Could the Great Indian Middle Class be the Great Indian Mythical Class? A proposed new international definition of what constitutes the middle class in a developing country has thrown up a startling conclusion by global standards, India has no middle class. Noted economist Nancy Birdsall, president of the Center for Global Development, has proposed a new definition of the middle class for developing countries in a forthcoming World Bank publication,...

It's a myth that the global financial crisis left India virtually unscathed. In fact, India is the biggest victim of financial crisis-induced poverty, according to data obtained by TOI from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs' (UNDESA). Check out these figures. The UNDESA data estimates that the number of India's poor was 33.6 million higher in 2009 than would have been the case if the growth rates...

Angus Deaton, the Princeton economist regarded as world's foremost authority on cross-country income data, has cast serious doubts on the World Bank's last upward revision of global poverty figures and India's statistics are at the centre of the storm. The world became poorer as a result of a combination of India's economic growth and its low poverty line, Deaton, who is president of the American Economic Association, said in his...