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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Understanding the poverty line by Amitabh Kundu

Understanding the poverty line by Amitabh Kundu

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published Published on Oct 15, 2011   modified Modified on Oct 15, 2011

The popular outrage over the official definition of poverty at abysmally low levels of daily income, of Rs 26 in rural areas and Rs 32 in urban areas, assumes the state will deny basic services to a household whose income is above the figure. This is totally erroneous.

There is no mechanism in the hands of the government to ascertain income or expenditure to identify the 'poor' on the ground. The poverty data generated at aggregative level is only useful for intergovernmental transfers or allocations under anti-poverty programmes, and it is well known that these are determined also by several other socio-political considerations.

The state governments would identify the poor on the ground based on indicators proposed by committees such as those headed by N C Saxena and S R Hashim for rural and urban areas respectively. In case the total number thus generated is higher than that obtained through the Tendulkar formula, the former must be accepted.

This does not mean that there should be no cap on the number of targeted beneficiaries in heavily-subsidised anti-poverty programmes. It is a tragedy that 400 million people in the country do not have even the income defining the official poverty line when the government promises a dream of inclusive growth.

Tendulkar Committee does not dispute that, despite decline in the percentage of the poor over the past decades, the number of persons not having the normative calorie intake of 2,400 and 2,100 calories in rural and urban areas respectively, has not gone down.

Scholars like Sukhatme, Minhas, Deaton, etc, have, nonetheless, criticised 'calorie fundamentalism' noting that people on their own are opting for lower calorie intake due to changed consumption habit, without jeopardising their health. However, even if the revised norm of 1,800 calories of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is accepted, hunger and malnutrition in the country would remain a matter of anxiety.

The decline in infant mortality rate (IMR) has had a setback in recent years. Reporting of ailments tends to be less in low-expenditure categories and among scheduled caste and tribes, particularly in rural areas, due to their lack of affordability of treatment.

What adds to their misery is that only 20% of their ailments are treated in government hospitals and the hospitalisation in public institutions has gone downfrom 60% to 38% over the period of the last one-and-a-half decade. The decline in enrolment at school starts at the age of 11 and at 14, about 45% of the children are out of the educational system.

Despite the calorific basis scaffolding the poverty line being dismantled by the Planning Commission as also several eminent economists, the relationship of calories deficiency below 2,000 calories per day with malnutrition, IMR and education of the mother is well established with the data from National Health and Family Survey.

Given this scenario, there is an urgent need to compel the government to address the problems of these 400 million by strengthening the public delivery of food, healthcare and education.

The figure of Rs 32 is hardly adequate to meet the necessities of life, but so was Rs 10 in early 1970s. The real problem is not that the government in

the past addressed the problems of only those below this line but actually did not address them adequately. And, most certainly did not succeed, if it did.

The myth that a researcher, administrator or activist, who supports anti-poverty programmes with a larger canvas and claims a higher percentage of people to be poor, is more progressive than one who is focused on a well-identified smaller group, needs to be dismissed.

The government must focus on households that do not get enough food, cannot send and retain their children in school, leave their ailments untreated, as their first priority. Acceptance of the proposition that it is impossible to identify the destitute and poor from the others and, therefore, cannot be targeted with differential levels of subsidy due to rampant corruption implies defeat of the system of governance.

Similarly, the argument made by some, under supposedly human right framework, that the public policy must only create institutional and legal framework to guarantee everyone her basic needs and do away with targeted programmes, is rooted in the interest of the middle class who have been pressuring the state to open the doors of anti-poverty programmes for them.

There have been failures in 'managing negative perceptions' of the people regarding the functioning of the government, as admitted at the highest level, but there have been real failures as well. All these have led to distrust and suspicion in public mind for the state apparatus.

This explains why the figure of poverty line, which has gone not only unchallenged but almost unnoticed in the media and civil society for the last four decades, is being used to question the intent and seriousness of the government in addressing the needs of the poor.

The current compulsions of the civil society to take a critical view of the state programmes is understandable, due to the serious trust deficit among different groups that came to the fore during the recent movement against corruption.

However, one expects a more informed analysis of the functioning of the socioeconomic system and public intervention, if the civil society has to play an effective role through the institutionalised channels that are being created in the country.

AMITABH KUNDU, PROFESSOR, JNU


The Economic Times, 15 October, 2011, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/comments-analysis/understanding-the-poverty-line/articleshow/10361103.cms


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