Over 41% rural households in Haryana still rely on firewood: NSSO

Tribune News Service

Bhartesh Singh Thakur

Chandigarh, March 16

Over 41 per cent households in rural Haryana are still relying on firewood, chips and crop residue for cooking while 3.7 per cent use dung cakes, reveals the Multiple Indicator Survey report of the National Sample Survey Office (NSS) 78th round.

Just 54.3 per cent households in rural areas of state are using LPG. However, in urban areas, the LPG usage has jumped to 94 per cent.

In comparison, 20.4 per cent rural households in Punjab rely on firewood for cooking and 69.3 per cent use LPG.

The survey was initially planned to be conducted during January-December, 2020, but due to the Covid pandemic, the data collection was continued up to August 15, 2021.

In rural Haryana, 3.3 per cent households don’t have access to latrines and hand-washing facility. There are 4.3 per cent households that wash hands with water and ash or mud or sand, while 8.2 per cent wash hands with water only. There are 84.2 per cent rural households that wash hands with water and soap.

In Computers and information technology (ICT) skills, just 19.9 per cent rural females in Haryana, aged 15 and above, could copy or move a file or folder and 19.1 per cent can use copy and paste tools. Just 8.8 per cent rural females could send e-mails with attached files. However, rural males have better ICT skills, as 33.8 per cent (aged 15 years and above) can copy or move a file or folder, while 31.8 per cent can use copy and paste tools and 16.4 per cent could send e-mails with attached files.

The percentage of ICT skills increase as we move from rural to urban areas.

Women have lesser access to mobile phones in Haryana. In rural Haryana, just 44.2 per cent females, aged 15 and above, had mobile phones with an active SIM card during last three months. When it comes to using the mobile phone exclusively, the percentage comes down to 38.2 per cent in rural areas.

Meanwhile, the percentage of rural males, aged 15 and above, having access to a mobile phone, is almost double at 81.6 per cent.

Even in urban areas, there is a big gap in women and men having access to mobile phones. Over 64 per cent women in urban settings in the state and 88.8 per cent men have access to mobile phones.

In comparison, in Punjab, 69 per cent rural women have access to mobile phones and in urban areas it is 77 per cent. The neighbouring Himachal Pradesh has even better statistics, as 78.5 rural women there have access to mobile phones, while in urban areas it is 88.3 per cent.

Indebtedness is higher in rural Haryana among males in comparison to those living in urban areas. There are 17,583 males per lakh population in rural areas, aged 15 and above, who were indebted to any institutional or non-institutional agency during the survey time-frame, while the figure for urban areas was 9,571 per lakh population.

In comparison, Punjab has more indebted men with 18,930 of them per lakh population (15 and above) in rural areas being indebted, while in urban areas the figure was 14,826 per lakh population.

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