Mapping Welfare and Development Schemes to SDGs at the Village Level in India

The paper examines relationship between the various development and welfare schemes and the SDGs at the village level in India. The objective of the paper is to enlist of the schemes functional at the village level that directly benefit the village households and measure the extent of benefits from different schemes by households categorized on the basis of income, social groups, occupation and land ownerships. The coverage of beneficiaries and financial assistance received by the villagers helps us to see a composite picture of the SDG implementation in the village linking it with policy impact. It further analyses whether the beneficiaries have utilized the resources distributed under the welfare schemes for its targeted purpose. The research was conducted in Emped village of India by collecting information from all 287 households in year 2017. Although more than 50 schemes were implemented in the state, the study covered only 29 schemes which had at least one beneficiary household in the village. Majority of the households benefited from schemes like the Public Distribution System, direct benefit transfer to farmers, employment guarantee and mid-day-meal scheme. But a very few were benefited from the large ticket schemes like housing scheme. Schemes addressed to women like the assistance to pregnant women were effective. Most of the assistance received from agricultural development schemes are spent on intended purpose, whereas others were spent on consumption purpose. Though these schemes were helpful in addressing the needs of the poor and the needy, there was delay in fund reimbursement, leakages, and exclusion errors. The relationship between monetary benefits received and income of households is best represented by a ‘inverted U shape’ curve indicating that most of the benefits from welfare programmes were received by the high and middle-income category excluding the poorest section.