Consider the following statements regarding poverty in India: 1. While determining poverty line in India, a minimum level of food requirement, clothing, footwear, fuel and light, educational and medical requirements, etc. are determined for subsistence. 2. The accepted average calorie requirement in India is 2400 calories per person per day in rural areas and 2100 calories per person per day in urban areas. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a)1 only
- (b)2 only
- (c)Both 1 and 2
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2
Correct — C, Both 1 and 2. Statement 1 describes how the poverty line is constructed in India, and it is accurate. The line is not a wage or an income threshold but the money value of a basket of goods judged necessary for subsistence, and that basket has always been wider than food alone — a minimum food requirement, and alongside it clothing, footwear, fuel and light, and educational and medical needs. That is why the official estimates are made from household consumption expenditure surveys rather than from income data. Statement 2 gives the calorie norm that the textbook treatment attaches to that food component: 2,400 calories per person per day in rural areas and 2,100 in urban areas. The rural figure is the higher of the two because rural work was taken to be physically heavier. Those norms came from the Task Force under Y. K. Alagh in 1979, which produced India's first official poverty line, and they are the numbers a candidate is expected to reproduce.
- (a)1 only — Rejects the calorie norms, which are correctly stated. It is the rural figure that is 2,400 and the urban 2,100, exactly as printed.
- (b)2 only — Rejects the description of the basket, which is also correct. The Indian poverty line has never been food alone; clothing, footwear, fuel and light and educational and medical needs are part of the standard list.
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2 — Both statements are as taught. Neither the composition of the basket nor the calorie norms is misstated here.
India measures poverty by a head-count ratio built from consumption expenditure. A basket of goods judged adequate for subsistence is priced, the resulting figure becomes the poverty line, and households whose monthly per capita expenditure falls below it are counted poor. The line has been redrawn several times — Dandekar and Rath in 1971, the Alagh Task Force in 1979, the Lakdawala Committee reporting in 1993, the Tendulkar Committee in 2009 and the Rangarajan Committee in 2014 — and each revision changed either the basket, the calorie anchor or the way prices are updated.
Both statements here are textbook statements, and the item is testing whether they have been read carefully rather than whether they are contested. The one detail to fix is which calorie figure goes with which area, since a candidate who remembers the pair but not the order has a fifty per cent chance of inverting it; the anchor is that rural work was assumed to be heavier, so the rural norm is the larger number. A present-day qualification worth carrying: the calorie anchor described here is the older methodology. The Tendulkar Committee of 2009, whose approach produced India's last officially adopted estimates, deliberately moved away from tying the poverty line to a calorie norm, and although the Rangarajan Committee of 2014 went back to nutrient norms, its recommendations were never officially adopted. So statement 2 is right as a description of the accepted norm, and it is still what examiners ask for, but it no longer describes how the last official line was actually drawn.
- The poverty line is the money value of a subsistence basket covering food, clothing, footwear, fuel and light, and educational and medical needs.
- The accepted average calorie requirement is 2,400 per person per day in rural areas and 2,100 in urban areas.
- Those norms come from the Alagh Task Force of 1979, which gave India its first official poverty line.
- Poverty is estimated from National Sample Survey consumption expenditure data and reported as a head-count ratio, never from per capita income.
- The Tendulkar Committee of 2009 moved away from a calorie anchor; the Rangarajan Committee of 2014 returned to nutrient norms but was not officially adopted.
- Inverting the two calorie figures. Rural is 2,400 and urban 2,100.
- Believing the poverty line covers food alone; clothing, footwear, fuel and light and educational and medical needs are part of the basket.
- Assuming the calorie anchor is still the official basis. Tendulkar dropped it, and his methodology produced the last adopted estimates.
As a two-statement item on how the line is built, as a committee-to-methodology matching row, or as a straight recall of the calorie norms.
Persons below the poverty line in India are classified as such based on whether
- (a) they are entitled to a minimum prescribed food basket
- (b) they get work for a prescribed minimum number of days in a year
- (c) they belong to agricultural labourer household and the scheduled caste/tribe social group
- (d) their daily wages fall below the prescribed minimum wages
Answer(a) they are entitled to a minimum prescribed food basket
The same principle stated as a single choice — the line is a consumption basket, not a wage, a caste category or a guarantee of employment days.
In a given year in India, official poverty lines are higher in some States than in others because
- (a) poverty rates vary from State to State
- (b) price levels vary from State to State
- (c) Gross State Product varies from State to State
- (d) quality of public distribution varies from State to State
Answer(b) price levels vary from State to State
Follows the basket idea to its logical end. If the line is the money cost of a fixed basket, then wherever that basket costs more the line must be higher — which is why State poverty lines differ within the same year.
Which of the following statements with regard to the Report of Tendulkar Committee (2009) on poverty estimates is/are correct? 1. The Committee had used an all-India urban poverty line basket as a reference to derive both rural and urban poverty levels. 2. The Committee had anchored the poverty line to the official food calorie norms. Select the correct answer using the code given below.
- (a) 1 only
- (b) 2 only
- (c) Both 1 and 2
- (d) Neither 1 nor 2
Answer(a) 1 only
The necessary companion to this item. Two sessions later CDS asks about the very committee that moved away from the calorie anchor — so the norms quoted here are the accepted textbook figures, not the basis of the last official estimates.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The calorie norms of 2,400 per person per day for rural areas and 2,100 for urban areas were laid down by which body?
- (a)The Lakdawala Committee
- (b)The Task Force under Y. K. Alagh
- (c)The Tendulkar Committee
- (d)The Rangarajan Committee
Answer(b) The Task Force under Y. K. Alagh, 1979 — which gave India its first official poverty line.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Official poverty estimates in India are based on data drawn from
- (a)income tax returns
- (b)National Sample Survey consumption expenditure surveys
- (c)the decennial Census
- (d)the Periodic Labour Force Survey
Answer(b) National Sample Survey consumption expenditure surveys — poverty in India is measured by what households spend, not by what they earn.