integrate the differentiated parts, new structural units and a new institution performs the functions which were performed by old units. For instance, the task of education which was easily performed by family is taken over by educational institutions like schools, colleges and universities.

4. Conflict theory: According to this theory, every pattern of action, belief and interaction tends to generate an opposing reaction. Thus this theory highlights the forces producing instability using social disorganization. It sees unequal distribution of power and authority as the fundamental source of conflict. The groups with power want to preserve the status quo while other groups desire to change it. This conflict between these groups leads to various changes in the structure of society although the nature and depth of conflict and resultant change depends upon numerous factors. Every social structure begins as a “thesis” of its current state of existence but its own internal contradictions or antagonisms prompt a challenge to its structure. This challenge is called the “antithesis”. This conflict resolves itself into a “synthesis” of a wholly new social structure carrying some elements from both “thesis” and the “antithesis”. However, this theory does not explain social stability in societies.

It is seen that social change follows certain patterns. The widely recognised patterns are:

1. Linear change: This type of change shows a straight -line progression from one stage to another in a linear fashion.

Society gradually moves to an even higher state of civilisation in the direction of improvement, thus it advances not only based on what exists today but on the origins of the past inventions. The growth of development in communication such as telephone has followed a linear pattern. It has grown from land-line to cordless telephones and has reached to the stage of mobile phones.

2. Cyclical stage: Rapid change on a closer look turns out to be a repeating set of activities that form a cyclical pattern like rhythms of nature, cycle of night and day, seasons sowing-harvesting. Similarly, society has a predetermined life cycle. After going through all the stages it returns to the original stag and the cycle begins afresh again.

3. Fluctuating change: When the order of change turns to the opposite direction after leading towards progress, it is called fluctuating change. In other words, the tendency of change in this phase is not consistent but seems to go up and down depending upon favorable or unfavorable circumstances, as is seen in the case of agriculture. Advancement in the field of agriculture gets retarded if there is insufficient monsoon in one season and increases if there is a normal monsoon in the next season.

Fluctuating change

PLANNED SOCIAL CHANGE
Planned social change refers to active intervention by change agents with a conscious policy objective to bring about a change in magnitude and/or direction of a well identified social behavior by means of one or more strategies of change.

Planned social change, therefore, consists of the following characteristics:

1. Social behavior to be changed must be identified and hopefully well defined.
2. There should be a policy objective with respect to magnitude and/or direction of social change.
3. Some entity should be earmarked as the change agent with appropriate resources or powers,
4. it utilizes one or more strategies of change;

Planned social change is, therefore, a managerial rather than a behavioral task which requires making decisions as to which strategies to use, in what combination and for which trait groups in order to achieve policy objectives related to ringing about a pre-specified magnitude and/ or direction change in a given social behavior. It is the managerial task of choosing the right strategies from among many strategies available to the change agent. As such, it must possess elements of strategic planning and decision making.

The changes in a system may be in two ways

• By mobilising its resources to improve and correct its own operation or structure or
• The normal process of maturation and development which may result in the spontaneous evolution of change from within the system.

All dynamic systems reveal a continuous process of change, adoption, adjustment and reorganisation.

Change agents: The specialists who introduce change are called change agents. These may be psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, extension workers C.D. workers, huma relations experts etc.

Client system: The individuals, groups, organisations, communities with which the change agent works for introducing a change is called the client system.

The change agent as manager of planned social change has many strategies at his disposal.

These strategies are broadly classified into the following eight categories:

1. Informing and Educating the Public: This is a dissemination of information strategy which is gaining considerable attention among the change agents. It entails making choices as to content, media and style of communication and especially as to the choice of mass media vs more direct media.
Examples include numerous booklets and brochures on consumer information as- well as public service announcements on mass media.

2. Persuasion and Propaganda. The recent trend in planned social change toward borrowing from the marketing practices is based on the belief that the public needs to be sold on the idea of planned social change. Therefore, the art of persuasion and selling so prevalent in the commercial world may be useful. Persuasion and propaganda implies a biased presentation of facts and figures in an aggressive manner to impact and change the public attitudes toward the planned social change.
Examples include the recent campaigns about energy conservation, drinking and driving as well as anti-smoking.

3. Delivery Systems. The emphasis in this strategy is to minimize the accessibility problems associated with the usage of many public services. This entails offering flexible time schedules, more delivery contact points, and in general, making the public feel welcomed in making use of the public services associated which a specific planned social change. Examples include community centers, summer programs for the ghetto children, distribution of contraceptives in remote parts of India, and school lunch programs.

4. Economic Incentives: This is a relatively older strategy based on the economic principles of cost-demand relationships. It presumes that economic incentives may provide motivating force for the public to behave in the desired direction of social change. Economic Incentives Include not only cost reduction tactics but also include offering cash or other tangible incentives.
Examples include tax rebates, tax credits for home insulation, cash payments for vasectomy or offering transistor radios and other highly desired products for birth control or greater usage of public transportation.

5. Economic Disincentives: This is an age old strategy based on the economic principle that demand for a behavior can be reduced or dampened by adding economic disincentives. Economic disincentives includes extra duties, tariffs, surcharges, taxes and other similar economic burdens to the cost of the product or service identified with a particular social behavior which the change agent wants to alter in its magnitude and/or direction. They are presumed to demotivate the public from manifesting a particular social behavior.
Examples include heavy taxes levied on hard liquor, cigarettes and many luxury goods and services.

6. Social Controls: Social controls refer to group identifications and norms, values and pressures which peer groups bring to bear for both ensuring and sustaining social change in the planned direction. In many ways, social controls are the most traditional ways of planned social change. They are built into the norms and values of various social and institutional groups as small as the family unit and as large as the cultural aggregates.
Examples of social controls include Alcoholics Anonjnnous, Weight Watchers, church and charity groups, community activity groups, and the PTA as well as family, peer reference groups and other socioeconomic groups.

7. Clinical Counseling and Behavior Modification: The psychiatric and psychoanalytic programs tailored for each deviant individual as well as small group therapy programs are examples of this strategy. The basic premise is that the desired social change is very specific and limited to a small percentage of the total public and their behavior has high degree of social or personal consequences. The clinical counseling and behavior modification strategies involve the unlearning of socially undesirable behavior or learning of a socially desirable behavior among a hard core of individuals in the society toward which the planned social behaviour is directed by the change agent. It often entails unraveling the deep-seated emotional or physical motivations which lead to the behavior in question.

8. Mandatory Rules and Regulations: This strategy is based on the concept of power endowed in the change agent by the legal-political process. The mandatory rules and regulations are by definition, involuntary measures, and universal in nature. The individual in the society has no choice in obeying or disobeying them. Furthermore, the change agent possesses the power to utilize punitive measures to ensure their compliance. One common denominator underlying all mandatory rules and regulations is the curtailment or elimination of individual choice with respect to a given behavior.
Examples of mandatory rules and regulations are laws related to speeding, violent behavior, product safety, physical safety and, in general, what the society has declared as blue collar or white collar crimes.

WORKING TOWARDS ENSURING CHANGE:
It covers four aspects

A) WORKING TOWARDS CHANGE:

1) Diagnosing the problem/problems: This is done by obtaining information through questionnare or survey method using interaction in small groups like

1. Self questioning technique
2. Selecting information from neighboring systems
3. Eliciting a demonstration on a problem
4. Participating as an observer in the client system’s routine activities
5. Projective communication

2) Processing information or formulating a diagnosis: Once the information has been gathered, the change agents make their diagnosis in the following ways:

1. Diagnosing from assumption of generality of problem
2. Diagnosis by change agents acting independently
3. Diagnosing by change agents and client systems acting cooperatively
4. Self analysis

Stimulating understanding and acceptance of diagnostic insights, impairing diagnosing skills.

3) Stabilising goals and interaction of action which is done by

1. Defining the direction of change
2. Arousing and supporting intentions to change
3. Providing opportunities for anticipating testing
4. Developing and mobilising competance in action

4) Resistance forces in the process of planned change:

1. Conceptual or intellectual difficulty which arises for both change agent and the client system, in converting diagnostic insights into projections of possible goals and means
2. Diagnosis often reveals the need for accustomed pattern behaviour to be changed while the group resists this change
3. Conflict between the influence of the change agent and te influence of the client system’s ‘operating group’. The client system may fear that the changes which seen useful may be really negative, so it resists.
4. The client system may have a fear that it actually does not possess the strength or skill which is required for contemplated change.
5. Occasionally the change agent’s own behaviour during this stage creates a justified resistance in the client system.

B) TRANSFER OF CHANGE:

Client’s expressions of intent to change and even his ability to gasp new concepts, acquire new skills are not safe indications that an actual change occurs.

1. Situational context in which help is given to the client system
2. The initiation of change system efforts depends on
   1. Methods of giving direct support to the client system during the initiation of change
   2. Methods for developing support within the larger client system for change efforts

C) STABILISATION OF CHANGE:

1. Assessing efforts to change: The change agents should help their client system to evaluate change by contrasting the conditions before and after change. There should be some self auditing to assess the progress.

