Socio Economic Challenges in India

Definition of 'Social Economics' Problems

Socio Economics Problems focuses on the relationship between social behavior and economics. Social economics examines how social norms, ethics and other social philosophies that influence consumer behavior shape an economy, and uses history, politics and other social sciences to examine potential results from changes to society or the economy.

At present time India faced many types of Socio Economic Problems :

1.     Religious violence : Constitutionally India is a secular state, but large-scale violence have periodically occurred in India since independence. In recent decades, communal tensions and religion-based politics have become more prominent.

2.     Terrorism : Terrorism in India has often been alleged to be sponsored by Pakistan. After most acts of terrorism in India, many journalists and politicians accuse Pakistan's intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence of playing a role. Recently, both the US and Afghanistan have accused Pakistan of carrying out terrorist acts in Afghanistan.

3.     Naxalism : Naxalism have spread into less developed areas of rural central and eastern India, such as Chattisgarh and Andhra Pradeshthrough the activities of underground groups like the Communist Party of India (Maoist).

4.     Caste related violence : Caste-related violence and hate crimes in India have occurred despite the gradual reduction of casteism in the country. Independent India has witnessed considerable amount of violence and hate crimes motivated by caste. Ranvir Sena, a caste-supremacist fringe paramilitary group based in Bihar, has committed violent acts against Dalits and other members of the scheduled caste community.

5.     Overpopulation : India suffers from the problem of overpopulation. Though India ranks second in population, it ranks 33 in terms of population density below countries such as The Netherlands, South Korea and Japan. To cure this problem, Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India, had implemented a forced sterilization programme in the early 1970s but failed. Officially, men with two children or more had to submit to sterilization, but many unmarried young men, political opponents and ignorant, poor men were also believed to have been sterilized. This program is still remembered and criticized in India, and is blamed for creating a wrong public aversion to family planning, which hampered Government programmes for decades.

6.     Poverty : One-third of India's population (roughly equivalent to the entire population of the United States) lives below the poverty line and India is home to one-third of the world's poor people. Though the middle class has gained from recent positive economic developments, India suffers from substantial poverty. According to the new World Bank’s estimates on poverty based on 2005 data, India has 456 million people, 41.6% of its population, living below the new international poverty line of $1.25 (PPP) per day.

The World Bank further estimates that 33% of the global poor now reside in India. Moreover, India also has 828 million people, or 75.6% of the population living below $2 a day, compared to 72.2% for Sub-Saharan Africa.

Wealth distribution in India is fairly uneven, with the top 10% of income groups earning 33% of the income. Despite significant economic progress, 1/4 of the nation’s population earns less than the government-specified poverty threshold of $0.40/day. Official figures estimate that 27.5%[47] of Indians lived below the national poverty line in 2004–2005.[48] A 2007 report by the state-run National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS) found that 25% of Indians, or 236 million people, lived on less than 20 rupees per day[49] with most working in “informal labour sector with no job or social security, living in abject poverty.”

7.     Corruption : Corruption is widespread in India. India is ranked 72 out of a 179 countries in Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, although its score has improved consistently from 2.7 in 2002 to 3.5 in 2012. Corruption has taken the role of a pervasive aspect of Indian politics and bureaucracy.

8.     White Collar Crime : white collar crime as a “crime committed by persons of respectability and high social status in course of their occupation”. A white-collar criminal belongs to upper socio-economic class who violates the criminal law while conducting his professional qualities. Thus misrepresentation through fraudulent advertisements, infringement of patents, copyrights and trademarks etc.

9.     Unemployment :