BharatNotes What is Poverty Line (Tendulkar vs Rangarajan)?
The poverty line is the cut-off level of monthly per capita consumption expenditure (MPCE) below which a person is classified as poor. India's two most examined methodologies are the Tendulkar Expert Group (constituted 2005, report November 2009) and the Rangarajan Expert Group (constituted 2012, report June 2014). Both moved beyond the older calorie-intake approach towards a wider basket of food and non-food consumption.
Key methodological shifts
- Tendulkar (2009): Discarded separate calorie norms; adopted a uniform all-India consumption basket with implicit prices, and for the first time included private spending on health and education. The Planning Commission adopted it as the official line.
- Rangarajan (2014): Reintroduced explicit nutritional norms (calories, protein, fat), restored separate rural and urban baskets, and used the independent Modified Mixed Reference Period of the NSSO. It produced a higher line — but the Government never officially adopted it.
The numbers (for 2011-12)
| Parameter | Tendulkar | Rangarajan |
|---|---|---|
| Rural line (per capita per month) | ₹816 | ₹972 |
| Urban line (per capita per month) | ₹1,000 | ₹1,407 |
| Approx. per day (rural / urban) | ₹27 / ₹33 | ₹32 / ₹47 |
| Rural poverty ratio | 25.7% | 30.9% |
| Urban poverty ratio | 13.7% | 26.4% |
| All-India poverty ratio | 21.9% | 29.5% |
(Figures for 2011-12, NSSO 68th round; Tendulkar data per Planning Commission/NITI Aayog Press Note on Poverty Estimates, 2011-12; Rangarajan data per PIB release on the Rangarajan Report, 2014.)
Because Rangarajan set a higher line, it counted far more people as poor — roughly 36.3 crore versus 27 crore under Tendulkar for 2011-12.
Significance
The contrast illustrates a core idea: where you draw the line decides how many are poor. Rangarajan's higher line better captured the real cost of a minimally decent life (health, education, nutrition), while Tendulkar's lower line drew sustained criticism for understating deprivation — the much-debated "₹27 a day" figure.
Current status (as of June 2026)
India has no fresh official poverty line. The Tendulkar-based 21.9% (2011-12) is the last officially released estimate. The 2017-18 Consumption Expenditure Survey was scrapped and not published. With the new Household Consumption Expenditure Survey 2022-23/2023-24 data and NITI Aayog's National Multidimensional Poverty Index (based on health, education and living standards rather than a single income line), policy attention has shifted from a single monetary poverty line towards multidimensional measurement.
UPSC angle: Foundation concept — no single direct PYQ for this exact pairing, but it underpins recurring Prelims committee-matching questions and Mains GS2/GS3 themes on poverty measurement, deprivation, and the move to the Multidimensional Poverty Index. Remember: Tendulkar = lower line, officially adopted; Rangarajan = higher line, never adopted.
