Rescuing exclusion from the poverty debate

This paper discusses the conceptualisation of group deprivation - particularly of Dalits and Adivasis - in recent poverty analyses in India. While the poverty debate highlights the severe inequalities that groups based on social identity are exposed to, it pays insufficient attention to the nature of exclusion these groups suffer from, and the causes of historically rooted deprivation. This paper explores the ways in which ‘SC/ST’ (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) categories are applied in analysis and policy, the role of these categorisation in India’s targeted poverty programmes and recent BPL (Below Poverty Line) Census, how these understate different manifestations of discrimination, and the risks that targeted programmes enhance stigma of groups.