1. The momentum of change effort as a stabilising factor: A changed state of affairs produces changed expectations and satisfactions and theses in turn tend to maintain the change.
2. New need of status as a stabilising factor
3. Methods of encouraging a spread of change through demonstartion
4. Methods of helping to allay resistence to spread

The institutionalisation of change as a stabilising factor: Once a new practice is adopted, or a new pattern of behaviour is fully accepted, forces for the maintenance of the new state of affairs and against additional change begin to arise.

2) Achieving a terminal relationship:

1. General preparation of changeability
2. Methods by which the role of the change agent may be permanently incorporated in the client system
3. Conducting periodical examinations
4. Learning where and how to ask for further help

D) TRAINING THE CHANGE AGENTS:
After examining the functions of the change agents, one should develop the course contents of the change agents as regards their need in the scientific and professional areas.

• Conceptual diagnostic training: The training should include education not only in change concepts but also in the skills of diagnosis techniques, for asking the right questions for establishing valid patterns of observation or measurement for using reliable methods to collect, process and interpret data.
• Orientation to theories and methods of change
• Orientation to ethical and evaluative functions of the change agent
• Knowledge of the sources of help
• Optional and rational skills

Due to the various efforts of exogenous forces like community development organisations, the agricultural universities or colleges, means of transportation and communications, educational facilities, rural electrification, irrigational facilities and the resultant into increased incomes have brought about a change in the material, possessions and amenities rather than the traditions, customs and beliefs.

On the whole, social change is usually a combination of systematic factors along with some random or unique factors. There are many theories of social change. Generally, a theory of change should include elements such as structural aspects of change (like population shifts), processes and mechanisms of social change, and directions of change.

The relative advantage of innovations like improved seeds, fertilizers, insecticides, etc. as compared to the old practices constitute a condition affecting acceptance of changes. In economic terms this is the comparison of output per unit (in the form of fertilizers, peticides, improved seeds etc.) on the relative efficiency of new technology in farming, producing returns in the form of economic or consumption of goods. The greater the likelihood of its acceptance. An important qualifying condition of this principle is the relative ease with the new technique can be demonstrated and the amount of time it takes to do this.

This is affected by various socio economic and cultural factors like:

• Size of holding of the farmer,
• His educational level,
• Availablity of capital,
• Exogenous forces (like transport and communication,
• Change agents like block staff and subject matter specialists of the Agricultural Universities
• Social status of the farmer,
• Cultural prejudices etc.

The adoption of a new practice is the decision of an individual farmer and his family and is influenced by a series of events or activities bearing upon the decision making process.

When a developing country launches an Agricultural Development Programme, in the beginning the rate of acceptance is slow, then the commutative effect brings rapid acceptance until almost all the potential adopters have accepted the change. Some of the practices are accepted more quickly than others. In some of these the farmer wants to see the results at other farms.

The steps of adoption are

The problem of training specialists and generalists in planned change:

There may be five main dimensions along which specialisation develops. These are:

• The specialisation by type of client system: These may be training in psychiatry, clinical psychology, social work, education, industries, group work etc.
• Specialisation in terms of diagnostic orientations and methods
• Specialisation by areas of change objectives
• Specialisation by level of problem
• Specialisation by five type of change methods

Effects of Technology leading to changes such as:

1) Machine replaces uneconomic use of work animals
2) The productivity of farm labour increases and man hours workload is reduced.
3) Due to the lesser number of labour units requires for producing the same amount of grain, the farm population declined in a decade
4) With the adoption of technology in agriculture the persons supported per farm worker increases.

SOCIAL PROBLEMS

Definition, Types, and Social Problem Solving Efforts
Social problems is a condition that was born from a society that is not an ideal situation. That is, as long as a society still found the unmet needs of society equally, then the social problems will always exist. In a heterogeneous society like in Indonesia, will certainly encountered a lot of social problems.

Definition of Social Problems
Soerjono Soekanto define social problems as a discrepancy between the elements of culture or society, which endanger the lives of social groups. Elements that exist in society may interfere with social relationships if you have a friction or clash. As a result, the life of a society or group will falter. These social problems arise due to the occurrence of significant differences between values ​​in society with the reality or the reality of the matter in the field. The existence of social problems in a society defined by the community itself, usually by an institution that does have special authority, such as community leaders, community meetings, social organization, or government.
Types of Social Problems
Social problems encountered in the community are usually very diverse. However, the fact that diversity of social problems can be categorized into four main factors, namely as follows.

• Economic factors, usually in the form of poverty, unemployment, and so on.
• Cultural factors, usually in the form of divorce, juvenile delinquency, and so on.
• Biological factors, usually in the form of infectious diseases, food poisoning, and so on.
• Psychological factors, usually in the form of neurological disease, a cult, and so on.

The existence of social problems in public life can be known by several processes and analytical stages. Analytical stage is done by making a diagnosis. The process of this social problem diagnosis can be performed using two approaches, namely Person Blame Approach and the system blame approach.

Person Blame Approach is an approach to understanding the social issues that are at the individual level. That is, the unit of analysis is the individual’s primary. From this analysis process can be known causes of social problems at the individual level. Usually, the cause of social problems at this level of physical and psychological conditions of each individual.

Meanwhile, the second approach, namely system Blame approach, an approach that makes a system that is used in society as the primary unit of analysis. Of the two approaches before it can be concluded that social problems could arise because of “mistakes” individuals and “fault” system in a society.

Characteristics of Social Problems
On the basis of the above definitions, we can identify the following characteristics of social problems:

• All social problems are situations which have injurious consequences for society
• All social problems are deviations from the “ideal” situation
• All social problems have some common basis of origin
• All social problems are social and political in origin 
• All social problems are caused by pathological social conditions
• All social problems are interconnected 
• All social problems are social in their results – they affect all sections of society
• The responsibility for social problems is social – they require a collective approach for their solution.
• Social problems occur in all societies

Types of Social Problems
Norm Violations

• Norm violations assume that a standard of behaviour exists .
• People who study norm violations are interested in society’s failures like the criminal, the mentally ill, or the school dropout.
• Norm violations are symptoms of social problems rather that the problem itself, Deviants, for example, are victims and should not be blamed entirely.
• The system in which they live is blamed as well.

 SOCIAL PROBLEMS IN GENERAL
Social problems differ country to country and area to area:

Overpopulation

• Economic issues
  • Poverty
  • Sanitation
  • Corruption
  • Debt bondage
  • Unemployment
• Education
  • Illiteracy
  • Social issues
  • Opportunity for youth
  • Inequality
  • Untouchability
  • Gender discrimination
  • Superstitions
• Violence
  • Religious violence
  • Terrorism
  • Naxalite Maoist insurgency
  • Caste related violence

ILLITERACY:
Illiteracy means when a person cannot read or write. UNESCO defines functional illiteracy as “measured by assessing reading, writing and mathematical skills in the various domains of social life which influence individual identity and insertion into society. From this perspective, literacy involves not only reading and writing but also the acquisition of the skills necessary for effective and productive performance within society” (UNESCO 2011).

Poor literacy also limits a person’s ability to engage in activities that require either critical thinking or a solid base of literacy and numeracy skills.

Such activities may include:

• Understanding government policies and voting in elections
• Using a computer to do banking or interact with government agencies
• Calculating the cost and potential return of a financial investment
• Using a computer or smart phone to look up and access up-to-date news and information;
• communicate with others via email or social networking sites; or shop online,
• read product reviews and user feedback, and
• get the best prices for goods and services
• Completing a higher education degree or training
• Analysing sophisticated media and advertising messages, particularly for get-rich-quick scams
• Assisting children with their homework

UNEMPLOYMENT:
Unemployment occurs when a person who is actively searching for employment is unable to find work. Unemployment is often used as a measure of the health of the economy. The most frequently cited measure of unemployment is the unemployment rate. This is the number of unemployed persons divided by the number of people in the labour force.

Types of Unemployment in India
We can see unemployment is a serious problem which is not always easy to identify. Let us discuss the different types of unemployment in India.

Seasonal Unemployment
Normally when we talk of employed people we mean those who have work throughout the year. But this may not possible for all. In agriculture, work is seasonal even though agricultural activities are performed throughout the year. During the peak agricultural seasons (when the crop is ready for harvesting) more people are required for work. Similarly in the sowing, weeding and transplantation period more labour is required. However, once these seasons are over the agricultural workers, especially those who do not own land or whose land is not sufficient to meet their basic requirement (these are landless labourers and marginal farmers respectively), remain unemployed. This type of unemployment is known as seasonal unemployment.

Voluntary Unemployment
People who are unwilling to work at prevailing wage rate and people who get a continuous flow of income from their property or any other sources and need not to work, such people are voluntarily unemployed.

Frictional Unemployment
Unemployment attributable to the time required to match production activities with qualified resources. Frictional unemployment essentially occurs because resources, especially labor, are in the process of moving from one production activity to another. Employers are seeking workers and workers are seeking employment, the two sides just haven’t matched up. Hence unemployment of the frictional variety increases. This mismatch is largely the result of limited information, which is often compounded by geographic separation between producer and resource.

Causal Unemployment
Cyclical unemployment is based on a greater availability of workers than there are jobs for workers. It is usually directly tied to the state of the economy. Lower demand for products due to lack of consumer confidence, disinterest, or reduction in consumer spending results in the workforce cutting back on production. Since production is reduced, companies that retail such products may also cut back on workforce, creating yet more cyclical unemployment.

