Indebtedness at Household Level and Investigating the Household Financial Health- A Mixed Study on Azad Nagar and Audali Village of Udam Singh Nagar District, Uttarakhand, 2016-2017

Abstract

Background: With the village economy transition, people are shifting from tenancy relation to money borrowing from local money lender to different institutional sources. In other hand, the inform job condition, low income make villagers vulnerable toward financial crisis. The study tries to see in such scenario what is the indebtedness condition by different background character for two village- Azad Nagar and Audali located in Uttarakhand in India.
Method: The present study is based on primary survey conducted for the financial year of 2015-2016. The study includes 116 HH. Debt Service Ratio (DSR) is calculated to analyse the financial crisis condition by the HH income. Multiple regression model is used to see the possible factor effecting poor DSR value. Individual perspectives are used to understand deep about the indebtedness in the HH.
Result: Azad Nagar and Audali, in both the villages schedule group are highly vulnerable toward the indebtedness condition. Co-operative society and commercial bank provide the loan. Most of the HH are associated with inform job which are insecure and low wage based. The regression model shows that high non-food expedition and low land holding are explaining poor Debt Service Ratio. It means because of these two factors HH are more vulnerable toward financial crisis.
Conclusion: In Azad Nagar village the Scheduled caste and in Audali village Scheduled Tribes are vulnerable toward the financial crisis as these sections of people are not having any formal job security. With expenditure related to high non-food consumption and low land holding has significant effect on the high indebtedness for both the villages and it also lead to high vulnerability to eard financial crisis.