Poverty tribals and: a rehabilitation approach

For more than four decades both government and non-government organisations are in search of a model, an approach and a design for rural development and poverty removal. From community develop ment in early fifties to target group approach and direct poverty alleviation programmes in seventies and eighties a variety of approaches, models and institutional arrangements have been tried by such organisations. What has been achieved is mostly temporary relief at best and the poor have been found to be sliding back to their poverty status soon.

The study examines the poverty alleviation programme in Vansda taluka of a South Gujarat district undertaken by Bharat Agro-Industries Foundation, a Pune based voluntary organisation.
This programme hopes to help the poor to overcome their poverty and the accompanying ills permanently. The author calls this a rehabilitation approach since it attempts to settle the poor tribals of Southern Gujarat, whose life has been disrupted due to the so-called development forces, in their original environment with a view to removing their poverty permanently.
It is hoped that on the basis of this experience a model would emerge which would be suitable for adoption at national level.
The study would, therefore, be of immense interest to Government authorities, NGOs, academics and training institutions involved in poverty alleviation efforts. It would also be of considerable interest to foreign and international funding agencies who are involved in working. out right strategies and fruitful formulation and implementation of poverty alleviation programmes in India.