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A total of 1960 families which migrate during the
sugarcane-cutting season were surveyed. They belong to the same 165
villages that were surveyed for the Village Survey. A complete age and gender breakup of all the
members of surveyed families is shown in Table
H 1. Gender ratio We find that sex ratios in the survey sample are
the lowest compared to Maharashtra and even Ahmednagar, whether in the
younger age group or the overall ratio. The sex ratio of 843 females to 1000 males is even more
biased against women than the ratio in the entire village sample
(906:1000). These ratios are evidence of greater overall backwardness of
this sample than that seen in the villages surveyed as a whole, which
are themselves, as we have already noted, from a relatively backward
part of Maharashtra.
Table
H 2 : Comparative gender ratio
Caste
/ community profile The two major groups in the migrating community are the
Vanjaris and the Marathas which form 37.9% and 26.8% of the sample respectively.
(Table H 3) The Banjaras form 9.9% of this sample. There
are about 20 to 90 families of Bhills, Dhangars, Mahars, Bouddhas, Matangs,
Muslims, Gujars, each forming 1% to less than 5% of the sample.
Another 20 castes/communities form the rest of the 4.5% of the sample.
Table
H 3 : Caste / Community profile
Educational
profile Another parameter of development is again
indicative of the backwardness of this community. Educational
levels are abysmal (Table H4). 92
% of the women have not been to school at all. Only 1.5% i.e.
41/2713 women have completed Std X. and there are only three graduates
among them. Similar figures for men though better than those
for the women are still quite disheartening. 66%
of the men have not been to school. 358 of 2882 or 7.5% of the men
have completed Std X and there are 82, 2.84%
graduate men. Table H 4 : Education
profile
The age wise break up of the men and women who have
completed Std XII and those who have graduated is along expected lines (Table
H5). Half the women who have completed Std. XII are not more than 20
years of age, while 76% of them are less than 30 years indicating that
the numbers of women getting a high school education is increasing. The
table also shows that there are more older men who have completed higher
secondary school than there are women. However, completing education
upto higher secondary stage is still an exception rather than the rule,
even for men. Table
H 5 :
Age
profile of adults, who have completed Higher Secondary / First Degree
Economic
profile Ration
cards 1716, 87.6% of the 1960 families
surveyed possess ration
cards; 244 families do not have ration cards at all. Of those who have, 1430, 73% families have the yellow ration cards i.e. they
belong to the ‘below poverty
line’ category. Table H 6 : Possession
of ration card
Ownership
of assets Among the assets owned by the 1960 families
(Table H7) are a yard, a bathroom, a bed, cycle, T.V.,
cupboard, cooking gas, table, chair, shegadi
and gobar gas. The most commonly owned is an angan mentioned by 1433,
73% families. Seven to nine hundred, 35-45% families have a
bathroom, bed or cycle. A TV set is owned by about 300, 16% families and
a cupboard by about 200, 10% families The other assets mentioned earlier
are owned by less than 2.5 % families each. Table H 7 : Distribution
of assets in families
If we consider the ownership of assets by caste groups
(Table H8) we find that the scheduled castes are the worst off,
66% of them owning 2 or less of the assets mentioned above. In the low
asset category the N.T.’s seem to be the best off considering that
only 4.5 %, as against more than 20% of
any of the other categories, fall in
the zero asset group. Also, only 47 % of them fall in the 2 or less
asset group whereas more than 54% of any of the other groups fall in
that category. However,
their number in the higher asset groups falls behind those of the open
and OBC categories. Their number is the largest in the 2
and 3 asset category. Table H 8 : Castewise
comparison of asset ownership
Occupational profile 1,006 or 51.4% of the families are
engaged in some kind of labour work as main occupation while for nearly
1,405 or 75% of the families labour is
the sub-occupation. Table H 9 : Main and sub-occupation
For 46.02 % of the families sugarcane cutting is
the main occupation. It means that for these families sub-occupations generate
even less income than sugarcane cutting. Table H 10 :
Sub-occupations of families having sugarcane cutting as main occupation
Ownership
of land and farming as main occupation 1577 families own land but only 913 families
mention farming as the main occupation. This is because although the maximum land ownership
goes up to 35 acres 1139 or 72% of the land
owning families have less than 5 acres of land each (Table H11).
Besides, only 233 or 14.8% of the land
owning families have any irrigated land and finally 101 or 6.4%
of the land owning families have just 1 or less acres of irrigated land.