Disguised Unemployment
There are also instances where we find too many people working when so many are not required. In agriculture, we may find that all members of the family work. It is possible that 3-4 people can do a given work in the farm, but we find that the whole family of say 10 people doing the job. This may be because the excess people are not able to find employment elsewhere, so rather than remain unemployed they prefer to do the work along with others. This is known as disguised unemployment. This occurs when more than the necessary numbers of people are employed for the specified work. Disguised unemployment is found in agriculture because of the lack of employment opportunities elsewhere. Similarly disguised unemployment can be found in industry and offices as well.

Rural and Urban Unemployment in India
The unemployment rate at all India level stood at 3.8 per cent while in rural and urban areas it was 3.4 per cent and 5 per cent respectively. Unemployment rate is more in urban areas than in rural areas as in urban areas educated unemployed are more in numbers and also in urban areas it requires some vocational training or technical skill to do a job as compared to rural areas. Urban unemployment is that unemployment which exit in urban areas. It is not only painful at personal level but also at social level.

Despite this problem the government has not given attention to it. Urban unemployment can be classified into two forms.

• Industrial unemployment: The exact size of the industrial unemployment is not known because the necessary data for its estimation are not available.
• Educated unemployment: It constitutes large part of urban unemployment in India. Rural unemployment is the main problem of Indian government and it requires huge capitalization of capital. Disguised unemployment, seasonal unemployment etc are some of the example of rural unemployment.

The educated are not the only ones who face the problem of unemployment in the urban areas. There are large numbers of people in the rural areas who do not have a high level of education and who are unemployed.

CHILD ABUSE
Child abuse is a state of emotional, physical, economic and sexual maltreatment meted out to a person below the age of eighteen and is a globally prevalent phenomenon. However, in India, as in many other countries, there has been no understanding of the extent, magnitude and trends of the problem. The growing complexities of life and the dramatic changes brought about by socio-economic transitions in India have played a major role in increasing the vulnerability of children to various and newer forms of abuse. Despite hectic planning, welfare programmes, legislation and administrative action in the past six decades, a large majority of the Indian children continue to remain in distress and turmoil. In most families, the parents neglect them, caretakers batter them and in work-place employers sexually abuse them. Though this problem of emotional, physical and sexual abuse of children in India is increasing, it has failed to capture the attention of sociologist and psychiatrists in our country.

According to World Health Organization (WHO), Child abuse or maltreatment constitutes all forms of physical and/or emotional ill-treatment, sexual abuse, neglect or negligent treatment or commercial or other exploitation, resulting in actual or potential harm to the child’s health, survival, development or dignity in the context of a relationship of responsibility, trust or power.

A child is defined by the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), 1989, as “Every human being below the age of 18 years unless under the law applicable under the child majority is attained earlier. Throughout the consultation the importance of the CRC in the area of child abuse was emphasized.

While Article 19 of the convention specifically addresses child abuse and recommends a broad outline for its identification, reporting, investigation, treatment, follow-up and prevention.

The Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) defines child abuse and neglect as: “at a minimum, any recent act or failure to act on the part of a parent or caretaker, which results in death, serious physical or emotional harm, sexual abuse or exploitation, or an act or failure to act which presents an imminent risk of serious harm.” For CAPTA, the term child is someone who has not reached the age of 18; or (except in the case of sexual abuse) the age specified by the child protection law of the State in which the child resides; Within the minimum standards set by CAPTA, each State is responsible for providing its own definitions of child abuse and neglect. Most States recognize four major types of maltreatment:

• Neglect,
• Physical abuse,
• Sexual abuse, and
• Emotional abuse.

Although any of the forms of child maltreatment may be found separately, they often occur in combination.

Instruments and Standards for protection of child right in India
The Constitution of India recognizes the vulnerable position of children and their right to protection. Following the doctrine of protective discrimination, it guarantees in Article 15 special attention to children through necessary and special laws and policies that safeguard their rights. The right to equality, protection of life and personal liberty and the right against exploitation are enshrined in Articles 14, 15, 15(3), 19(1) (a), 21, 21(A), 23, 24, 39(e) 39(f) and reiterate India’s commitment to the protection, safety, security and well-being of all its people, including children.

Article 14: The State shall not deny to any person equality before the law or the equal protection of the laws within the territory of India;
Article 15: The State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them;
Article 15 (3): Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any special provision for women and children;
Article 19(1) (a) : All citizens shall have the right (a) to freedom of speech and expression;
Article 21: Protection of life and personal liberty-No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law;
Article 21A: Free and compulsory education for all children of the age of 6 to 14 years;
Article 23: Prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labour-(1) Traffic in human beings and beggars and other similar forms of forced labour are prohibited and any contravention of this provision shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.
Article 24: Prohibition of employment of children in factories, etc. -No child below the age of fourteen years shall be employed to work in any factory or mine or engaged in any other hazardous employment;
Article 39: The state shall, in particular, direct its policy towards securing:
(e) that the health and strength of workers, men and women, and the tender age of children are not abused and that citizens are not forced by economic necessity to enter vocations unsuited to their age or strength;
(f) that children are given opportunities and facilities to develop in a healthy manner and in conditions of freedom and dignity and that childhood and youth are protected against exploitation and against moral and material abandonment.

CHILD LABOUR:
The children of today are the future of tomorrow; this powerful statement assumes special significance in our context as children (0-14 years) comprise one third of the total population in the country. Every child, on provision of a conducive and an enabling environment, may blossom into an ever fragrant flower, to shine in all spheres of life.
Child labour is a concrete manifestation of violations of a range of rights of children and is recognized as a serious and enormously complex social problem in India. Working children are denied their right to survival and development, education, leisure and play, and adequate standard of living, opportunity for developing personality, talents, mental and physical abilities, and protection from abuse and neglect. Notwithstanding the increase in the enrolment of children in elementary schools and increase in literacy rates since 1980s, child labour continues to be a significant phenomenon in India.

Who is a Child Labour?
There is no agreement on the definitions of a ‘child’. According to article 1 of UNCRC (United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989), “A child means every human being below the age of 18 years unless, under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier.”

Government Measures to Prevent Child Labour
Legal Measures against Child Labour
In the very constitution of India provisions are made to protect the interests of children.
Article 24 of the Constitution states that children below 14 years shall not be employed any factory or in any hazardous unit.
The first Act to regulate the employment of children was the Factory Act of 1881, which forbids the appointment of children below 7 years. Second was the Indian Merchant Shipping act, 1923 which prevents appointing children below 14 in ships.
In 1986, the Parliament enacted the Child Labour Act (Regulation and Prohibition), The Act prohibits the employment of children below the age of 14 years in 16 occupations and 65 processes that are hazardous to the children’s lives and health. These occupations and processes are listed in the Schedule to the Act.
In October 2006, the Government has included children working in the domestic sector as well as roadside eateries and motels under the prohibited list of hazardous occupations. More recently, in September 2008 diving as well as process involving excessive heat (e.g. working near a furnace) and cold; mechanical fishing; food processing; beverage industry; timber handling and loading; mechanical lumbering; warehousing; and processes involving exposure to free silica such as slate, pencil industry, stone grinding, slate stone mining, stone quarries as well as the agate industry were added to the list of prohibited occupations and processes;

SOCIAL PROBLEMS

DRUG ABUSE:
Any substance (usually chemical) which influences our bodies or emotions when consumed may be called a drug, i.e. it is a chemical substance, that, when put into your body can change the way the body works and the mind thinks. These substances may be medicinal i.e. prescribed by a doctor for reducing minor ailments or problems, e.g. lack of sleep, headache, tension, etc. but are also used without medical advice, used for an excessively long period of time and used for reason other than medical ones.
The use of such drugs is usually legal.

• Some drugs may be non-medicinal in nature. Their use is illegal e.g. heroin.
• Another group of drugs are those that are legal, but are harmful for the person if consumed in excess, regularly, e.g. alcohol.
• There are other substances like cigarettes, coffee, tea etc. which can be termed as socially accepted legal drugs. But these are not seen as harmful.
• Some drugs like alcohol, brown sugar, etc. are dangerous and addictive.

According to Julian (1977) drug is any chemical substance which affects bodily function, mood, perception or consciousness which has potential for misuse and which may be harmful to the individual or the society.

Measures to combat Drug Trafficking
For reducing the supply and demand for drugs into the country, the government deemed it necessary to enact domestic laws that would be stringent enough to deter the organised gangs of drug smugglers; that would allow concerned agencies to investigate and prosecute drug related offences; that would strengthen the existing cartel control over drug abuse and; that would enable India to fulfill its obligations towards international treaties and conventions that it has signed against narcotics drugs and their trafficking.

The Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS):

• This act was enacted in 1985.
• Under this act, cultivation, manufacturing, transportation, export and import of all narcotics drugs and psychotropic substances is prohibited
• Except for medicinal and scientific purposes and as authorised by the government.
• A minimum punishment of ten years rigorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs. One lakh extendable to 20 years of rigorous punishment and a fine of Rs. Two lakhs is handed to persons caught possessing ‘small to commercial quantities’ of drugs.
• In case of repeated offence, the Act provides for a minimum of 15 years and a fine of Rs.1.5 lakhs and if extended it would go up to 30 years with a fine of Rs. three lakhs.
• Death penalty is mandated for the second offence. The act also provides for the detention of any person for more than two years in areas categorised by it as ‘highly vulnerable’.
• The NDPS Act also provides for forfeiture of property acquired through illicit trafficking of drugs.
• Under the NDPS Act, a number of persons have been persecuted and sentenced to rigorous imprisonment and their properties confiscated.
• In fact, in a number of cases special courts have served death penalties to persons found guilty of possessing drugs for the second time.

The Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1988:

• The act allows detention of persons suspected to be involved in illicit trafficking of drugs (shah).
• Besides, a few sections of the Customs Act of 1962 are implemented for curbing the illicit export of precursor chemicals.
• Under the Act, acetic anhydride has been declared as ‘specified item’ to check its illegal export and detection in the border states of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram.
• Also, a 100 km belt along the Myanmar border in these states has also been declared as ‘specified area’ under the Customs Act of 1962 to curb any illegal export of acetic an hydride.
• The enactment of various legislations has indeed provided the government with the means to achieve the twin goals of reduction in drug supply and demand.

NGOs role:

• Furthermore, proper licensing and strict vigilance is required to ascertain that there is neither illegal cultivation of poppy nor any diversion of opium to manufacture heroin.
• Since de-addiction and rehabilitation of drug dependants require innovative and sustained involvement, the government is assisted by a number of voluntary organisations.
• These voluntary organisatons complement the government’s efforts in the prevention and control of drug abuse by spreading awareness about the destructive effects of drugs in the communities, as well as by assisting in de-addiction treatments and reintegration of drug dependants into the societal mainstream. The Federation for Indian NGOs (non-governmental organisations) in Drug Abuse Prevention (FINGODAP) facilitates intense interactions among various NGOs to share their expertise and ensure better service for reduction of drug dependency.
• These voluntary organisations, through various programmes like detoxification and de-addiction, rehabilitation and reintegration, outreach, awareness and education, sensitisation and intervention, extended care and livelihood generation, have been quite effective in reducing the demand and abuse of drugs in the country.

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
Throughout their life cycle women face violence and discrimination:

Violence against women is defined by the Convention on Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) (1993) in the (World Health Organization (WHO) Report: June 2000) as

• ‘any act of gender violence
• that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering to women,
• including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty,
• whether occurring in public or private life’.
• This violence can be committed by the institutions of family, state, law, religion and by individuals.

Gender violence is a phenomenon which may start at conception and can take different forms through the entire life span of women. Violence manifests itself in various forms –

• female foeticide and infanticide,
• unequal access to food, shelter, clothing, education and health facilities,
• sati and child marriage,
• wife battering,
• wife murder,
• dowry,
• marital rape,
• sexual harassment at work place, sexual assaults such as rape and molestation,
• property violence,
• trafficking of women,
• torture of widows and many more.

Protection:
The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005
The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (“Domestic Violence Act”) was passed in order to provide a civil law remedy for the protection of women from domestic violence in India.

The Domestic Violence Act encompasses all forms of physical, verbal, emotional, economic and sexual abuse and forms a subset of the anti-dowry laws to the extent it is one of the reasons for domestic violence.

Section 3 of the Domestic Violence Act specifically incorporates all forms of harassment, injury and harms inflicted to coerce a woman to meet an unlawful demand for dowry.

Some of the common remedies under the Domestic Violence Act include:

• protection orders – prohibiting a person from committing domestic violence;
• residence orders – dispossessing such person from a shared household;
• custody orders – granting custody of a child; and
• compensation orders – directing payment of compensation.

The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013:  

• The Act defines sexual harassment at the work place and creates a mechanism for redressal of complaints. It also provides safeguards against false or malicious charges.
• The Act also covers concepts of ‘quid pro quo harassment’ and ‘hostile work environment’ as forms of sexual harassment if it occurs in connection with an act or behaviour of sexual harassment. Through theCriminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2013, Section 354 was added to the Indian Penal Code that stipulates what consists of a sexual harassment offence and what the penalties shall be for a man committing such an offence.
• Penalties range from one to three years imprisonment and/or a fine. Additionally, with sexual harassment being a crime, employers are obligated to report offences.

The Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 article 3:

• Dowry in the Act is defined as any property or valuable security given or agreed to be given in connection with the marriage.
• The penalty for giving or taking dowry is not applicable in case of presents which are given at the time of marriage without any demand having been made.
• This legislation provides for a penalty in section 3 if any person gives, takes or abets or giving or receiving of dowry.
• The punishment could be imprisonment for a term not less than 5 years and a fine not less than ₹15,000 or the value of the dowry received, whichever is higher.
• The Act provides the penalty for directly or indirectly demanding dowry and provides for a penalty involving a prison term of not less than 6 months and extendable up to two years along with a fine of ₹10,000.
• Under its powers to frame rules for carrying out its objectives under the Act, the government of India has framed the Maintenance of Lists of Presents to the Bride and the Bridegroom Rules, 1985.
• Dowry agreements are voidab initio and if any dowry is received by anyone other than the woman, it should be transferred to the woman. The burden of proving that an offense was not committed is on the persons charged and not on the victim or her family.
• There are also several state level amendments to the Dowry Prohibition Act.

The Preconception and Prenatal Diagnostic Techniques Act of 1994 (PCPNDT Act 1994)

• Female foeticideis the selected abortion of a fetus, because it is female.
• Female foeticide occurs when a family has a strong preference for sons over daughters, which is a common cultural theme in India.
• Modern medical technology has allowed for the gender of a child to be determined while the child is still a fetus. Once these modern prenatal diagnostic techniques determine the gender of the fetus, families then are able to decide if they would like to abort based on gender.
• This process began in the early 1990s whenultra sound techniques gained widespread use in India.
• There was a tendency for families to continuously produce children until a male child was born.Foetal sex determination and sex selective abortion by medical professionals has today grown into a Rs. 1,000 crore industry (US$ 244 million).
• Social discrimination against women and a preference for sonshave promoted female foeticide in various forms skewing the sex ratio of the country towards men.
• According to the decennial Indian census, thesex ratio in the 0-6 age group in India went from 104.0 males per 100 females in 1981, to 109.4 in 2011.
• Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (PCPNDT) Act, 1994is an Act of the Parliament of India enacted to stop female foeticides and arrest the declining sex ratio in India. The act banned prenatal sex determination.
• The act was modified in 2003 in order to target medical professionals also.
• Sex-selective abortions have totaled approximately 4.2-12.1 million from 1980-2010.
• Poorer families are responsible for a higher proportion of abortions than wealthier families.
• Significantly, more abortions occur in rural areas versus urban areas when the first child is female.
• According to the act,
• nolaboratory or centre or clinic will conduct any test including ultra sonography for the purpose of determining the sex of the foetus.
• No person, including the one who is conducting the procedure as per the law, will communicate the sex of thefoetus to the pregnant woman or her relatives by words, signs or any other method.
• The punishment can be imprisoned for up to three years and fined Rs. 10,000.
• The Act mandates compulsory registration of all diagnostic laboratories, all genetic counselling centres, genetic laboratories, genetic clinics and ultrasound clinics orelse their registration gets cancelled.

Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act (ITPA),
Human Trafficking is an umbrella term that is, problematically, often reduced to mean prostitution.

Article 3, paragraph (a) of the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons defines Trafficking in Persons as

• the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons,
• by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits
• to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person,
• for the purpose of exploitation.

Exploitation shall include, at a minimum,

• the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation,
• forced labour or services,
• slavery or practices similar to slavery,
• servitude or the removal of organs.
  • The Government of India penalises trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation through the Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act (ITPA),
  • with prescribed penalty of seven years’ to life imprisonment. India also prohibits bonded and forced labour through the Bonded Labour Abolition Act, the Child Labour Act, and the Juvenile Justice Act.
  • Indian authorities also use Sections 366(A) and 372 of the Indian Penal Code, prohibiting kidnapping and selling minors into prostitution respectively, to arrest traffickers.
  • Penalties under these provisions are a maximum of ten years’ imprisonment and a fine.

