Concise Health Care Scenario of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes People in Rural North Twenty - Four Parganas District of West Bengal, India

The present paper elaborately seeks to examine the state of health care scenario of Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) population in a purely rural or village based economy of the North Twenty Four Parganas district of West Bengal in India on the basic of collecting primary data through direct field survey throughout the year 2014–15. I examined eleven socio-economicdemographic factors which have close relation with access to health namely, the state of health of children ages up to five years, the state of female health of ages 15–49 years in terms of pregnancy and natal care, the nature of dependency of the health care system of households, the state of health of adult family members of age 15 years and above were suffering from serious illness within one year preceding the survey, state of health of adult family members ages 15 years and above were suffering from serious illness before five years at the time of survey, health status of households etc.

The analysis of field level data generated by me points to a number of significant observations regarding the health status of households in the country size. It is seen that access to health services is influence more by the nature and quality of available health services than by income and other resource indicators. However there is no strong evidence of gender discrimination against the females member but there are signs of relative low levels of care within the households for female and child health while the dependence of traditional medical services, is quite high. The households are ready to avail of the public health services if there is sufficient providing. What is surprising is that we have not come across any evidence suggesting that the General (GEN) category of households performed at distinctly better level than the SCs and STs Groups and for as the overall health status is concerned.