Absolute poverty virtually eliminated, says Niti Aayog's Arvind Virmani

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Absolute poverty measured by the World Bank's yardsticks is "virtually eliminated" in India, and general policy action cannot be deployed to address the few people earning under $1.9 a day, a member of the government's think tank Niti Aayog said on Tuesday. 

Speaking at an event organized by IMC Chamber of Commerce here, Arvind Virmani said the percentage of the population tagged as "vulnerable" has also gone down drastically and will be eliminated in the next seven years. 

He, however, admitted that while absolute poverty is down, we have got "worse" from an income distribution perspective. 

"Absolute poverty has gone down from 12.2 per cent to 2.3 per cent in over 11 years and has gone down further to 1 per cent. And this poverty as we have been talking about it for 50 years is now gone. There is no poverty left, absolute poverty is virtually eliminated," Virmani, who has served as the chief economic advisor between 2007-09, said. 

He said the 1 per cent population which is yet to come out of absolute poverty resides in remote areas and hilly terrain, and we have to go looking for such people. 

"You have to go out there and find the actual individual. You can't have a general policy," he said. He explained that in 1960s, the World Bank came up with the definition of absolute poverty as people earning less than $1 per day, which would be $1.9 per day adjusted for inflation today. Similarly, those earning under $2 per day (or $3.2 today) were classified as vulnerable. 

Share of those falling under the "vulnerable" category has dropped to 15 per cent from over 50 per cent 12 years ago, he said. The economist said that this number will also be eliminated over the next seven years.