SOCIAL PROBLEMS

SOCIAL INEQUALITY
The social issue of social inequality occurs when resources in a given society are distributed unevenly, typically through norms of allocation, that engender specific patterns along lines of socially defined categories of persons. Economic inequality, usually described on the basis of the unequal distribution of income or wealth, is a frequently studied type of social inequality. Though the disciplines of economics and sociology generally use different theoretical approaches to examine and explain economic inequality, both fields are actively involved in researching this inequality.
However, social and natural resources other than purely economic resources are also unevenly distributed in most societies and may contribute to social status. Norms of allocation can also affect the distribution of rights and privileges, social power, access to public goods such as education or the judicial system, adequate housing, transportation, credit and financial services such as banking and other social goods and services.
While many societies worldwide hold that their resources are distributed on the basis of merit, research shows that the distribution of resources often follows delineations that distinguish different social categories of persons on the basis of other socially defined characteristics. For example, social inequality is linked to racial inequality, gender inequality, and ethnic inequality as well as other status characteristics and these forms can be related to corruption
There are a number of socially defined characteristics of individuals that contribute to social status and, therefore, equality or inequality within a society. When researchers use quantitative variables such as income or wealth to measure inequality, on an examination of the data, patterns are found that indicate these other social variables contribute to income or wealth as intervening variables. Significant inequalities in income and wealth are found when specific socially defined categories of people are compared. Among the most pervasive of these variables are sex/gender, race, and ethnicity. This is not to say, in societies wherein merit is considered to be the primary factor determining one’s place or rank in the social order, that merit has no effect on variations in income or wealth. It is to say that these other socially defined characteristics can, and often do, intervene in the valuation of merit.
Gender inequality: Sex- and gender-based prejudice and discrimination, called sexism, are major contributing factors to social inequality. Most societies, even agricultural ones, have some sexual division of labour and gender-based division of labour tends to increase during industrialization. The emphasis on gender inequality is born out of the deepening division in the roles assigned to men and women, particularly in the economic, political and educational spheres.
Gender discrimination, especially concerning the lower social status of women, has been a topic of serious discussion not only within academic and activist communities but also by governmental agencies and international bodies such as the United Nations. These discussions seek to identify and remedy widespread, institutionalized barriers to access for women in their societies. By making use of gender analysis, researchers try to understand the social expectations, responsibilities, resources and priorities of women and men within a specific context, examining the social, economic and environmental factors which influence their roles and decision-making capacity. By enforcing artificial separations between the social and economic roles of men and women, the lives of women and girls are negatively impacted and this can have the effect of limiting social and economic development.
Cultural ideals about women’s work can also affect men whose outward gender expression is considered “feminine” within a given society. Transgender and gender-variant persons may express their gender through their appearance, the statements they make, or official documents they present. In this context, gender normativity, which is understood as the social expectations placed on us when we present particular bodies, produces widespread cultural/institutional devaluations of trans identities, homosexuality and femininity. Trans persons, in particular, have been defined as socially unproductive and disruptive.
A variety of global issues like HIV/AIDS, illiteracy, and poverty are often seen as “women’s issues” since women are disproportionately affected. In many countries, women and girls face problems such as lack of access to education, which limit their opportunities to succeed, and further limits their ability to contribute economically to their society. Women are underrepresented in political activities and decision making processes throughout most of the world. Women’s participation in work has been increasing globally, but women are still faced with wage discrepancies and differences compared to what men earn. This is true globally even in the agricultural and rural sector in developed as well as developing countries. Structural impediments to women’s ability to pursue and advance in their chosen professions often result in a phenomenon known as the glass ceiling, which refers to unseen – and often unacknowledged barriers that prevent minorities and women from rising to the upper rungs of the corporate ladder, regardless of their qualifications or achievements. This effect can be seen in the corporate and bureaucratic environments of many countries, lowering the chances of women to excel. It prevents women from succeeding and making the maximum use of their potential, which is at a cost for women as well as the society’s development. Ensuring that women’s rights are protected and endorsed can promote a sense of belonging that motivates women to contribute to their society. Once able to work, women should be titled to the same job security and safe working environments as men. Until such safeguards are in place, women and girls will continue to experience not only barriers to work and opportunities to earn, but will continue to be the primary victims of discrimination, oppression, and gender-based violence.
Women and persons whose gender identity does not conform to patriarchal beliefs about sex (only male and female) continue to face violence on global domestic, interpersonal, institutional and administrative scales. This process ensures that women encounter resistance into meaningful positions of power in institutions, administrations, and political systems and communities.

Racial and ethnic inequality
Racial or ethnic inequality is the result of hierarchical social distinctions between racial and ethnic categories within a society and often established based on characteristics such as skin color and other physical characteristics or an individual’s place of origin or culture. Even though race has no biological connection, it has become a socially constructed category capable of restricting or enabling social status. Unequal treatment and opportunities between such categories is usually the result of some categories being considered superior to others. This inequality can manifest through discriminatory hiring and pay practices. In some cases, employers have been shown to prefer hiring potential employees based on the perceived ethnicity of a candidate’s given name – even if all they have to go by in their decision are resumes featuring identical qualifications. These sorts of discriminatory practices stem from prejudice and stereotyping, which occurs when people form assumptions about the tendencies and characteristics of certain social categories, often rooted in assumptions about biology, cognitive capabilities, or even inherent moral failings. These negative attributions are then disseminated through a society through a number of different mediums, including television, newspapers and the internet, all of which play a role in promoting preconceived notions of race that disadvantage and marginalize groups of people. This along with xenophobia and other forms of discrimination continue to occur in societies with the rise of globalization.
Racial inequality can also result in diminished opportunities for members of marginalized groups, which in turn can lead to cycles of poverty and political marginalization. Racial and ethnic categories become a minority category in a society. Minority members in such a society are often subjected to discriminatory actions resulting from majority policies, including assimilation, exclusion, oppression, expulsion, and extermination. These types of institutional barriers to full and equal social participation have far-reaching effects within marginalized communities, including reduced economic opportunity and output, reduced educational outcomes and opportunities and reduced levels of overall health.
Age inequality: Age discrimination is defined as the unfair treatment of people with regard to promotions, recruitment, resources, or privileges because of their age. It is also known as ageism: the stereotyping of and discrimination against individuals or groups based upon their age. It is a set of beliefs, attitudes, norms, and values used to justify age-based prejudice, discrimination, and subordination. One form of ageism is adultism, which is the discrimination against children and people under the legal adult age.
As implied in the definitions above, treating people differently based upon their age is not necessarily discrimination. Virtually every society has age-stratification, meaning that the age structure in a society changes as people begin to live longer and the population becomes older. In most cultures, there are different social role expectations for people of different ages to perform. Every society manages people’s ageing by allocating certain roles for different age groups. Age discrimination primarily occurs when age is used as an unfair criterion for allocating more or less resources. Scholars of age inequality have suggested that certain social organizations favor particular age inequalities. For instance, because of their emphasis on training and maintaining productive citizens, modern capitalist societies may dedicate disproportionate resources to training the young and maintaining the middle-aged worker to the detriment of the elderly and the retired (especially those already disadvantaged by income/wealth inequality).
In modern, technologically advanced societies, there is a tendency for both the young and the old to be relatively disadvantaged. However, more recently, in the United States the tendency is for the young to be most disadvantaged. Sometimes, the elderly have had the opportunity to build their wealth throughout their lives; younger people have the disadvantage of recently entering into or having not yet entered into the economic sphere. Moving up the income distribution ladder, children and youth do not fare much better: more than two-thirds of the world’s youth have access to less than 20 percent of global wealth, with 86 percent of all young people living on about one-third of world income. For the just over 400 million youth who are fortunate enough to rank among families or situations at the top of the income distribution, however, opportunities improve greatly with more than 60 percent of global income within their reach.
Although this does not exhaust the scope of age discrimination, in modern societies it is often discussed primarily with regards to the work environment. Indeed, non-participation in the labour force and the unequal access to rewarding jobs means that the elderly and the young are often subject to unfair disadvantages because of their age. On the one hand, the elderly are less likely to be involved in the workforce: At the same time, old age may or may not put one at a disadvantage in accessing positions of prestige. Old age may benefit one in such positions, but it may also disadvantage one because of negative ageist stereotyping of old people. On the other hand, young people are often disadvantaged from accessing prestigious or relatively rewarding jobs, because of their recent entry to the work force or because they are still completing their education. Typically, once they enter the labour force or take a part-time job while in school, they start at entry level positions with low level wages. Furthermore, because of their lack of prior work experience, they can also often be forced to take marginal jobs, where they can be taken advantage of by their employers.
Inequalities in health: Health inequalities can be defined as differences in health status or in the distribution of health determinants between different population groups. Health inequalities are in many cases related to access to health care. In industrialized nations, health inequalities are most prevalent in countries that have not implemented a universal health care system,
While universal access to health care may not completely eliminate health inequalities, it has been shown that it greatly reduces them. In this context, privatization gives individuals the ‘power’ to purchase their own health care (through private health insurance companies), but this leads to social inequality by only allowing people who have economic resources to access health care. Citizens are seen as consumers who have a ‘choice’ to buy the best health care they can afford; in alignment with neoliberal ideology, this puts the burden on the individual rather than the government or the community.
A lack of health equity is also evident in the developing world, where the importance of equitable access to healthcare has been cited as crucial to achieving many of the Millennium Development Goals. Health inequalities can vary greatly depending on the country one is looking at. Inequalities in health are often associated with socioeconomic status and access to health care. Health inequities can occur when the distribution of public health services is unequal. Access to health care is heavily influenced by socioeconomic status as well, as wealthier population groups have a higher probability of obtaining care when they need it.

FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS:
This is a charter of rights contained in Part III of Constitution of India. It guarantees civil liberties such that all Indians can lead their lives in peace and harmony as citizens of India.

These include individual rights common to most democracies in the world, such as

• Equality before law,
• freedom of speechand expression,
• Religious and cultural freedom and
• peaceful assembly,
• freedom to practice religion, and
• The right to constitutional remedies for the protection of civil rights by means of writs such as habeas corpus.

