Socio Economic Impact of Scheduled Caste Reservation Policy on Household Income and Living Standards: Evidences from Bihar

Socio Economic Impact of Scheduled Caste Reservation Policy on Household Income and Living Standards: Evidences from Bihar Shashi Kant Prasad* The reservation policy for Scheduled Castes (SCs) protected in the Constitution of India was designed to redress centuries of caste-based exclusion from education, employment, and public life. Seventy-five years after Independence, however, the extent to which this affirmative action has actually translated into improved household income and living standards remains empirically under examined at the state level. This paper draws on a primary survey of 417 SC reservation beneficiary households, selected through Cochran's formula and distributed across four high SC population districts of Bihar (Patna, Gaya, Muzaffarpur and Samastipur) using purposive sampling, to assess the socio-economic status of beneficiaries before and after they availed reservation benefits. A structured schedule captured household income, housing, transport, and asset ownership, and a paired samples t test was used to compare pre and post benefit household income. The results show a statistically significant rise in mean monthly household income from ₹6,612.71 to ₹43,033.57 (mean difference = ₹36,420.86; t = 12.034; p < 0.001), accompanied by universal ownership of pucca housing and a marked shift from informal to formal employment. The findings confirm that SC reservation has been an effective instrument of income mobility in Bihar, while also revealing persistent income disparity among beneficiaries that calls for complementary skill development and financial inclusion measures. * Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, JNL College, Pataliputra University, Patna. Email ID: [email protected]