Poverty Data
By Dhurjati Mukherjee
A very recent discussion paper released by Niti Aayog titled ‘Multidimensional Poverty in India since 2008-09’, authored by member Ramesh Chandra and senior adviser Yogesh Suri, claimed that nearly 24.82 crore Indians have been lifted out of poverty over the last decade. The paper showed a decline from 29.17 percent in 2013-14 to 11.28 percent in 2022-23. The Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), based on Alkire and Foster (AF) method, identifies people as poor based on universally acknowledged metric designed to assess acute poverty, providing a complimentary perspective to conventional monetary poverty measures.
Several economists have questioned the assessment based on the MPI as also the method of calculation. They contended that the MPI, which mainly measures possessions and access to certain services, is a poor and inaccurate method of estimating poverty, traditionally measured through household expenditures on certain goods and services.
The projections of the report are based on the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) for which data was collected before the pandemic. Based on the overall numbers, it concluded that Uttar Pradesh managed to get 5.9 crore out of poverty followed by 3.8 crore in Bihar, which is the home to the highest share in the country.
Recall that the last poverty estimation was done in 2011-12 by applying the Tendulkar methodology after price indexation and based on the last consumption pattern data from the NSSO survey. As per that estimate, 21.9 percent of the population were below poverty line in 2011-12. Meanwhile, it is indeed surprising that poverty reduction has been announced though the government has not released the Household Consumer Expenditure Survey report for 2017-18, citing high divergence between the survey findings and administrative data. Many economists pointed out that MPI is not used as a measure of poverty and deprivation. They maintained that the MPI simply shows the percentage of people unable to access facilities provided by the government.
Just on the heels of this report, the Oxfam came out with a more revealing and judicious report. it came out with the startling revelation that ending poverty, the target for which is 2030 under the SDGs may not be possible for another 229 years. This has been in sharp contrast to the Niti Aayog report that predicted India is likely to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of “halving multidimensional poverty well before 2030”.
Oxfam observed that runaway inflation across the world has destabilised governments and pushed people to desperation but if there’s one thing that has grown faster than prices of bare necessities it is the wealth of the ultra-rich. It found that the “super charged surge” enjoyed by the wealthy in the last three years has meant that billionaires are $3.3 trillion richer than in 2020; their wealth growing three times faster than the rate of inflation. In fact, there has been 114 percent jump in wealth of the richest men since 2008. Their combined wealth has more than doubled – going from $406 billion in 2020 to $869 billion now. Moreover, one percent of wealthy people own 43 percent of all global financial assets.
Mention may also be made of Oxfam India’s ‘Survival of the Richest: The India Supplement’ that reveals some stark findings proving that the gap between the rich and the poor is indeed widening. Some of the key findings from the India supplement are:-
the top 1 percent in India now owns more than 40.5 percent of total wealth in 2021 while the bottom 50% of the population (700 million) has around 3 per cent of total wealth.
While these contrasting reports of the government and Oxfam make interesting reading, it is surprising that why the present dispensation is trying to project things in a distorted manner. If one delves deep into the matter and considers other international surveys, there is little justification in the data projected as also the laughable estimation of the elimination of poverty by the year 2030.
One cannot doubt the fact that the ground reality presented a stark rebuttal. Former finance Minister, P. Chidambaram expressed concern over Modi government’s alleged tendency to manipulate research and data. It was pointed out that the fact that the government manipulated data showing only 15 crore poor in India, then there has possibly been no justification of giving free ration to 80 crore people. Supriya Shrinate of the Congress pointed out that the Niti Aayog has measured poverty based on the government’s flagship programmes, ignoring the standard parameters adopted the world over.
According to her, “The government’s recent growth figures suggested the consumption growth was 4.4 percent. If people are getting more money, why are they not buying basic stuff such as soap, hair oil, toothpaste, biscuit and so on?” Some economists and even the Congress are of the opinion that the government is compelled to rely on such manipulated data after its 10-year tenure because it has somewhat failed to solve the country’s economic problems.
Let us turn to a recent UN estimate which found that over a billion people in India could not afford a healthy diet in 2021 and this puts a question mark on the government’s recent estimate of decline in poverty levels. The 2023 report on food security and nutrition released by five UN agencies earlier this week stated that 74.1 percent of Indians or 1043 billion people were unable to afford a healthy diet in 2021. The report also estimated India’s proportion of undernourished population at 16.6 percent during 2020-2023. Comparatively 66 percent of people in Bangladesh, 82 percent in Pakistan and 30 percent in China were unable to afford a healthy diet in 2021. The report from FAO emerged amid what some food security advocates and nutrition experts view as the Indian government’s efforts to deny the persistence of food deprivation and poor nutrition among large sections of the population.
Meanwhile, one may also refer to the Global Hunger Index (GHI) which ranked India as low as 111 among 125 countries though the government alleged that it was “an erroneous measure of hunger with serious methodological issues” that displayed a “a malafide intent”. Some experts pointed out that though the government has been bragging about its food aid programmes and challenged the GHI, but it is quite surprising that its own estimate of 813 million people need food aid contradicts the government’s contention.
Thus, the present estimation is not quite justified and does not reveal the true picture of the poor in India. The basics of decent livelihood which consists of nutritious food, potable water and a permanent shelter is possibly not available to at least 15 percent of the population. The government’s attempt to bring forward concocted data may not be acceptable to the really educated sections though the aam janata can be swayed with such irrelevant findings. — INFA