Violation of these rights

• result in punishments as prescribed in the Indian Penal Code or other special laws, subject to discretion of the judiciary.
• The Fundamental Rights are defined as basic human freedoms that every Indian citizen has the right to enjoy for a proper and harmonious development of personality.
• These rights universally apply to all citizens, irrespective ofrace, place of birth, religion, caste or gender.
• Aliens (persons who are not citizens) are also considered in matters like equality before law.
• They are enforceable by thecourts, subject to certain restrictions.

The six fundamental rights recognized by the Indian constitution are:

1. Right to equality: Which includes equality before law, prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, gender or place of birth, and equality of opportunity in matters of employment, abolition of untouchability and abolition of titles. Right to equality is provided from Article 14 to Article 18 of Indian constitution.
2. Right to freedom: Which includes freedom of speech and expression, assembly, association or union or cooperatives, movement, residence, and right to practice any profession or occupation (some of these rights are subject to security of the State, friendly relations with foreign countries, public order, decency or morality), right to life and liberty, protection in respect to conviction in offences and protection against arrest and detention in certain cases. Right to freedom is provided from Article 19 to 22 of constitution.
3. Right against exploitation: Which prohibits all forms of forced labour, child labour and traffic of human beings. It is provided under Articles 23 and 24 of Indian constitution.
4. Right to freedom of religion: Which includes freedom of conscience and free profession, practice, and propagation of religion, freedom to manage religious affairs, freedom from certain taxes and freedom from religious instructions in certain educational institutes. Article 25 to 28 enumerates the right to freedom of religion.
5. Cultural and Educational rights: Preserve the right of any section of citizens to conserve their culture, language or script, and right of minorities to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice. Article 29 and Article 30 of Indian constitution provides for cultural and educational rights.
6. Right to constitutional remedies: This is present for enforcement of Fundamental Rights. It is provided under Article 32 of Indian constitution.

Fundamental rights for Indians have also been aimed at overturning the inequalities of pre-independence social practices. Specifically, they have also been used to abolish untouchability and thus prohibit discrimination on the grounds of religion, race, caste, sex, or place of birth. They also forbid trafficking of human beings and forced labour(a crime). They also protect cultural and educational rights of ethnic and religious minorities by allowing them to preserve their languages and also establish and administer their own education institutions. They are covered in Part III (Articles 12 to 35) of Indian constitution.

SUPERSTITIONS
Superstition is considered a widespread social problem in India. Superstition refers to any belief or practice which is explained by supernatural causality, and is in contradiction to modern science. Some beliefs and practices, which are considered superstitious by some, may not be considered so by others. The gap, between what is superstitious and what is not, widens even more when considering the opinions of the general public and scientists.

Superstitions are usually attributed to a lack of education. But, in India educated people have also been observed following beliefs that may be considered superstitious. The literacy rate of India, according to the 2011 census is at 74%. The beliefs and practices vary from region to region, with many regions having their own specific beliefs. The practices may range from harmless lemon-and-chilli totems for warding off evil eye to serious concerns like witch-burning. Some of these beliefs and practices are centuries old and are considered part of the tradition and religion, as a result introduction of new prohibitory laws often face opposition.

Some of the examples of the superstitions are
Sati: According to Commission (Prevention) of Sati Act 1987, Sati is defined as the act of burning alive or burial of a widow (or any women) along with the body of her deceased husband (including relatives, or object belonging someone like that), irrespective of whether it was voluntary. After he watched the Sati of his own sister-in-law, Ram Mohan Roy began campaigning for abolition of the practice in 1811. The practice of Sati was abolished in British India in 1829 by Governor General Lord William Bentinck. Although it has been therefore illegal in India for almost two centuries, some incidents have been recorded in recent years.

Human sacrifices: Although, human sacrifices are not prevalent in India, rare isolated incidents happen occasionally, especially in rural areas. In some cases, human beings have been replaced by animals and birds. But after backlash from animal rights groups, in some places they have been replaced by human effigies. The beliefs behind these sacrifices vary from inducing rainfall to helping childless women conceive. It is alleged that some cases often go unreported or are covered up. Between 1999 and 2006, about 200 cases of child sacrifices were reported from Uttar Pradesh.

Godmen and faith healers: The word godman is a colloquial blanket term used for charismatic spiritual leaders in India. Locally, they may be referred to as baba, swami, guru, shastri, bapu or bhagat. Many of them claim to have magic or psychic powers and perform miracles. On the other hand, some only provide spiritual advice. There are also female gurus. Many of them are worshipped by their followers as avatars or living gods. Many of them belong to ancient ascetic lineages or claim to be successor to some previous spiritual predecessor. Some of them have built large pan-Indian or international networks. Their recent success has been attributed to the use of mass media and public relations techniques.

Solar and lunar eclipses: There are several superstitions associated with solar eclipses. Solar eclipses are associated with war, violent events and disasters. Any cooked food considered to have become impure during the event; they are thrown away or given to beggars. People don’t eat or cook food during the event. Temples are closed before the event and reopened after the event is over. Many shops also remain closed. It is also believed that asuras are worshipped during the period. Pregnant women are advised to stay indoors. It is considered inauspicious to give birth during the event. Solar eclipse are also said to cause miscarriages Other people also avoid venturing outside. It is believed that the sun rays become toxic during the event and a bath must be taken after the event. Indian stock exchanges also observe a drop in trades during eclipses. There are some reports of disabled children being buried neck-deep in sand or mud in hopes of curing their disabilities. Similar beliefs exist around lunar eclipses, where food is avoided and people refrain from venturing outside. Rationalist organisations have been trying to eradicate these superstitions by organising events during eclipses, where people are encouraged to drink water and eat food.

Witch-hunts: Some people, mostly in villages, have the belief that witchcraft and black magic are effective. On one hand, people may seek advice from witch doctors for health, financial or marital problems. On the other hand, people, especially women, are accused of witchcraft and attacked, occasionally killed. It has been reported that mostly widows or divorcees are targeted to rob them of their property. Reportedly, revered village witch-doctors are paid to brand specific persons as witches, so that they can be killed without repercussions. The existing laws have been considered ineffective in curbing the murders. In June 2013, National Commission for Women (NCW) reported that according to National Crime Records Bureau statistics, 768 women had been murdered for allegedly practising witchcraft since 2008, and announced plans for newer laws to protect the women.

Astroloy: Rahukaalam (or Rahu kala) is an inauspicious period of time every day. A person born under the influence of Mars is called a manglik or having Mangal Dosha. People avoid marrying such a person, especially if the person is a woman. Marriage with such a person is believed to cause marital discord and divorce, even sometimes death. However, it is believed that if two mangliks marry, the effects of both cancel out.

LEGAL ASPECTS:
Article 51 A (h), Constitution of India: The Article 51 A (h) of the Constitution of India, lists “to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform” as a fundamental duty for every Indian citizen. Rationalist Narendra Nayak has argued the Article 51 A (h) is contrary to IPC 295A and the constitution should be held over to IPC 295A.

Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954: This act prohibits advertisements of magical remedies, like amulets or spells, for certain diseases. The law lists 56 of these diseases. The law also curbs sales and promotion of so-called miracle drugs and cures. But, the law is rarely enforced and several such products are freely available to the public. The law is considered severely outdated as 14 of the diseases in the list are now curable, and newer diseases like AIDS are not on the list.

Indian Penal Code, Section 295A: The Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code criminalises “deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs”, it includes “words, either spoken or written, or by signs or by visible representations”.

Regional laws: The Prevention of Witch (Daain) Practices Act of 1999 outlaws witch-hunting in Bihar. It has also been adopted by the state of Jharkhand. It carries a sentence of 3 months for accusing a woman of being a witch and 6 months for causing any physical or mental harm. In 2005, Chhattisgarh passed the Tonahi Pratadna Nivaran Act. It holds a sentence of 3 years for accusing a women of being a witch and 5 years for causing her physical harm. The upcoming Women (Prevention of Atrocities) Bill of 2012 in Rajasthan also covers witch-hunting. In December 2013, Odisha passed the Odisha Prevention of Witch-Hunting Bill which has a maximum penalty of seven years. Also in the same month, the Anti-Superstition and Black Magic Act was passed in Maharashtra.

UNTOUCHABILITY
Status of certain social groups confined to menial and despised jobs. It is associated with the Hindu caste system, but similar groups exist outside Hinduism, for example the Burakumin in Japan and Hutu and Twa of Rwanda. At the beginning of the twenty-first century there were over 160 million untouchables on the Indian subcontinent.

            Untouchablity in simple terms can be understood as a practice whereby a particular class or caste of persons are discriminated with on the ground of their being born in that particular caste or on the ground of their being members of those social groups involved in menial jobs. The discrimination can be in the form of physical or social boycott from the society.

For instance:

• The members of so-called higher castes such as Brahmin, Kshatriyas etc would not dine or sit with a person of lower class.
• It was believed that people of higher castes could become impure even if a shadow of an untouchable person touches him and to re-gain his purity he had to take a dip into holy waters of the Ganga.

According to traditional Hindu ‘Varna System’, a person is born into one of the four castes based on karma and ‘purity’.

