# **1. Introduction**

This paper provides comprehensive up-to-date estimates of poverty by social and religious groups in the rural and urban areas of the largest 17seventeen states in India. The specific measure of poverty reported in the paper is the poverty rate or head-countratio (HCR), which is the proportion of the population with expenditure or income below a pre-specified level referred to as the poverty line. In the context of most developing countries, the poverty line usually relates to a pre-specified basket of goods presumed to be necessary for above-subsistence existence.

In so far as prices vary across states and between rural and urban regions within the same state, the poverty line varies in nominal rupees across states and between urban and rural regions within the same state.<sup>1</sup> Similarly, since prices rise over time due to inflation, the poverty line in nominal rupees in a given location is also adjusted upwards over time.

The original official poverty estimates in India, provided by the Planning Commission, were based on the Lakdawala poverty lines so named after Professor D. T. Lakdawala who headed a 1993 expert group that recommended these lines. Recommendations of a 2009 expert committee headed by Professor Suresh Tendulkar led to an upward adjustment in the rural poverty line relative to its Lakdawala counterpart. Therefore, whereas the official estimates for earlier years are based on the lines and methodology recommended by the expert group headed by Lakdawala, those for more recent years have been based on the line and methodology recommended by the Tendulkar Committee. Official estimates based on both lines and methodologies exist for only two years, 1993-94 and 2004-05. These estimates are provided for the overall population, for rural and urban regions of each state and for the country as a whole. The Planning Commission does not provide estimates by social or religious groups.

In this paper, we provide estimates using both Lakdawala and Tendulkar lines for different social and religious groups in rural and urban areas in all major states and at the national level. Our estimates based on Lakdawala lines are computed for all years beginning in 1983 for which large or “thick” expenditure surveys have been conducted. Estimates based on the Tendulkar line and methodology are provided for the three latest large expenditure surveys, 1993-94, 2004-05 and 2009-10<sup>2</sup> .

Our objective in writing the paper is twofold. First, much confusion has arisen in the policy debates in India around issues such as whether or not growth has helped the poor; if yes, how much and over which time period; and whether growth is leaving certain social or religious groups behind. We hope that by providing poverty estimates for various time periods, social groups, religious groups, states and urban and rural areas in one place this paper will help ensure that future policy debates are based on fact. Second, researchers interested in explaining how various policy measures impact poverty

> 1 Prices could vary not just between urban and rural regions within a state but also across sub-regions within rural and sub-regions within urban regions of a state.  Therefore, in principle, we could envision many different poverty lines within rural and within urban regions in each state. To keep the analysis manageable, we do not make such finer distinctions in the paper.

> 2 Panagariya and More (2013) use data from the 68th Round of the national Sample Survey and provide results for 2011-2012.