ABSTRACT
The growth in the number of poor has not only been analysed, theorised and acted upon with varying degrees of commitment, but is a living witness to the overall failure of these efforts. In 1984, the Institute of Social Studies Trust, Bangalore, undertook a study to assess how for the government's anti-poverty schemes, especially designed for the poor, had reached poor women. Another aspect of the study carried out by the Institute of Social Studies focused on poor women, in particular innovative approaches to poverty alleviation for rural women, perse. Numerous women's studies have probed gender differentiation issues, not only in terms of the impact of credit or sectoral development projects, but also in terms of the responses of women to external development impulses. Poverty alleviation is expensive as well as time consuming. Low profile activities are mocked as simulating the poor, by keeping the poor poor, and thereby carry the colonial legacies full circle.