• Those born as Brahmans are priests and teachers;
• Kshatriyas are rulers and soldiers;
• Vaisyas are merchants and traders; and
• Sudras are laborers.

According to Dr. B. R. Ambedkar,

• Untouchables form an entirely new class i.e. the fifth varna apart from the existing four varnas. Untouchables are literally outcastes.
• They do not directly figure into any of the traditional ‘Varna System’ of Hindus. Thus, untouchables are not even recognized under the caste system of Hindus.
• However, historically persons born in lowest castes and classes of persons doing menial jobs, criminals, persons suffering from contagious diseases and tribals living outside the so-called civilized world were considered as untouchables. Their exclusion from the mainstream society was based on the belief that they are impure and harmful and it was necessary to ostracized them for the overall benefit of the society.
• Untouchability was also practiced as a form of punishment to the law-breakers and criminals; they were socially boycotted for their misdeeds.

Who are the Dalits?

• Untouchables are also known as depressed classes, harijans etc; but today they are more frequently referred to as ‘Dalits’.
• In modern times, ‘Dalit’ refers to one’s caste rather than class; it applies to members of those so-called menial castes which are born with the stigma of “untouchability” because of the extreme impurity and pollution connected with their traditional occupations.They are considered impure and polluting and are therefore physically and socially excluded and isolated from the rest of society.
• Today members of Schedule Castes and Schedule Tribes (SC/ST) are considered as ‘Dalits’ and they are subjected to various forms of discrimination in the society. Especially, Schedule Castes such as Chamars, Passi, Bhangis and Doms etc are known as ‘Dalits’; these people are generally associated with menial jobs such as tanning, skinning of hides, works on leather goods, sweeping, scavenging etc.

Types of Discrimination against Untouchables or Dalits
According to National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), there are various forms of discriminations being practiced against Dalits in India, these are:

• Prohibited from eating with other caste members,
• Prohibited from marrying with other caste members,
• Separate glasses for Dalits in village tea stalls,
• Discriminatory seating arrangements and separate utensils in restaurants,
• Segregation in seating and food arrangements in village functions and festivals,
• Prohibited from entering into village temples,
• Prohibited from wearing sandals or holding umbrellas in front of dominant caste members,
• Prohibited from using common village pat,
• Separate burial grounds,
• No access to village’s common/public properties and resources (wells, ponds, temples, etc.),
• Segregation (separate seating area) of Dalit children in schools,
• Bonded Labor,
• Face social boycotts by dominant castes for refusing to perform their “duties”

Abolition of Untouchability under Indian Constitution
India got Independence on 15th of August, 1947 after long and painful struggle of more than one hundred years. The struggle was not only against the foreign rule of British but it was also against the social evils such as untouchability prevailing from centuries. After Independence when great leaders of freedom struggle agreed to make our own Constitution, it was decided that there must be provisions under the Constitution regarding the abolition of social evils and upliftment of down-trodden castes and social groups etc.

In view of this objective Article 17 was added to the Constitution; which reads as follows:
“Untouchability is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden. The enforcement of any disability arising out of “Untouchability” shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.”

Thus, Article 17 abolishes and forbids untouchability in any form. At the same time, it also makes it an offence punishable as per the law made by the Parliament.

In order to fulfill the mandate of Article 17 of the Constitution, the Parliament enacted the Untouchability (Offences) Act, 1955.

It made several discriminatory practices punishable as offences, although the punishment provided were rather mild and in their actual application even milder. Several lacunae and loopholes were found in the working of the Untouchability (Offences) Act, 1955 which compelled the Government to bring about a drastic amendment in the Act in 1976. The Act was revamped as the Protection of Civil Rights Act. However, the menace of untouchability continued and ‘dalits’ were still being treated in a discriminatory way, their socio-economic conditions remained vulnerable, they are denied a number of civil rights and were subjected to various offences, indignities and humiliations.

Therefore, to counter theses atrocities meted out to so-called ‘Dalits’ section of society, the Parliament passed ‘Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Attrocities) Act, 1989. The Act provided more comprehensive and punitive measures to deal with and to prevent discrimination and atrocities against ‘dalits’. The ultimate objective of the Act was to help the social inclusion of Untouchables/ Dalits into the mainstream Indian society.

These above mentioned Acts were made with good intention and with positive objective of removing discriminatory practices against untouchables/ dalits but in actual practice, these Acts have failed to live up to their expectations.

RURAL SOCIAL REFORMS

Change comes from two sources:

1. Random or unique factors such as climate, weather, or the presence of specific groups of people.

2. Systematic factors: For example, successful development has the same general requirements, such as a stable and flexible government, enough free and available resources, and a diverse social organization of society.

On the whole, social change is usually a combination of systematic factors along with some random or unique factors.

A reform movement is a kind of social movement that aims to make gradual change, or change in certain aspects of society rather than rapid or fundamental changes. A reform movement is distinguished from more radical social movements such as revolutionary movements.

• These social reform movements arose among all communities of the Indian people.
• They attacked bigotry, superstition and the hold of the priestly class.
• They worked for abolition of castes and untouchability, purdah system, sati, child marriage, social inequalities and illiteracy.
• Social reform became integral part of religious reform in India and this was equally true of Brahma Samaj, Prarthana Samaj, Arya Samaj, Ramakrishna Mission, and Theosophical Society in Hinduism as also among the Muslims, the Parsis and the Sikhs.
• The social reform movement in India has aimed at uprooting social evils and inculcating in men and women the spirit of sacrifice for the general good of the society.
• Some of these reformers were supported directly or indirectly by the British officials and some of the reformers also supported reformative steps and regulations framed by the British Government.

India has a rich history of social reformers who have helped to establish the foundations of modern India, and, in some cases, have affected a worldwide impact through political action and philosophic teachings. Especially, Indians were given a leaning towards oral and mythical rather than a written tradition throughout much of its history. It is almost impossible to put together an exhaustive list of social reformers who have lived through the ages.

Sati and Child Marriages:
The term sati literally means a ‘pure and virtuous woman’. It was applied in case of a devoted wife who contemplated perpetual and uninterrupted conjugal union with her husband life after life and as proof thereof burnt herself with the dead body of her husband. Enlightened Indian reformers led by Rammohan Roy launched a frontal attack on the evil of sati. Regulation XVII of December 1829 declared the practice of satis or burning or burying alive of widows illegal and punishable by criminal courts as culpable homicide. The Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1978 raised the age of presage for girls from 15 to 18 years and for boys 18 to 21.

Education of Women: Hindu society in the 19th century suffered from religious illusions that Hindu scriptures did not sanction female education of girls wrought wrath of gods leading to their widowhood. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar also did a lot in popularising the cause of education and was associated with no less than thirty-five girl’s schools in Bengal. In the broad perspective, women education became a part of the general campaign for betterment of the plight of women in society.

Abolition of Slavery: Slavery of the Greek or Roman or American Negro type did not exist in India. Slavery in India was more akin to what may be termed as bonded-servant, bonded-labour type and slaves in India were treated in a humane manner unknown to Western countries.

In this context the observation of the Committee of Circuit deserves to be quoted. It reads, “The ideas of slavery borrowed from our American colonies will make even modification of it appear in the eyes of our countrymen in England a horrible evil.

But it is far otherwise in this country here slaves are treated as children of the families to which they belong and often acquire a much happier state by their slavery than that could have hoped for by the enjoyment of liberty. If in northern India slaves generally served as domestic servants, in south India slaves were mostly employed in cultivation. Of course, European slave-owners in India treated their slaves in the same inhuman manner characteristic of Western slave-owners.

Impact of the Reforms Movement:The British wanted to appease the orthodox upper section of society. As a result only two important laws were passed. Some legal measures were introduced to raise the status of women.
For example

• Sati was declared illegal (1829). Infanticide was declared illegal.
• Widow remarriage was permitted by a law passed in 1856.
• Marriageable age of girls was raised to ten by a law passed in 1860. A law passed in 1872, sanctioned inter-caste and inter-communal marriages.
• The other law passed in 1891, aimed at discouraging child marriage.
• For preventing child marriage, the Sharda Act was passed in 1929. According to it a girl below 14 and a boy below 18 could not be married. In the 20th century and especially after 1919 the Indian national movement became the main propagator of social reform.
• Increasingly, the reformers took recourse to propaganda in the Indian language to reach the masses.

They also used novels, dramas, short stories, poetry, the Press and in the thirties (1930’s), the cinema too spread their views.
Numerous individuals, reform societies, and religious organizations worked hard

• to spread education among women,
• to prevent marriage of young children,
• to bring women out of the purdah,
• to enforce monogamy, and
• to enable middle class women to take up professions or public employment.

Due to all these efforts, Indian women played an active and important role in the struggle for independence of the country. As a result many superstitions disappeared and many others were on their way out. Now, it was no longer a sin to travel to foreign countries.

Baba Amte: He was a worker and social activist. He spent some time at the Sevagram ashram of Mahatma Gandhi, and became a follower of Gandhism for the rest of his life. He believed in Gandhi’s concept of a self-sufficient village industry that empowers seemingly helpless people, and successfully brought his ideas into practice at Anandwan. He practised various aspects of Gandhism, including yarn spinning using a charkha and wearing khadi. Amte founded three ashrams for treatment and rehabilitation for leprosy patients, disabled people, and people from marginalised sections of the society in Maharashtra, India.

