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With reference to a village in a predominantly tribal part of Rajasthan, this paper illustrates the increasing heterogeneity of the rural educational landscape and examines different patterns of enrolment within this. While the findings confirm those of more macro-level studies using the four official social categories, intra-category differences are shown to be equally, if not more, important in helping to explain variations in the types and locations of schools chosen by parents. The social composition of government schools in the village has greatly narrowed and the majority of pupils in local private schools now come from tribal households. The expansion in size and number of commutable schools has moved the frontier of private schooling away from the village and provided new and increasingly exclusive contexts for both old and new forms of social division to be manifested.

With reference to a village in a predominantly tribal part of Rajasthan, this paper illustrates the increasing heterogeneity of the rural educational landscape and examines different patterns of enrolment within this. While the findings confirm those of more macro-level studies using the four official social categories, intra-category differences are shown to be equally, if not more, important in helping to explain variations in the types and locations of schools chosen by parents. The social composition of government schools in the village has greatly narrowed and the majority of pupils in local private schools now come from tribal households. The expansion in size and number of commutable schools has moved the frontier of private schooling away from the village and provided new and increasingly exclusive contexts for both old and new forms of social division to be manifested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By reference to a multi-caste and tribal village in southern Rajasthan the paper examines the degree to which caste and tribal membership impacts on different aspects of migration, e.g. commencement, form, destination, duration, and types of work undertaken. Using a livelihoods approach, supplemented by other perspectives and concentrating on four migration streams (three domestic, one international), data collected over a period of nearly thirty-five years indicates that patterns of migration are far from random. It is argued that the use of official stratification categories in migration surveys can obscure important differences within caste groupings. Short-term circular migration, underestimated in national surveys, is shown to be substantial, especially for the tribal migrants in the village. While position in the social structure differentially affects aspects of migration across the village hierarchy, examples are given of individual migrant agency overcoming structural constraints. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given their physical presence in India, banks are arguably well-placed to improve financial inclusion in rural areas. However, uncertain repayment capacities and high transaction costs mean formal financial institutions are often reluctant to lend to the rural poor. Conversely, high transaction costs in dealing with banks are also incurred by clients, through, for example, lengthy, cumbersome and potentially ignominious procedures. Negative attitudes towards poor clients can be an important component of such transaction costs. An applied research project funded by the Enterprise Development Innovation Fund (EDIF-DFID) developed an innovative training programme designed to encourage more positive attitudes of bank staff towards poor clients, and towards their own role in rural poverty alleviation and development. This paper examines the development of the training programme, its implementation, and the results of its evaluation. It is shown that training can bring about attitudinal change, which in turn is reflected in behaviour and social impact. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]