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60% of India’s Rural Population Live Below Rs.35

Recently, the government revealed a survey on income and expenditure of the population in both rural and urban areas of India. The Director General of National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) in the survey report says that about 60% of India’s rural population lives below Rs.35 a day and urban population live on Rs.66 per day.

The 66th round of National Sample Survey (NSS) which is carried out between July 2009 and June 2010, reveals that all India average Monthly Per-capita Consumer Expenditure (MPCE) in rural areas was found Rs.1,054 and in urban areas it was Rs.1,984.

The survey reported that 10% of the population in rural areas lives on Rs.15 a day while in urban areas it was at Rs.20 a day. This 10% of the rural population had an average MPCE of Rs.453 while urban population had an average MPCE of Rs.599. The NSSO survey conducted in both rural areas and urban areas showed that, some states have shown lowest MPCE and some shown highest average MPCE among the other states.

Also, the median level of MCPE was found at Rs.895 in rural and Rs.1,502 in urban India which indicates the consumption level of majority of population in India. Based on these NSSO estimates, Planning Commission had estimated that, poverty line was at Rs.28.65 for urban and at Rs.22.42 for rural population for 2009-10. It is estimated that the population living below poverty line was 35.46 crore in 2009-10 as compared to 40.72 crore in 2004-05.