Inequalities in accessing LPG and electricity consumption in India : the role of caste, tribe, and religion

Using the National Sample Survey Organisation data from the 68th round (2011–12) of 88,939 households, this paper investigates the inequalities in access to Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) and electricity usage by the households belonging to the three major disadvantaged groups in India, viz., the scheduled castes, the scheduled tribes, and the Muslims. The results of our analysis suggest that, after controlling for the other socio-economic factors which impinge on the households’ demand and supply characteristics, the households belonging to these disadvantaged groups do have poorer access to LPG and electricity usage as compared to the upper caste households. It is the scheduled caste and scheduled tribe households who would appear to face most discrimination in the equality spaces of the electricity usage and LPG distribution. Policy implications of the findings are considered.Publisher PD

Socio-economic determinants of child and juvenile sex ratios in India : A longitudinal analysis

The paper examines the determinants of the child and juvenile sex ratios in India in a multivariate framework, using district level data from the 1981, 1991, and 2001 Indian population censuses. The results strongly suggest that there are deep rooted cultural factors at play in the determination of the sex ratios at birth and at early ages, cultural factors that are not much responsive to the enhancement of women's agency or to economic development. However, the results also show that the behaviour of the juvenile sex ratio does respond to the enhancement of women's agency and to economic development. Policy implications of these findings are considered.Preprin

Socio-economic determinants of child and juvenile sex ratios in India : A longitudinal analysis

The paper examines the determinants of the child and juvenile sex ratios in India in a multivariate framework, using district level data from the 1981, 1991, and 2001 Indian population censuses. The results strongly suggest that there are deep rooted cultural factors at play in the determination of the sex ratios at birth and at early ages, cultural factors that are not much responsive to the enhancement of women's agency or to economic development. However, the results also show that the behaviour of the juvenile sex ratio does respond to the enhancement of women's agency and to economic development. Policy implications of these findings are considered.Preprin

Social groups and credit shocks : evidence of inequalities in consumption smoothing

A strand of research holds the view that restricting access to credit to regulate over-borrowing can worsen consumers’ financial condition. Another strand of research holds the view that access to credit in the developing countries with subprime credit markets is determined by social groupings and ethnic affiliations. By merging these two strands of research, we investigate the impact of Andhra Pradesh microfinance act (2010) on the consumption expenditure of marginalised social groups and the upper caste Hindu groups in India. We construct an aggregated district level panel data for eight quarters and estimate the impact of unanticipated policy change. The results of our analysis show that the sudden restriction of access to credit has relatively larger impact on the consumption levels of the marginalised social groups: lower castes, tribes, and Muslims. The findings also confirm the failure of contingency policy enacted for smoothing consumption.PostprintPeer reviewe

Inequalities in LPG and electricity consumption in India : The role of caste, tribe, and religion

This paper examines the role of caste, tribe, and religion in determining energy inequality in India. We provide evidence by using the National Sample Survey Organisation data from the 68th round (2011–12) of 87,753 households. We estimate the inequalities in access to Liquid Petroleum Gas (LPG) and electricity usage by the households belonging to the three major disadvantaged groups in India, viz., the scheduled castes, the scheduled tribes, and the Muslims. The results of our empirical analysis suggest that, after controlling for the determinants which impinge on the households’ microeconomic demand and regional supply characteristics, the households belonging to the scheduled tribe and scheduled caste communities do have significantly poorer access to LPG and electricity usage as compared to the upper caste households. The decomposition analysis of average differences in the predicted outcomes shows that it is the scheduled caste and scheduled tribe households who would appear to face most discrimination. The Muslim households too face significant inequality in accessing LPG. Policy implications of the findings are considered.PostprintPeer reviewe

Social groups and credit shocks : evidence of inequalities in consumption smoothing

A strand of research holds the view that restricting access to credit to regulate over-borrowing can worsen consumers’ financial condition. Another strand of research holds the view that access to credit in the developing countries with subprime credit markets is determined by social groupings and ethnic affiliations. By merging these two strands of research, we investigate the impact of Andhra Pradesh microfinance act (2010) on the consumption expenditure of marginalised social groups and the upper caste Hindu groups in India. We construct an aggregated district level panel data for eight quarters and estimate the impact of unanticipated policy change. The results of our analysis show that the sudden restriction of access to credit has larger impact on the consumption levels of the marginalised social groups: lower castes, tribes, and Muslims. The findings also confirm the failure of contingency policy enacted for smoothing consumption.Publisher PD

Social groups and credit shocks : evidence of inequalities in consumption smoothing

A strand of research holds the view that restricting access to credit to regulate over-borrowing can worsen consumers’ financial condition. Another strand of research holds the view that access to credit in the developing countries with subprime credit markets is determined by social groupings and ethnic affiliations. By merging these two strands of research, we investigate the impact of Andhra Pradesh microfinance act (2010) on the consumption expenditure of marginalised social groups and the upper caste Hindu groups in India. We construct an aggregated district level panel data for eight quarters and estimate the impact of unanticipated policy change. The results of our analysis show that the sudden restriction of access to credit has larger impact on the consumption levels of the marginalised social groups: lower castes, tribes, and Muslims. The findings also confirm the failure of contingency policy enacted for smoothing consumption.Publisher PD

Essays on inequality and discrimination : caste, religion and gender in India

This thesis estimates the inequality on the basis of caste and religion, and analyses the socio-economic structural factors in determining sex ratios in India. In the first part of the thesis, the inequality spaces are determined by average household income and access to clean energy sources at the household level. The regression estimates suggest that the scheduled caste, scheduled tribes and Muslims are significantly worse off in comparison to the upper caste Hindu households (others) in the sample. However, the summary of the results in the first part is that the Muslim households appear to be either significantly better off or indifferent to the scheduled caste and scheduled tribe households. Post regression, Oxaca-Blinder methodology is also employed to measure the proportion of discrimination among the predicted outcomes in the first part of thesis. The results in the second part of the thesis, which distinguishes the discussion of child sex ratios (0-6 age group) from juvenile sex ratios (0-14 age group), show that the cultural factors play a major role in determining the child sex ratios, rather than women’s agency and economic development. However, the regression results of the juvenile sex ratios indicate the positive impact of economic development and women’s agency variables. The separate regression analysis of the tribal population in the second part suggests similarities between the regression results of the tribal population and the total population. However, the important deduction is that the scheduled tribes of India are emulating the culture of gender inequality with the increasing proximity of ‘Hindu population’. Failure of the previous policies and new suggestions are considered

Socio-economic determinants of child and juvenile sex ratios in India:A longitudinal analysis

The paper examines the determinants of the child and juvenile sex ratios in India in a multivariate framework, using district level data from the 1981, 1991, and 2001 Indian population censuses. The results strongly suggest that there are deep rooted cultural factors at play in the determination of the sex ratios at birth and at early ages, cultural factors that are not much responsive to the enhancement of women's agency or to economic development. However, the results also show that the behaviour of the juvenile sex ratio does respond to the enhancement of women's agency and to economic development. Policy implications of these findings are considered