The Great Indian Poverty—and Inequality—​Debate

Grand Tamasha

As India heads to the polls, a new chapter is being written in a very old debate about poverty and inequality in India. This debate has been stirred up by the release of new data from a government-sponsored consumption survey, which some have argued shows a massive decline in poverty in India. Others believe that this data are not so unequivocal and point to a widening gap between top income-earners and ordinary Indians.

To make sense of this debate, Milan is joined on the show this week by Maitreesh Ghatak. Maitreesh is a professor of economics at the London School of Economics, where he has been the director of the Development Economics Group at the research centre, STICERD, since 2005. He is a widely respected voice on India’s economic development and has been especially focused, in recent years, on questions of growth, poverty, and inequality.

Milan and Maitreesh discuss the government’s recent consumption survey, contested claims that India has eliminated extreme poverty, and recent inequality trends. Plus, the two discuss the overall health of the macro-economy and the state of India’s statistical system.

Episode notes:

1. Maitreesh Ghatak and Rishabh Kumar, “Poverty in India Over the Last Decade: Data, Debates, and Doubts,” The India Forum, April 10, 2024.

2. Maitreesh Ghatak, “The rise of the affluent is the real India growth story,” Hindustan Times, February 29, 2024.

3. Maitreesh Ghatak, “The simmering debate over poverty rate,” Mint, May 4, 2023.

4. Maitreesh Ghatak, Ramya Raghavan, and Linchuan Xu, “Trends in Economic Inequality in India,” The India Forum, September 19, 2022.

5. Maitreesh Ghatak, “India’s Inequality Problem,” The India Forum, June 23, 2021.

6. “The Crisis in India’s Economic Data (with Pramit Bhattacharya),” Grand Tamasha, February 12, 2020.

7. “Decoding the Indian Economy (with Pranjul Bhandari),” Grand Tamasha, April 3, 2024.