Female headed households in rural Haryana-A sociological study
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Date
2020-08
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CCSHAU, Hisar
Abstract
Female-headed households have not received the same attention of researchers and academicians as the other categories of women. Such households are a separate category and cannot be equated with other households. Being head of the household does not necessary ease the women's position for the entire responsibility of maintaining the household falls on her. Widowhood is the main source of female household headship. The study was conducted in two zones of Haryana state namely Bagar and Nardak. A sample of 260 female -headed households was selected randomly from two districts namely Karnal and Hisar with following objectives 1. To find out the incidence of female-headed households in rural Haryana. 2. To assess the socio-economic characteristics of these households. 3. To study the livelihood strategies of female headed household. It was found that the main reasons becoming head of household was widowhood (42.69%) due to the death of their husbands. More than three-fourth of the female-headed households (78.78%) were facing the problem of low income. Mostly female-headed households were engaged in non-farm activities namely tailoring work, beauty parlour, kirana shops and dairy farming and shifting from one crop to other crop in both the district, respectively. Mostly female heads were managing all agricultural affairs single handedly but female heads were not aware of any agricultural developmental programme. Livelihood diversification to business/enterprise strategies were adopted by respondent was the most remunerative strategy followed by farming. To sum up our discussion, it is necessary to provide them need based trainings to generate income at household level. As female-headed households constituted substantial proportion of the rural households, development agencies and planners must recognize the existence of these households in project design and implementation.