ISAS Briefs

A recent press note by India’s Planning Commission releasing the poverty estimates for 2009-2010 created a stir in the Indian Parliament and media. Widely criticised as being too low, the Planning Commission outlined S$16.61 (Rs 672.8 monthly per capita consumption expenditure) for rural areas and S$21.22 (Rs 859.6 monthly per capita consumption expenditure) for urban areas as the poverty line. Most say this line is perceived as identifying the starving, not the poor. The paper analyses the methodology behind the Planning Commission’s poverty estimates and recommends another measure -- including the burgeoning vulnerable classes in the estimates.