Karnataka maintains its status as the poorest among the four southern States, according to the data on poverty recently released by an expert committee set by the Planning Commission.
The committee, headed by noted economist Suresh Tendulkar, which has determined a new methodology for estimating the extent of poverty in India, has estimated that a little over one-third of Karnataka’s population lived below the poverty line in 2004-05.
The committee has revised rural poverty levels in India in 2004-05, from 28.3 per cent to 41.8 per cent, a significant upward revision. The committee established the poverty line for 2004-05 at Rs. 417.8 per capita a month for rural Karnataka and at Rs. 588.10 for urban areas of the State. (The poverty line implies a minimum consumption expenditure level required by a person to procure a standardised basket of goods and services to satisfy basic needs.)
Significantly, the head-count ratio of people below the poverty line in Karnataka is far higher than in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In fact, at 33.4 per cent, the poverty ratio is only marginally lower than the national average of 37.2 per cent in 2004-05. Kerala, a clear outlier among Indian States in respect of poverty levels, had a head-count ratio of 19.7 per cent. Karnataka’s position is, in what would appear to be contrary to common perceptions of poverty, in fact closer to States such as Assam and Rajasthan, which are generally regarded to be poorer.
A comparison of the committee’s revised poverty data for 1993-94 and 2004-05 reveals two striking features of Karnataka’s performance in poverty reduction. First, Karnataka has achieved the sharpest reduction among the southern States in the intervening period. The overall head-count fell from 49.5 per cent in 1993-94 to 33.4 per cent in 2004-05. In particular, the head-count ratio in rural Karnataka declined from 56.6 per cent in 1993-94 (which in that year was higher than the national average head-count ratio) to 37.5 in 2004-05.
However, despite this reduction in rural poverty, Karnataka has remained the leader (jointly, with Tamil Nadu) among south Indian States in the matter of rural poverty levels.
Urban poverty stays
The second aspect of the results is that while rural poverty levels declined significantly, the State was unable to effect a significant decline in urban poverty.