B. R. Ambedkar: He was an Indian jurist, political leader, Buddhist activist, philosopher, thinker, anthropologist, historian, orator, prolific writer, economist, scholar, editor, revolutionary and the revivalist of Buddhism in India. He was also the chief architect of the Indian Constitution. He formed the “Independent Labour Party”. Ambedkar spent his whole life fighting against social discrimination, the system of Chaturvarna – the Hindu categorisation of human society into four varnas – and the Hindu caste system. He is also credited with having sparked the bloodless revolution with his Buddhist movement. Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar has been honoured with the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian award.

Dhondo Keshav Karve: He was a social reformer of his time in India in the field of women’s welfare. Karve was one of the pioneers of promoting women’s education and the right for widows to remarry in India. The Government of India recognised his reform work by awarding him its highest civilian award, Bhārat Ratna, in 1958 (Incidentally his centennial year). The label Maharshi, which the Indian public often assigned to Karve, means “a great sage”. Those who knew Karve affectionately called him as Annā Karve.

Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar:  He was a philosopher, academic, educator, printer, publisher, entrepreneur, reformer, and philanthropist. He was a Bengali polymath and a key figure of the Bengal Renaissance. Vidyasagar championed the uplift of the status of women in India, particularly in his native Bengal. Vidyasagar started a movement in support of widow remarriage which resulted in legislation of widow remarriage. He also led a crusade against child marriage and polygamy. He did much for the cause of Women’s education.

Jamnalal Bajaj: He was an industrialist, a philanthropist, and Indian independence fighter. Gandhi is known to have adopted him as his son. He is known for his efforts of promoting Khadi and village Industries in India. With the intent of eradicating untouchability, he fought the non-admission of Harijans into Hindu temples. He began a campaign by eating a meal with Harijans and opening public wells to them. He opened several wells in his fields and gardens. Jamanalal dedicated much of his wealth to the poor. He felt this inherited wealth was a sacred trust to be used for the benefit of the people. In honour of his social initiatives a well known national and international award called Jamnalal Bajaj Award which has been instituted by the Jamnalal Bajaj Foundation.

Kandukuri Veeresalingam: He was a social reformer who first brought about a renaissance in Telugu people and Telugu literature. He was influenced by the ideals of Brahmo Samaj particularly those of Keshub Chunder Sen. He got involved in the cause of social reforms. He encouraged education for women, and started a school in Dowlaishwaram in 1874. He started a social organisation called Hitakarini (Benefactor).

Periyar E. V. Ramasamy: He was a businessman, politician, Indian independence and social activist, who started the Self-Respect Movement or the Dravidian Movement and proposed the creation of an independent state called Dravidasthan comprising South India. He is also the founder of the socio-cultural organisation “Dravidar Kazhagam”.

Rao Bahadur Hari Raoji Chiplunkar: A Honorary Magistrate, and President of the Landlord’s Association in Pune, was a prominent reformer, activist and close friend of Jyotirao Phule. He donated land and funds, enabling Savitri and Jyotirao Phule to start one of the first girls schools in India in 1851 on Chiplunkar’s estate.

Jyotiba Phule: He belonged to the Mali (gardener) community and organized a powerful movement against upper caste domination and brahminical supremacy. Phule founded the Satyashodhak Samaj (Truth Seekers’ Society) in 1873, with the leadership of the samaj coming from the backward classes, Malis, Telis, Kunbis, Saris, and Dhangars. The main aims of the movement were social service, spread of education among women and lower caste people. Phule aimed at the complete abolition of caste system and socio-economic inequalities.

Pandita Ramabai: A renowned social reformer of Maharashtra fought for the rights of women and spoke against the practice of child marriage. She promoted girls education and started the Arya Mahila Samaj in1881, in Pune, to improve the condition of women, especially child widows. She also started Sharda Sadan which provided housing, education, vocational training, and medical services to widows, orphans and the visually challenged. She also wrote many books showing the hard life of women, including child brides and child widows.

Raja Ram Mohan Roy: He was the founder of the Brahmo Sabha movement in 1828, which engendered the Brahmo Samaj, an influential socio-religious reform movement. His influence was apparent in the fields of politics, public administration and education as well as religion. Rammohan Roy launched a frontal attack on the evil of sati. The practice of satis or burning or burying alive of widows was made illegal and punishable by criminal courts as culpable homicide.

Shriram Sharma Acharya: He was an Indian seer, Great Sage, Writer, Indian social worker, a philanthropist, a visionary of the New Golden Era and the Founder of the All World Gayatri Pariwar. He devoted his life to the welfare of people and the refinement of the moral and cultural environment.

Vijaypal Baghel: He is an environmental activist. He is known for his efforts in protecting environment at grass root level through traditional methods. He is a prominent campaigner on behalf of mission as Jhola Movement for fighting against polythene across India. He devoted his life to conserve nature, save water, save trees, reduce pollution and stop global warming with the theme of “Think globally-Act locally”. He is a noted Indian environmental philosopher, promoter of vegetarianism & renowned nature conservationist, people called him Green-Man. His contribution in the social sector for promotion in the field of ecology, nature and environment have contributed a lot.

Vinoba Bhave:  He was an Indian advocate of non-violence and human rights. He is well known for the “bhoodaanyagn” movement which means “collecting of land from landlords and serving it to the poor and landless”. Many people gave him land in which he severed for the poor. Pochampalli is a place which was given by Acharya Vinoba Bhave.

Virchand Gandhi: He advocated female education. He is a 19th-century Indian patriot who was a friend of Mahatma Gandhi and contemporary to Swami Vivekanand. He and Swami Vivekananda drew equal attention at the first World Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893. He won a silver medal in same.

Vitthal Ramji Shinde: He was a prominent campaigner on behalf of the Dalit movement in Maharashtra and established the Depressed Classes Mission to provide education to the Dalits in Maharashtra.

Lokmanya Tilak also denounced untouchability and asked for active steps to be taken to abolish it. However, no concrete steps were taken in this direction. Gandhiji’s leadership introduced a major change in the position towards untouchability. In 1923, the Congress decided to take active steps for the removal of untouchability. The basic strategy was to educate and mobilise opinion among caste Hindus over the issue.

Social Reform and Movement are linked with different ideas including

• Presence of Colonial government,
• Economic and Social backwardness of society,
• Influence of modern western ideas,
• Rise of intellectual awakening in the middle class and
• Poor position of women in society.

British rule in India acted as a catalyst to deep seated social changes. Western culture also influenced the Indian Life and thought in several ways. The most important result of the impact of western culture was the replacement of blind faith in current traditions, beliefs, and conventions by a spirit of rationalism.

Important characteristics of Social Reform Movement
The reforms include leadership by wide emerging Intellectual middle class. Reform movement started in different parts of India in different period but having considerable similarities. They were link with one region or one caste. It was clear to them that without religious reformation, there cannot be any social reformation.

Two Intellectual criteria of social reform movement included

• Rationality
• Religious Universalism

Contributions of the Social Reform Movement

• In spite of the opposition from the orthodox sections of the society, these movements contributed towards liberating people from the exploitation of priests. The religious texts were translated into vernacular languages; there was more emphasis on interpretation of scriptures and simplification of rituals, thus making worship a more personal experience.
• The movement gave the upcoming middle class cultural roots and reduced the sense of humiliation that the British powers had created.
• Modern, rational, secular, and scientific outlook was promoted realizing the need of the modern era. The reformers aimed at modernisation rather than outright westernization. A favourable social climate was created to end India’s cultural and intellectual isolation from the world.
• It was greatly due to the constant endeavours of the reformers that abolition of Sati and legalisation of widow-marriage were achieved during the nineteenth century. There was much intellectual fervour, prolonged agitation and acute discussion during the controversy over the age of Consent Bill, Such debates, even if they failed to bring about any concrete change immediately, raised the level of consciousness.
• The ideas and activities of the intellectuals were directly or indirectly related to the task of nation – building and national reconstruction. The social reform movement, as a matter of fact, was not an isolated phenomenon; it was loaded with wider national political and economic considerations.

RURAL REFORMS (PRESENT)

Millenium development Goals:

What they are
At the Millennium Summit in September 2000 the largest gathering of world leaders in history adopted the UN Millennium Declaration, committing their nations to a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty and setting out a series of time-bound targets, with a deadline of 2015, that have become known as The Millennium Development Goals.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are the world’s time-bound and quantified targets for addressing extreme poverty in its many dimensions-income poverty, hunger, disease, lack of adequate shelter, and exclusion-while promoting gender equality, education, and environmental sustainability. They are also basic human rights-the rights of each person on the planet to health, education, shelter, and security.

Now these countries want to build on the many successes of the past 15 years, and go further. The new set of goals, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), aims to end poverty and hunger by 2030. World leaders, recognizing the connection between people and planet, have set goals for the land, the oceans and the waterways.

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS (SDGS)

In a way, the social reform movement was a prelude to nationalism. In this view of nation building The ministries of the Government of India have come up with various schemes from time to time. These schemes could be either central, state specific or joint collaboration between the Centre and the states.

The List is as well as follows: