The Niti Aayog recently released its National Multidimensional Poverty Index 2023, according to which the poverty headcount ratio declined from 24.85 percent in 2015-16 to 14.96 percent in 2019-21. In absolute numbers this translates to 135 million people exiting multidimensional poverty in this time period. In addition, a few days earlier, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) released its own Multidimensional Poverty Index, which in a press note said that,...

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...

-Newsclick.in Inequality is not natural but manufactured. It’s time policymakers stopped normalising the wealth and income gap. Else, post-Covid inequality could become a permanent feature. Wealth and income inequality are more than just economic concepts. They also influence education and health outcomes, poverty levels, employment and unemployment rates, opportunities, choices, and, ultimately, happiness. Of late, several reports have investigated the impact of COVID-19 on various segments of society at the regional, national,...

-Newsclick.in The economy faces stagflation. The steps announced by the government are a start. More needs to be done to eliminate supply bottlenecks without curtailing demand. The Government, worried about the inflation rapidly inching up month after month, has finally become pro-active. The steps announced are designed to lower the prices of basics like diesel, steel, cement and plastics. Wholesale Price Index (‘WPI’) has risen at more than ten per cent for...

-Newsclick.in Speaking to NewsClick in a telephone interview on Friday, the Rajya Sabha leader lamented that the Centre has “not accepted even a single recommendation” that was made to it by Standing Committee on Labour in its different reports over the Labour Codes. New Delhi: Communist Party of India (Marxist) Rajya Sabha MP Elamaram Kareem on Friday introduced a Private Member’s Bill that seeks to repeal the contentious four Labour Codes which...