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The sample The survey included 165 villages from 6 talukas of
4 districts of the Marathwada region of mid-western Maharashtra. Shirur,
Patoda, Ashti are the talukas belonging to Beed district, Chalisgaon
taluka belongs to Jalgaon district, Pathardi belongs to Ahmednagar and
Ambad to Jalna district. All these places belong to a chronically drought
prone region which is also a less industrialised part of the state. It is,
therefore, relatively an economically backward region. Location
of villages – Distance from taluka place The distance of the villages from their taluka
place is an important factor influencing the quality of life in the
village. In the present sample this distance ranges from 2.5 km to 70km
the average distance being 20 km. Half
the villages are less than 18 km from the taluka place. Only 4 are more
than 40 km away. (Table S 1) Population
A third of these villages
have a population of less than a thousand, the smallest having a
population of just 293. The population of about half of them is between
1000 and 3000. The rest, i.e. 28 villages have more than
3000 residents ranging to a maximum of 8324. (Table
S 2) The number
of families in a village ranges from 50 to 1630.
Half the villages have 200 to 500 families. 25 villages have more
than 500 families while 60 villages have less than 200. The total number
of families in the 165 villages is 55,130. (Table
S 3) The total female population
of the villages is 1,42,457 while the male population is 1,57,019. The
total population of the surveyed villages is 2,99,476. This gives an average
family size of 5.43 members per family. Gender ratio
The average male population of a village is 952,
while the average female population is 863. The overall average of the
gender ratio is thus 907 females to every 1000 males. This average is
poorer than the state as well as the national gender ratio which are 922
and 933 females respectively to 1000 males.
(census 2001). Table S 4 : Comparative gender ratio
Voter
registration
The average registration as voters is 66.2% of the women and 67.9% of men. This gives an average of 66.6 % of the total population registered as voters. Even in the villages which have the least proportion of registration as voters the percentage of registered voters is not less than about 30%. Five villages have 100% eligible voters registered. Literacy rates
The average female literacy rate for the 165
villages is 54.1% and the same for men is 67.6% this gives a combined
literacy rate of 60%
(Table S 6) Table S 7 : Comparative literacy rates
Religion profile
The Hindus are the predominant religious group,
there being only one village in the sample without a single Hindu
household. Here the population is entirely of Muslim households. Among the other religions represented, the Bouddhas
form the biggest group. Occupations
and wage rates
There are not a great variety of occupations
being practised in these villages. Only 4 villages mention 3 occupations
and 54 mention 2. The commonest is labour
work
mentioned in
134 villages. The next is EGS (Employment Guarantee Scheme run by the
Government) , again labour work though perhaps of longer duration and
better paid, in 47 villages. Farming and pashupalan in 11 villages and the
rest (which includes dairy, working at a brick kiln, dhobi, sutar, and
tyrework) mentioned in less than 5 villages each completes the list. Even
this work is not available throughout the year. The average
period for which these occupations are practised is 5 months. This
probably means that these occupations do not
yield much income. Hence, when the sugarcane cutting season comes
people go away from the villages giving up these occupations for the
season which is of 5-6 months duration. In
some villages labour work is available around the year but villages where
farm work is available around the year are a rarity. (Table S 8) Wages
range from Rs.20 to Rs.80 per day for men as well as for women although
the average is substantially different. The average rate for men for farm
work is Rs.53 per day while that for women is Rs.28. There are, however,
many villages where the rates for men and women are the same or quite
close. The
highest wage rate of Rs. 80 per day is given for
watershed development schemes but these rates are not the same
everywhere. The lowest rate is for labour work. (Table
S 9 ) Naturally, the area of land available for farming and the availability of water for irrigation are crucial factors determining the economic welfare of the rural population where farming one’s own land or working as farm labour is the most prevalent occupation. We see that of the total of the 1,67,223 acres of farmland available for agriculture at an average of 1052 acres to a village only 38,750acres or an average of just 244 acres of land per village is irrigated. Only 23% of the farmland has come under irrigation. In a drought prone area as the one surveyed lack of irrigation makes farming an unreliable means of earning a living. (Table S 10) Factories
near the villages As mentioned earlier, this is not an industrial
belt. In fact, of the 165 villages in the sample only 22 have factories of
any sort nearby. And even in these factories only 26 men from villages
near 12 factories have been employed. i.e. only 0.175% of the male
population of the 12 villages with factories have been employed there. For the record there are among these factories 5
government and 5 private sugar factories. There is one private tin factory
and one private factory manufacturing poles used
for street lighting. The average male population of the villages, which
have factories near them, is 952, which is practically the same as the
average of the entire sample. The average of the
male population in the villages from which some men have been employed is
1137. This is 9% higher than the overall average of the sample. Extent
of migration
We
find that from 130, 78.8% of the villages more than 50% of the people
leave the village for the sugarcane cutting
season. There are 9 villages from which more than 90% of the
families migrate. The average extent of migration from a village is 63%,
while altogether 28,972 out of the 55,130 families or 52.55% of the
families migrate. (Table S 11) Availability of mukadams The
mukadams are the labour contractors who employ the sugarcane cutters for
the factories. They also belong to the same villages. A mukadam can be
contacted easily for seeking employment. In
these 165 villages there are altogether 1031 mukadams. Thus, there are on
an average 6 mukadams per village. The
total number of families being 55130 there is also one mukadam for every
53 families. In fact, there are 7 villages with as many as 20 or more
mukadams. Even if these were the villages with the largest number of
families there would still be one mukadam for every 83 families. On the
other hand there are also 11 villages in which there is no mukadam. (Table
S 12) On correlating the number of mukadams per family in
a village with the extent of migration we find no relationship
(correlation co-efficient – 0). However,
we do find a fairly high correlation co efficient of – 0.55 between the
number of families in a village and the extent of migration from it.
