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One issue in particular is how the poor citizens have fared in the last 10 years in India. Many spurious claims have been made, despite the overwhelming evidence that the last 10 years have witnessed a significant rise in consumption per capita; a drastic reduction in poverty; and decline in inequality. Nearly 25 crore people exited multidimensional poverty in the nine-year period between 2013-14 (29.17%) and 2022-23 (11.28%), according to Niti Aayog
Hardeep S Puri
Be it reservations, caste-based divisions, or personal attacks on political leaders, the level of misleading propaganda and outright misinformation in the current general elections is alarming.
One issue in particular is how the poor citizens have fared in the last 10 years in India. Many spurious claims have been made, despite the overwhelming evidence that the last 10 years have witnessed a significant rise in consumption per capita; a drastic reduction in poverty; and decline in inequality. Nearly 25 crore people exited multidimensional poverty in the nine-year period between 2013-14 (29.17%) and 2022-23 (11.28%), according to Niti Aayog.
Data on poverty
The World Poverty Lab, which provides real-time poverty estimates based on official data, reported a few months ago that extreme poverty (less than PPP $2.15) was brought down to less than 3% in India. Bhalla and Bhasin have argued that “high growth and large decline in inequality have combined to eliminate poverty for the PPP $1.9 poverty line…[which] closely corresponds to the official India Tendulkar poverty line.”
The Ayushman Bharat mission has heralded a qualitative change — no longer do families have to submerge themselves indebt to pay for a medical emergency. More than 6.5 cr hospital admissions have been undertaken under the mission
They have also suggested that there has been “an unprecedented decline in both urban and rural inequality. The urban Gini declined from 36.7 to 31.9; the rural Gini declined from 28.7 to 27.0.” Other studies and analyses verify these claims.
‘Garib Kalyan’ or welfarism — from ‘Antyodaya se Sarvodaya’ —has driven this wave of empowerment. Large-scale programmes designed with precision and implemented with speed, minimal leakages, using technology, have been the bulwark behind the ‘saturation of public services’ provided to the poor.
Missions to provide universal access to toilets, electricity, cooking fuel, piped water, and roads have increased consumption, improved health outcomes, and generated jobs.
Before 2014, 45% of people did not have access to clean cooking in rural areas. Of the 10.29 cr gas connections added to achieve saturation, 8 cr were in rural areas.
Before the Jal Jeevan Mission began, access to piped water supply in rural areas was a meagre 16%, but now stands at 76%.
Nearly 12 crore toilets constructed across India have almost completely eliminated open defecation.
The Ayushman Bharat mission has heralded a qualitative change — no longer do families have to submerge themselves indebt to pay for a medical emergency. More than 6.5 cr hospital admissions have been undertaken under the mission.
JAM effect
Despite many challenges thrown at the Modi government, which included the twin balance sheet problem; high informality of the economy; weak global recovery after the global financial crisis; and the pandemic, we have only increased public spending in our tenure. The JAM (Jandhan Aadhar & Mobile) trinity has allowed the government to distribute benefits to the poor directly through linked bank accounts, which themselves have increased in coverage – from around 48% of households in 2014 to 99% now. During the pandemic, we expanded our food support plans through the PM Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana to provide dry rations to 80 cr people at zero cost.
In urban areas, the PM SVANidhi Yojana has sanctioned 88.57 Lakh loans worth more than Rs. 11,300 cr to more than 63 Lakh street vendors and self-employed individuals. These vendors, who were earlier subject to rent seeking, now have allocated vending zones, thus giving them an identity, dignity…
In urban areas, the PM SVANidhi Yojana has sanctioned 88.57 Lakh loans worth more than Rs. 11,300 cr to more than 63 Lakh street vendors and self-employed individuals. These vendors, who were earlier subject to rent seeking, now have allocated vending zones, thus giving them an identity, dignity, access to digital capital, and opportunities to become micro-entrepreneurs.
These achievements paint a vivid picture of transformation. The economically weaker sections of our society now have claim to the trifecta of dignity, connectivity, and prosperity.
Welfare plus growth
Our model of combining welfarism with free enterprise, and with emphasis on capital expenditure on digital and physical infrastructure, has ensured India is in a structurally sound position, poised to leapfrog other economies in the coming years.
In comparison, the opposition has made grand promises like giving Rs. 1 Lakh to one woman of each household, which would cost Rs. 32 Lakh cr annually, almost equal to the entire revenue expenditure of GOI.
On the flip side, countries which have had sustained rates of growth have all thought long-term. PM Modi is perhaps the only global leader who is planning for his nation’s welfare for the next 25 years.
(The writer is Minister of Petroleum &
Natural Gas and Housing & Urban
Affairs, Government of India)