Tomato prices are up through the roof. Retail prices are in the range of Rs 120-150 per kilogram in most mandis across India, making the household vegetable more expensive than petrol. Prices, which at the beginning of the year were in the range of Rs. 25 a kg, have increased by an order of between 500-600 percent.   What does the data show? The National Horticultural Board is a body under the...

The Periodic Labour Force Survey for the January-March quarter of 2023 has revealed that the all India unempolyment rate has declined to 6.8 percent from 8.2 percent in the same quarter a year ago. The unemployment rate for males stood at 6 percent in Jan-Mar 23 (from 7.7 percent a year ago) and for females the rate was 9.2 percent (from 10.1 percent). The report was released yesterday by the...

KEY TRENDS   • Oxfam India's 2023 India Supplement report on poverty and inequality in India reveals that the gap between the rich and the poor is widening. Following the pandemic in 2019, the bottom 50 per cent of the population have continued to see their wealth chipped away. By 2020, their income share was estimated to have fallen to only 13 per cent of the national income and have less than 3...

The National Sample Survey Organization's Multiple Indicator Survey - part of the 78th round - has revealed that only 39.1 percent of all Indian households have access to drinking water within the  dwelling. When it come to cooking, 46.7% of rural households use firewood.  These are some of the findings of the survey whose purpose was to collect data about the indicators of Sustainable Development Goals. Data was collected for households...

The average value of assets (AVA) of the top ten percent of urban households in India is more than seven thousand five hundred times greater than what the bottom ten percent owns. The AVA of the top decile was Rs. 1.5 crores, while the lowest decile owned an average of Rs. 2,000 of assets. The data is part of the All India Debt and Investment Survey - 2019, the survey for...