Poverty, Lean Period of Food Availability and Scarcity: A Case of Dalits of Eastern Uttar Pradesh, India

Dalits in India have a history of suffering, deprivation and destitution which prevails even in the modern, democratic and globalized world despite several efforts by the government through its policies and programmes.  The issue of Dalits and their caste based exclusion is widely debated. Mostly it is viewed from structural vis a vis functional and dialectical perspectives. Here it is amenable that, the structural reality around which other substantive form of deprivation; educational backwardness; economic disadvantage and political negligence are forth with. For them basic facilities such as housing, drinking water, food availability, education, and health services are inaccessible; reflecting the intensity of their deprivation and magnitude of poverty. Food is the prime concern for human being for active and healthy life. A human or any living being can live without luxury, but cannot survive without food. Hunger is man’s first and most tenacious enemy, can dived communities into fed, and unfed rich and poor. A society or nation, just cannot flourish without food security.  

With this backdrop the argument in this paper is of three fold: (i) The level of food availability, lean period and the question of food security of Dalits, (ii) the provisions of government for providing food security and other safeguards to fulfill the minimum level of subsistence (iii) the operational successiveness of these programmes.