In reduced circumstances, suffering in purdah (4,2)
I believe the answer is:
hard up
'in reduced circumstances' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'suffering in purdah' is the wordplay.
'suffering in' indicates anagramming the letters (letters suffer disruption).
'purdah' with letters rearranged gives 'HARD-UP'.
(Other definitions for hard up that I've seen before include "Poor" , "'In great need (4,2)'" , "Impoverished" , "Short of money - it's tough at the top" , "Badly-off" .)