Number of people lying below poverty line still unknown: Sharad Yadav

Janata Dal-United (JD-U) President Sharad Yadav on Saturday said the number of people lying below the poverty line is still unknown despite various committees being set up for the purpose of assessing the same.

"The country's biggest challenge is to deal with poverty eradication. And, we haven't been able to identify the poor. Be it the Saxena Committee (N.C Saxena Committee) or Tendulkar Committee (Suresh Tendulkar Committee), we have not been able to record the actual number of people lying below poverty line," he said.

Earlier, the Planning Commission said in its report on July 23 that the poverty ratio in India has declined to 21.9 percent in 2011-12 from 37.2 percent in 2004-05 on account of increase in per capita consumption.

According to the Commission, in 2011-12, the national poverty line, by using the Tendulkar methodology, was estimated at Rs. 816 per capita per month for rural areas and Rs. 1,000 per capita per month for cities.

This would mean that the persons whose consumption of goods and services exceed Rs 33.33 in cities and Rs 27.20 per capita per day in villages are not poor.