SATPATHY, BINEETARAI, RUBINA2023-02-082023-02-082022M/EE/009/2020-21https://krishikosh.egranth.ac.in/handle/1/5810193443India is an agrarian country where many rural men and women rely on agriculture for a living. Among the many challenges confronting Indian agriculture today, increasing climate variability and natural disasters are the most pressing. Reduced agricultural production is one of the most direct ways in which natural disasters have an impact. Floods are the most expensive and widespread natural disasters, causing up to 50,000 deaths and affecting 75 million people worldwide each year. (FAO 2008). The evidence suggests that the effects of flooding are not genderneutral. As a result, various gender groupings may interpret the impact of flood differently, as well as cope with or adapt to its effects in different ways. Analysis of gender perception of flood impacts is a prerequisite for assessing their adaptation decisions and for avoiding gender-blind rehabilitation policies and programmes that fail to include the gendered responsibilities of both men and women farmers. Besides, the fact that the natural disasters have a gendered impact it is critical to understand how men and women perceive and interpret natural disasters so as to devise and advise on effective adaptation strategies that will secure their livelihoods. With this background, this study entitled “Gender based variations in perception of flood impacts: A study in Darbangha district of Bihar” has been taken up with the objective to study the gender centric perception of impact of flood viz. - socio economic, psychological and environmental and the gender centric adaptation strategies in the locale of study. The investigation was conducted in the state of Bihar. Out of 38 districts in Bihar, Darbangha was selected purposively for this research study as it tops the list of the districts which are most severely affected by flood in Bihar. Hanumannagar and Baheri blocks were selected purposively among the 18 blocks in Darbangha district. Two villages were selected from each block, Godhaila and Uchauli from Hnaumannagar block and Jhakra and Aadabon from Baheri block. So a total of 4 villages were selected for the study. From each of the four villages, 30 respondents were selected (15 men and 15 women), thus making total sample size as 120. The findings revealed that most of the women farmers in the study area belonged to young age group while most of the men farmers were from middle and old age category. Majority of the women were illiterate while most of the men had an education level up to higher secondary and college level which indicates the education disparity among men and women farmers of the study area. Majority of the women belonged to scheduled caste while most men were from general caste category. Majority of both women and men farmers had medium level of information seeking behaviour, exposure to mass media, risk orientation, social participation, and extension contact in the study area. Only a small percentage of women farmers had regular access to mobile phones in the study area whereas more than half of the men farmers used mobile phones regularly as a mass media source. More number of women farmers fell in the low income category as compared to men farmers. Majority of the respondents practiced farming as their primary occupation. Both men and women farmers surveyed had marginal land holdings with women occupying a large majority as compared to men farmers. Goat was seen to be a common livestock holding among women while cow of local breed was popular among the men farmers. The respondents in the study area did not possess more than 2 livestock. In the context of men and women farmers‟ perception about the socio economic, psychological and environmental impact of flood, it can be concluded that majority of them had medium level of perception with women having slightly higher perception of socio economic and psychological impact of flood as compared to men whereas more percentage of men had high perception of environmental impact of flood as opposed to women. The findings of the study revealed that selling livestock, cultivating smaller area than usual and changing planting date were the three prime farm-based adaptation strategy opted by women farmers whereas men resorted to selling of livestock, farm diversification and change in cropping pattern. As for non-farm based adaptation, the three strategies women adopted were using their saved money, borrowing money from friends and relatives and less consumption or changing food habits while men opted for stocking of food grains, borrowing money from friends/relatives and using saved money. Factors like age, household headship, decision making and social participation had positively significant relationship with women‟s perception of psychological impact of flood. With respect to men farmers, age and extension contact had a negatively significant relationship with perception of psychological impact of flood while family size had high positively significant relationship. The results further indicated that education and annual income had a positive correlation with men‟s perception of environmental impact of flood whereas age had a positive correlation with perception of environmental impact of flood in case of women. Annual income and extension contact had negatively significant relationship with men‟s perception of socio economic impact of flood while social cohesiveness was found to be negatively correlated with women‟s perception of socio economic impact of flood.EnglishThesis