Thus, 81% of the families
have no source of water for farming their land except rains. No
words are needed to describe the helpless condition of marginal farmers
in a drought prone area trying to eke out a living from rain dependent
agriculture. Table H 11 : Land
holding and water source
Table H 10 : From Table H12 we can compare land holdings of families which give
farming as their main occupation with those of families which give
sugarcane cutting as their main occupation and farming as their
sub-occupation.
We find that although there are more of the latter who are landless,
there is not much difference between the two categories in the numbers
of the landless families or in the land holdings of those who own some
land. Eighty-one percent of the former and 84% of the latter have only
up to 5 acres of land; and the difference in the numbers of families
having bigger land holdings is a mere 2.5 %. Thus we
see that whether farming
is the main occupation and sugarcane cutting the sub-occupation or vice
versa is more a matter of perception than fact. Table H 12 : Land
holdings of families giving farming and sugarcane cutting as main
occupations
Table H13 shows
the comparative land holdings of
the various caste categories. Table H 13 :
Castewise breakup of land holdings
Family’s
source of income As can be
expected from the data about occupations labour work is given as a
source of income (mostly
sugarcane cutting - 37.65%) by 1,255 or 64% of the
families. Farming is a source of income for
31% of the families. Table H 15 : Source of
income
As far as crop preferences
are concerned bajra (a course grain
requiring relatively less watering) is unsurprisingly the predominantly
preferred kharip crop chosen by 1482 or 93.4%
of the land owning families. Jowar is grown by 4% of these
families and kapashi (cotton) by 0.82% of them. Udid, moong, matki are
some pulses grown as a kharip crop.
We
also see that 599 or nearly 38 % of land owning families do not grow a
second crop. Jowar is the first
preference for the rabbi crop for 58 % of the families and wheat for
about 3% of them. Chana is the crop mentioned as the first or second
preference by about 64 families. (Table
H 16, Table H 17)
Ownership
of cattle and other animals Cows, buffaloes, bullocks,
goats and sheep are the animals owned by some of the families in the
sample. However, the numbers of these
families and the numbers of animals owned are small. Only 37.4% or 734 of the families own cows. 553, 75% of these families
own one cow while 146, 20% of them own two. The maximum number owned by
any one family is 7 cows.
Owning of buffaloes follows the same pattern. Only 19% or 365 of the
families own a buffalo. Again 273, 75% of these families own one buffalo
and 67, 18.3% own two. The maximum number of buffaloes owned by one
family is 12. (Table H 18) Even though there are many
families that own cows and buffaloes, not a single family mentions it as
main occupation, only 13 mention it as a sub-occupation
while only 73 families mention
dairy as a source of income. This is not surprising as the number of
cows or buffaloes owned is mostly just one or two. The number of cattle owned by
those who mention dairy as a source of income
is given in the following table. Table H 19 : Animals
owned by families having
dairy as a source of income
There are not
many families who own goats or sheep. 74% or 1452 of the families do not
own goats. The average number of goats owned by 508 families is more
than 2 per family, the maximum owned by one family being 25. Only 10 families own sheep
but those who do, have a larger number than the goats, the average being
17. There is one family which owns as many as 55 sheep. Care of these animals must be
a big problem if the families must migrate (as has indeed been expressed
later) and, perhaps, that explains why not many migrating families own
animals other than bullocks. The number of families owning
bullocks is very much larger at 1164 or 59.4% of the families.
Also, 1093 or 55.8 % of the families (which is 93.9% of the
families who own bullocks) own a pair of bullocks.
Only 44 families own just 1 bullock and 27 families own more than two
bullocks. Migration Responding to the question
about their reasons for migration some families have mentioned up to
four reasons. Altogether, a total of 5663 responses were obtained to
this question from 1865 families. However, the first reason for
migration given by the large majority is that work
for wages is not to be found in their own village. In different
words, the same reason is given as the first
response by 1557 or 79.4% of the
respondents to this question. (Table H
20) The most
frequently mentioned second reason given by 1129 families is the lack of rainfall forming 57.6% of the second responses. This in
effect is no
different from the first reason as it implies that there is no work
either for farm labourers or for land owners. Reasons 3 and 4 (large
family, indebtedness) again mean that the families must earn
money to look after their large families or pay off their debt or that
because of their indebtedness to the labour contractor they cannot
refuse to work for him even if it means migrating from the village. A small number of families,
210, 10.7%, mention a search
for fodder as their reason for migration but this consideration
weighs in mostly as the third or fourth choice of reasons.
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