This paper seeks to provide a profile of social group disparities and poverty in India, where social groups are classified as scheduled caste, scheduled tribe and other social groups, and examine the factors underlying differences in levels of living between these groups and for each group separately. The paper argues that social group disparities in levels of living are the result of historically rooted ‘social disadvantages’ for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, by way of social exclusion and physical exclusion respectively, which continue to operate in contemporary Indian society