Poverty in India: The Measurement Debate

Why Poverty Numbers Keep Changing

The official poverty line in India has been revised multiple times — Dandekar-Rath (1971), Alagh Committee (1979), Lakdawala Committee (1993), Tendulkar Committee (2009), Rangarajan Committee (2014). Each produced different numbers, different poverty ratios. UPSC expects you to understand why — not just know the committees.

The core methodological disagreement:

Calorie-based approach (older): Define poverty as inability to afford a minimum calorie intake (2,400 kcal/day rural, 2,100 kcal/day urban). Calculate the spending required to meet this, and set that as the poverty line.

Problem: People spend money on things other than food — transport, education, health. A pure calorie benchmark ignores non-food poverty.

Tendulkar approach: Shifted to a consumption expenditure basket that includes food and non-food items (health, education, clothing). Poverty line set at ₹816/month rural and ₹1,000/month urban (2011-12 prices). This was higher than the previous line and thus showed a higher poverty count.

Rangarajan approach: Further revised upward — ₹972/month rural and ₹1,407/month urban. Showed an even higher poverty count (29.5% vs Tendulkar's 21.9% for 2011-12).

The lesson: India does not have a single agreed poverty line. The choice of methodology is partly political.

Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)

UNDP's MPI measures poverty across **three dimensions...