Today we are going to discuss about a very important topic that is Describe how the poverty line is estimated in India. What are the characteristics of poverty life in India and across the world. Which are the method to estimate poverty line across the world and India? We will also discuss many other aspects of poverty line. Also like to mention here that details provided here in this post are based on the data and research published by Niti Ayog in 2021.
Table Of Contents
Describe How The Poverty line is Estimated in India
Poverty line is an estimate to defined the capacity of an individual to spend on himself (and his dependents) that is the minimum level one must spend just to survive. If one is able to spend ( or consume) this minimum threshold, the individual is known to be living above poverty line and if not, then he or she is called to live below poverty line or BPL in short.
India has shown tremendous growth from last two decade and among the world fastest growing economics along with China. Indian government has able to a large number of people out of poverty line but still it is the home of most number of people living below poverty line.
As per the report of World Bank published in 2018-19, India was on its way to lift its entire population from extreme poverty by 2022. But then COVID-19 outbreak has taken the plans for toss. Infect poverty and unemployment growth rate has been on highest since many years.
Many people has lost jobs and hence fall back into the below poverty line region. In the remaining part of this post we would be able to identify on Describe how the poverty line is estimated in India.
Indian government has been instrumental in providing food for needy and allocated nearly 200n Lakh metric ton of grains for needy people. As on date almost all of the allocated grains have been distributed across PAN Indian.
Indian government along with state government, have also initiated various housing schemes which give the people living below poverty line a free house and till date provides free houses to millions of people across the country.
In spite of effort by Indian government and state governments, Still 25% of India’s population is still living under poverty line and failed to fulfil their basic needs of living. If you look at the absolute numbers the same figure would be approx 40 crore (400,000,000) people still living below poverty line and struggling even for basic needs. In the global ranking of poorest county India is on 66th position across the universe. Hence Lot of efforts are still to be made to change the lifestyle of public.
United nation has also defined a threshold level for Below Poverty Line; however is it worth noting that the methods that are applicable for one country may not able applicable for another country because of the money inflations, social and economical conditions. In remaining part of the post we will discuss about our topic of Describe How The Poverty Line Is Estimated In India.
Methods For Estimating the Poverty Line In India
Now lets us come to the point of methods for identifying if an individual is living below or not. There are various methods for it across the world, but the limit of expenditure that may be true for united state may be great living standard here in India. There we should be adhering to the standard methods applicable in India. You might sometimes be asked to explain the two methods to estimate poverty line.
There are various methods for deciding the poverty line in India; however we would be concentrating mainly on two methods, monetary expenditure value method and calorie consumption count method.
Monetary Expenditure Value Method of Estimating Poverty Line
In Monetary expenditure value method of estimating the poverty line, we estimate level of an individual with the amount of many one should spend for a minimum living standard on mandatory items that are needed for living, example food, drinking water ,clothes and home. The same is different for urban as well as rural.
As per latest notification by Niti Ayog , for rural area the poverty line threshold is Rs 972 whereas for Urban areas this is Rs 1407 per month. Hence if an individual is not able to do the expanse of Rs 972 in rural areas (and Rs 1407 in Urban Areas), that individual is said be line under poverty line or below poverty line.
Calorie Consumption Count Method of Estimating Poverty Line
In calorie consumption count method the poverty line is assumed basis the calorie count one should consume to have a minimum healthy life. As in the case above in monetary expenditure value method, the value is different for both Urban and Rural areas basis the lifestyle of individuals.
For the rural areas the Calorie Consumption Count is 2400 kcal where for the urban areas the same is 2100kcal. The difference is understood also as rural population has gone through hardship in their daily life hence needed high calories count.
One thing to be noted that this monetary range is variable with time; however calorie consumption count method is likely to be stable. The reason being is because of the money inflation the value of Rs will be variable, whereas the minimum calories count for food consumption will remain constant. Hope by now we are well verse with our initial query of Describe How The Poverty Line Is Estimated In India
Distribution of People living under Poverty line in India
There is an uneven distribution of people living under BPL across the states, for example Kerala has registered lowest number of people living below poverty line and only 0.71% of Kerala people living below poverty line. Also Kottayam district of Kerala in has the first district across Indian which is BPL Free. Interestingly, Kerala also has 100% literacy rate, this show a clear inverse correlation between poverty and education. Describe How The Poverty Line Is Estimated In India has a direct link with the education.
Hence governments across the state are putting efforts in making the people educated and this will help in taking them out of poverty as educated person will have more opportunity for job and work.
On the same line Bihar is considered to be the poorest state in India with approximately 52% of the people live below poverty line in Bihar.
Summary
In this post we have tried to Describe How The Poverty Line Is Estimated In India. If we have to summarize the entire post in few lines, the crux would be that Indian government is working hard with state governments to ensure a better lifestyle for individuals. BPL(Below Poverty Line) is a relative term which signify the minimum expenditure one needs to do on food, clean water, cloths and house. The other method of measuring this below poverty line is the minimum calories intake one has to take in order to survive. More on Poverty Line Estimation can be read here.
The threshold is varied and updated continuously in years. The same is different for rural and urban areas. Governments are providing various schemes so that the lifestyle of each and every individual can be improved.
FAQs
Here are few of the FAQs pertaining to the poverty line is estimation in India-
Discuss the major reasons for poverty in India.
Lack of education is the major reason for poverty in India. The same can be understood with the example of Kerala. Kerala has 100% literacy rate whereas it has the lowest BPL % (only 0.71%) across India.
Explain two methods to estimate poverty line in India class 9 questions. Describe How The Poverty Line Is Estimated In India
The basic two methods for estimating poverty line in India are monetary expenditure value method and Calorie Consumption Count Method.
What is poverty line?
A Poverty line is an imaginary situation where an Individual is not even able to do minimum expenditure on food, water, clothes and house, which is needed for the survival.
What do you understand by human poverty?
Human Poverty is Explain in above FAQ
Who are the Poorest of the Poor?
As per the data and different research Women, children & old people are often considered as the poorest of the poor in the society. The reason being is in the poor family they will have lesser chance of having equal access to the resources available in that particular family.
How poverty line is estimated periodically Class 9?
Poverty line estimation methods are mention above. However out of the two mention methods, monetary expenditure value method changes frequently whereas Calorie Consumption Count Method is most likely to stay as per the current for a long time to come, as the food required to live or to survive will be same in coming times also.
What are the two methods of estimating the poverty line class 9? How is the poverty line calculated?
Both of the methods are mentioned in details in above post.
How poverty line is estimated in India? What is BPL?
BPL is the abbreviation of below poverty line. Poverty Line estimation method is mentioned above.
Which is the poorest state in India?
Bihar is considered as the poorest state in India as approximately 52% of its population is living under the poverty line.
Name top poorest state of India.
Bihar (51.91%), Jharkhand (42.16%), Uttar Pradesh (37.79%), Madhya Pradesh (36.65%) and both Meghalaya & Assam (32.67%) are the poorest state of India (BPL Population is written in Bracket)
Hope the above post on Poverty will be able to answer our question on Describe how the poverty line is estimated in India. However we urge you to kindly let us know in the comment section if any other questions are still unanswered.