Poverty plunged under UPA rule, claims govt study

The UPA government’s economic policies have resulted in record reduction of poverty over the last two years, with the individual’s monthly expenditure rising by around 18% per annum, the highest since 1987, government data released a week before the Parliament’s monsoon session claimed.

Updated on: Aug 2, 2012, 03:45:55 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

The UPA government’s economic policies have resulted in record reduction of poverty over the last two years, with the individual’s monthly expenditure rising by around 18% per annum, the highest since 1987, government data released a week before the Parliament’s monsoon session claimed.

The government’s National Sample Survey Organisation released the provisional data of the Household Consumer Expenditure Survey for 2011-12 on Wednesday. The study is the most crucial input for the Planning Commission to compute the extent of poverty in the country.

Pranob Sen, former chief statistician of India and the panel’s principal advisor, said the increase in per capita expenditure shows that poverty came down by 2 percentage points every year between 2009-10 and 2011-12, the highest since Independence.

The average per-annum poverty reduction from Independence till 2004-05 — when the UPA came to power — was around 0.8%. It fell at the rate of 1.21% per annum between 2004-05 and 2009-10, the plan panel's press note on poverty estimation — released in March 2012 — said.

If one goes by the latest consumer expenditure survey data, around 24% of 1.2 billion Indians should be categorised as poor. The average per capita expenditure — after adjusting the inflation — rose by about 4.5% per annum, especially in rural India, Sen said.

The average per capita expenditure in 2004-05 was R558 for rural India and R1,052 for urban India. It increased to R1,281 for rural India and R2,401 for urban India in 2011-12, the NSSO said on Wednesday.

The increase in rural expenditure can be attributed to the higher selling price of agriculture produce. Although the per capita expenditure has more than doubled in urban India, experts say it could be because of inflationary impact.

On the flip side, NSSO data revealed that the gap between the richest 10% and the poorest 10% Indians had widened. While the difference in monthly expenditure between them was 5.6 times in 2004-05, it rose to 6.9 times in 2011-12 in rural India. In urban areas, it was 9.8 and 10.9 times respectively.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.