Basic facilities and living conditions in rural households of Punjab

Abstract

Inequalities can be both economic and social. Inequalities related to income, consumption expenditure, assets ownership, employment and wealth are referred as economic. Inequalities related to education, health, gender, unfairness in access to welfare services, racial discrimination, cultural and religious unfairness form the social inequalities. These can be co-related, as economic inequalities, most of the time, lead to social inequalities. The main objective of the study is to analyse the basic facilities and living conditions across the different categories of rural households in Punjab. The analysis is based upon the primary data, collected through a detailed schedule, of 591 sampled households involved from the 23 villages belonging to four situated in three different regions of the Punjab state. The analysis shows that a majority of the houses are semi-pucca houses. Kutcha houses belong to agricultural labour households, non-agricultural labour households and ‘Other’ households. Good condition houses mostly belong to farming community. Single room houses belong to agricultural labour, non-agricultural labour, artisan and ‘Other’ households. Majority of the houses have a separate kitchen. Out of the households, which do not have a separate kitchen, most of these belong to labour households. Most of the sampled households are connected through metalled road or bricked roads. More than four-fifth of the sampled households have pacca nali for their house’s waste water drainage. In case of total sampled households, more than four-fifth of the households have the facility of toilets and slightly more than one-tenth of households do not have facility of toilets. Most of the dilapidated conditioned toilets are in houses owned by agricultural labour households, non-agricultural labour households, artisan households and ‘Other’ households. More than one-third from the total sampled households have bathroom of dilapidated condition. Most of the households’ source of drinking water is public water works. Only one-sixteenth households have R.O. facility and the maximum numbers of households are from large farm households. Mostly, the sampled households use LPG, dung cakes and wood as fuel. Around four-fifth of total sampled households have gas connections and one-fifth of the households do not have gas connection in their houses.