Puzzled

I try to keep track of Indian things via internet and visiting about once an year. but I really do not know how things are working for the poor. I heard stories (from a reliable social worker in Hyderabad) of a mother and daughter of whom only one can go out since they have only one decent set of clothes to wear. On the other hand, we have a poor relative of around 90 and at one stage we arranged for him to say in an old people's home paying around three thousand rupees a month. Then he had an accident in the bath room and broke his back. It seems that now he had a free operation under some government scheme and even gets a pension. He never worked, mainly lived off the land and sold most of it. I wonder how widely these schemes are available and how well they are working.