This means that a greater proportion of families migrates from villages
with fewer families. This is easily understood. Smaller villages offer less opportunities for earning a
living and considering the regular availability of sugarcane cutting and
accessibility of mukadams it is inevitable that larger numbers will
migrate. Government
appointments in the villages
include the police patil, the talathi, the gram sevak, the
headmaster of the local government school, and the head of the government
schools in a group of villages appointed by the
Education Department (the kendra pramukh). There are at least 17 women police patils, but no
women talathis. There are 6 women headmasters; at least 1 woman village
social worker and one woman kendra pramukh. Gram panchayats 135 out of 165 of the villages
have gram panchayats. Of these, 102 are independent ones while 66 are
group gram panchayats. The average
number of members in a panchayat is 8.5. Fifty gram
panchayats are headed by women sarpanches. The average number of women members is 3. There are two gram panchayats
which do not have any women representatives. However, we see that on an average the norm of 33% women representatives
on elected bodies is being met in these villages. There are 29
gram panchayats which do not have any members of the reserved categories. The average number of reserved
category members is 2. On about
half the village panchayats (82 villages ) there are no representatives of
the migrating community. In the 83 panchayats which have such representation 33 have 2 and 50
have 1 member representing the migrant community. Of this total of 116
representatives 24 are Marathas and 60
Vanjaris Table S
13 : Presence of offices in the village
Facilities in the
villages 123, 74.5% of the
165 villages
do not have pucca roads in the village. 109, 66% villages have a telephone
connection
of which 71, 43% also have the STD facility. There is taps for water supply in 128, 77.5% villages, 135, 82% villages have wells as well as bore
wells with hand pumps to draw the water. Of the 165 villages 118, 71.5%
have a State Transport Corporation (S.T.)
bus connection
to the nearest town or city of which 103 villages are connected by two
different routes while 14 have three different bus connections. Routes of
transport operated by private parties are available in 119, 72% villages, 20 of these 119 having
2 and 14 having 3 routes of private transport. Of the 165 villages,
93 have both the State run bus service as well as the private transport
service. However, 21 have neither. Only 56 villages have primary health centres located in them. However, 152 of the villages are served by
phc’s which are at a distance of 5 or less km from the village, the
average distance of the phc from any of these villages being just 250m.
However, for the 13 remaining villages the phc is at an average distance
of 12km while the maximum distance goes up to 20km for one of the
villages. If we were to calculate the
population served by each it would appear from the figures collected in
this survey that there is one phc for about 5000 people. However,
Government norms provide for one phc for every 20 to 30 thousand people.
This data is not from contiguous villages and so such a ratio is not
meaningful in this case. There are private
clinics
in 44 villages of which 13 have only one clinic. The maximum number of
clinics in a village is 12. The total number of private clinics is 108, thus giving an average of 2 to 3 clinics in a village,
which have them. A touring doctor is available to
71 villages. Out of 165 villages 23 have both
the Government-run phc as well as a private clinic. Street lighting is available to 160, 97% villages in all wasti’s except
in 8 villages, which have partial street lighting. Domestic
lighting
is available in 162, 98% villages. It is (admitted
to be) unauthorised in 12
villages. Ration shops i.e. Government fair price shops are
present in 152, 92% villages mostly within a distance of 1 km. 41 villages
have 2 ration shops and 2 have 3 of them. These fair price shops are owned
by families of different castes. 82 of these families are Marathas, 72
Vanjaris and 8 Banjaras. Families from 13 other castes/communities also
own ration shops to make a total of 195 ration
shops in the 165 villages. These other communities are Teli, Kahar,
Muslim, Dhangar, Wani, Mali, Gujar, Mahar, Nhavi, Sonar, Bouddha,
Gurav, Dhadi, and Marwadi. Months of water scarcity The villages face drinking water scarcity for an average of 4 months in a year. These are by and large the
months preceding the monsoons. 33 villages report scarcity for 6 or more
months in a year while there are 10 villages which report scarcity of
water all around the year. There are 33 villages in which
at least one privately owned well has been taken over by the government to
supply water to the entire village because of the scarcity of supply of
drinking water. 10 villages have 2 while 4 villages have 3 such wells
taken over by the Government. Table S
14 : Percentage of villages
not having civic facilities
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