Development Practitioner Perspective on Challenges of Implementing DBT Schemes In Rural and Trible Areas
The government of India started Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) to maintain transparency in the benefits provided to the underprivileged population; this system helps the beneficiaries to receive all the benefits directly. Last-mile delivery is the final stage of any delivery process of goods or services. Simply put the process of delivering goods and services to the end person or user. To make this process more efficient and transparent, the government of India introduced DBT, expansion of DBT is Direct Beneficiary Transfer.
Till 2003 and now, for the many schemes, the government releases the funds. The department transferred that funds to the state department, that department will have the beneficiaries’ details, and they will process the payment. This whole process will take time, value, and cost. It will increase the workload of the department also. The scholarships given to the students are the best example of this. Earlier, the scholarship amount from the GOI to the social justice and welfare department goes to the state government and social welfare/tribal welfare departments.
From there, the amount goes to the schools, colleges, and beneficiaries. To avoid all the intermediate processes and the workload in all the departments, the Andhra Pradesh government started Jaganana Vidya Deevena, which is directly going to the beneficiary account. This is one classic example of the DBT. Simply put, DBT is the delivery of welfare schemes, benefits, and subsidies to end-level users or beneficiaries. Andhra Pradesh government implemented 23 DBT schemes in various sectors like health, education, etc. Even though this process is a transparent and valuable addition to the work or services given by the government, there are a few challenges, especially in the rural and tribal areas.
Some of the problems faced by the tribal communities while accessing the state or national schemes:
Lack of awareness is the prime problem for this; most tribals need to be made aware of the DBT schemes and how to avail of those. Still, only 48.83% of the scheduled tribe population is educated. Even though the government gives many schemes like scholarships, this is the primary outcome of the need for more awareness. Conducting awareness campaigns is the best way to resolve this, but this could be in regular intervals.
Lack of infrastructure comes after the lack of information. Infrastructure becomes a significant challenge if they have information about the schemes or services the government provides.
Banking facilities: Banks percentage in the rural areas is 33.1%, and it’s significantly less in the tribal areas. Even though the banks are set up, very few people have accounts in the banks. This has some geographical reasons for this. From ancient times onwards, Tribal people have been practising nomadic culture, continually moving from one place to another. Practising slash-and-burn farming. There are so many predominant characteristics of the tribal population. As time evolved, tribes settled in one location, but those locations were very remote and close to the middle of mountain ranges or forests. These locations are challenging to have the infrastructure or communication infrastructure. It’s challenging but not impossible to construct. One time capital investment is made in these regions, then we can expect proper infrastructure. While making the capital investment or modernization, we have to think about our own culture, it should not disturb our own culture, and it has to be a valuable addition.
In the same sense, the government should primarily focus on housing, Drinking water, sanitation, education, and electricity. Then, after successfully implementing prime needs, the government should focus on improving the number of rural/ tribal banks, Bank accounts, ATMs, etc.
Digital advancement: Digital advancement is a critical factor in the modern era; using mobile phones, net banking, mobile applications, etc., for digital advancement also needs basic infrastructure like network towers to provide network connectivity.
CSCs: Implementing common service centres will help the community to understand, educate, and have exposure to the complete services of the government and other sectors’ benefits to underprivileged people. CSCs will help to educate and access the benefits reserved for the same section of people. Investing in these three factors in the tribal/rural areas will improve the basic amenities and access to all other benefits.
Language is the most significant barrier for any individual or community to develop. This is one of the prime reasons for the dropouts of the students in the tribal areas; the language they speak in their region varies to the school language (medium of language). When they came to school, teachers used to teach the medium, the state language, which was alien to them. As a result, they will lose interest in education and go out of school. In the same way, most of the DBT scheme information will be in the Hindi or English languages. Therefore, there should be a native language version of DBT while implementation, which will help them to access it easily.
Active participation of all stakeholders in the process is much more needed in the system. The whole process is like a chain system. If one gets damaged or weak, the whole system has a chance to collapse. In the position of the weakest chain holders, corruption, public or community interest, and process transparency will come. The chain system will be robust if all other ends are firm. The exploitation of tribal populations happens in the form of corruption. Because they need an awareness of the process and system, if the government works on the above-mentioned significant problems, all the secondary problems will dissolve automatically.
The Grievance Redress mechanism should be actively implemented at every end to create more transparency in the process. But this system should be proactive for all the other stakeholders. Then only these DBT schemes can gain the community’s trust and be successful in rural and tribal areas.
Overall addressing the last mile challenges of the DBT schemes in India requires working on a multi-dimensional approach which will include awareness-related issues, infra-related issues, digitalization-related issues, and activating grievance addressing systems in the tribal areas, giving importance to all stakeholders in the system, maintaining multilingual information of the schemes.
The PM Kisan Yojana is the best example of the DBT scheme. It aims to provide income support to all cultivable land-holding farmers. The amount of 6000 rupees is credited to farmers’ accounts in a year. However, in the tribal areas, most people have not even registered lands due to a lack of awareness about the scheme and land registration process. Naryanaswami from Paderu mentioned, “For the registration, I have to spend 50 thousand as fees to all the officers only for getting 6000 rupees. Now I am cultivating the land; after me, my son will cultivate the same land if he has that courage. But we don’t want to sell all our life to get that land in my name.”
Many of them need bank accounts, and if they have a bank account not linked to an Aadhaar card, they need immediate bank access to get all this work done. Moreover, they need more network connections to gain the full benefits of digitization. The official website is also in Hindi and English languages to get access to the tribal people. As per my understanding, there needs to be a proper grievance re-addressing mechanism to address the problems of the beneficiaries. If that were there, all the problems mentioned earlier would be solved.
References:
1. Professor B.SHIVA REDDY(2020), LITERACY AND EDUCATION LEVELS OF SCHEDULED TRIBES IN ANDHRA PRADESH, CENTRE FOR ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL STUDIES. Click Here for the link
2. Motkuri, Venkatanarayana S. R. Sankaran Chair (Rural Labour), Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Tribes (STs) in Andhra Pradesh: A Situation Assessment Analysis, National Institute of Rural Development, Hyderabad (2013) Click Here for the Link
3. U SUDHAKAR REDDY,(2021) TIMES OF INDIA Click Here for the Link
4. https://services.india.gov.in/service/detail/pm-kisan-samman-nidhi
5.https://www.lkouniv.ac.in/site/writereaddata/siteContent/2020041