India Sees 26.9 Crore Exit Extreme Poverty Between 2011 And 2023 As Rate Falls To 5.3 Per Cent, World Bank Data Shows

India has seen a massive drop in extreme poverty over the past decade, with the latest World Bank's latest data revealing that extreme poverty rate in the country dropped sharply from 27.1 per cent in 2011-12 to 5.3 per cent in 2022-23, news agency IANS reported.

The number of Indians living in extreme poverty reduced drastically to 75.24 million in 2022-23 from 344.47 million in 2011-12.

This translates to 269 million Indians rising out of extreme poverty over the span of 11 years, according to the World Bank data.

Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, West Bengal, and Madhya Pradesh—states that had 65 per cent of the nation’s extreme poor in 2011-12—were responsible for two-thirds of the decline by 2022-23.

"In absolute terms, people living in extreme poverty fell from 344.47 million to just 75.24 million," showed latest data from the World Bank, news agency IANS reported.

This gains significance as the decline in extreme poverty India comes despite the World Bank raising its threshold poverty line to $3 a day (daily consumption of less than $3) from the earlier $2.15 a day.

Using the $3 per day poverty threshold (2021 prices), the World Bank observed a broad-based reduction in poverty across both urban and rural India.

Under the older $2.15 per day threshold (2017 prices), India’s extreme poverty rate dropped from 16.2 per cent in 2011-12 to just 2.3 per cent in 2022, according to the World Bank's estimates.

The number of people living below the $2.15-per-day poverty line is recorded at 33.66 million in 2022, down from 205.93 million in 2011, as per the latest data.

The data further showed that this sharp decline was uniformly observed, with rural extreme poverty falling from 18.4 per cent to 2.8 per cent and urban extreme poverty reducing from 10.7 per cent to 1.1 per cent between 2011-12 and 2022-23.

Beyond income poverty, India has also registered notable gains in tackling multidimensional poverty.

The Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) dropped from 53.8 per cent in 2005-06 to 16.4 per cent in 2019-21, and then to 15.5 per cent in 2022-23, according to the data.

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