From poverty alleviation to prosperity

From the poverty income ruler line provided by the recent World Bank estimates, India has recorded one of the fastest extreme income-poverty declines in the world, as per its latest Poverty and Equity brief, which highlights that between 2011 and 2023, an estimated 496 million people moved out of poverty, with extreme income-based poverty ($3/per day) declining to 2.6%.

For the same period, the share of the population living below the lower middle-income country line ($4.20/day, 2021 PPP) fell from 57.7% to 16.1%. Non-monetary poverty indicators, as per OPHI’s Multi-dimensional Poverty Index, also recorded a sharp reduction in overall poverty numbers, i.e., from 53.8% in 2005-06 to 16.4% in 2019-21.