Entitlement Approach

By,
Anurag Chand
PMRDF 3rd Cohort

Introduction
The entitlement approach was given by Prof. Amartya Sen in his
essay Poverty and Famines. This was the path breaking
analysis of Bengal Famine of 1943, the Ethiopian famines of 1973
and 1974, the Bangladesh famine of 1974, and the famines in the
countries of the African Sahel in the 1970s.
The entitlement approach is based on three conceptual
categories, namely,
i. The Endowment set;
ii. The Entitlement Set; and
iii. The Entitlement Mapping.
The endowment set is defined as the combination of all
those legally owned resources by a person conforming to
established norms and practices. The said resources include
both tangible assets, such as land, equipment, animals and
intangibles such as knowledge and skill, labour power, or
membership of a particular community.
The entitlement set is defined as the set of all possible
combinations of goods and services (not just the one
actually being enjoyed) that a person can legally obtain by
using the resources of his endowment set. The use of the
resources to get final goods and services may be either in
the form of production, exchange or transfer.
The entitlement mapping, called E-mapping, is simply the
relationship between endowment set and entitlement set. It is the
rate at which the resources of the endowment set can be
converted into goods and services included in the entitlement set.

Following is the Mapping of my friend Ashutosh Baliyan who is

working in NTPC Ltd.
Endowment Set

Entitlement Set

Entitlement
Mapping

1.Father is engineer
and working in
reputed company.

1.Studied in DAV
school with all
facilities and good
teacher

1. Father was earning

sufficiently hence
didnt face any
problems in finance
and thus the studies
went on properly.

2.Having access to
good medical
facilities
3.Mother well
educated and trained
yoga teacher
4.Own house and
access to basic
facilities like
electricity,cable
tv,modern appliances
etc

2. Had good
academics all
through the school
life with good marks
both in 10th as well as
12th CBSE boards.
3.Joined IIT-JEE
coaching institute
and took 1 year drop
after 12th board.
4.Got admission into
NIT Rourkela on the
basis of AIEEE exam
in Electronics and
Instrumentation.
5.Joined NTPC in
campus placement
after the completion
of 4 year graduation
of Engineering.

2. Mother was yoga

teacher hence got to
learn yoga from his
childhood.As a result
of which he still
practices Yoga
everyday and this
has helped him in
overall development
mentally and
physically.
3.He afforded to take
admission in IIT
coaching institute
and took 1 year drop
because his family
was financially sound
4.After getting
admission into NIT
Rourkela,he

performed well due

and finally got into
NTPC through
Campus Placement
which was due to the
fact that he took
admission into a good
college.