Extreme poverty in India falls to 2.6%, but top 10% earn 13 times more than bottom 10%: World Bank

India’s extreme poverty rate fell from 27.1% in 2011 to 2.6% in 2023, the World Bank has said in its October Poverty and Equity Brief. However, it added that income disparities remain wide, with the top 10% of the population earning a median income about 13 times more than the bottom 10%.

The World Bank sets the international extreme poverty line at $3 a day, or roughly Rs 284.9 per day.

“As poverty declined, it became increasingly concentrated among households with lower education, fewer assets, limited access to stable employment, and higher dependency ratios,” said the World Bank.

It added that the share of India’s population living below the lower-middle-income poverty line of $4.2, or Rs 398.8 a day, fell from 57.7% in 2011 to 16.1% in 2023, with an estimated 49.6 crore people moving out of poverty.

The World Bank attributed the decline mainly to “strong consumption growth, rising employment, especially among women and expanded social transfers, including food subsidies”.

Poverty also declined on non-monetary measures. The Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative’s Multidimensional Poverty Index fell to 16.4% in 2019-’21 from 53.8% in 2005-’06. The World Bank’s own measure put multidimensional poverty at 15.5% in 2022-’23.

However, poverty remained higher in rural areas. In 2023, 19.3% of the rural population lived below...

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