In a major development reflecting India’s economic strides, the proportion of Indians living in extreme poverty plummeted from 27.1% to just 5.3% between 2011-12 and 2022-23, according to newly released estimates from the World Bank. This dramatic fall means that around 269 million people moved out of extreme poverty in a decade.
The World Bank’s updated global poverty analysis revealed that the number of Indians living in extreme poverty fell from approximately 344 million to 75 million during this time. These findings remain consistent even after applying a stricter methodology, which now sets the extreme poverty line at $3 per day, up from the earlier $2.15, and accounts for revised 2021 Purchasing Power Parities (PPPs).
Five Indian states—Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, West Bengal, and Madhya Pradesh—were responsible for about two-thirds of the overall poverty reduction. In 2011-12, these states had the largest share of India’s extremely poor. Their combined improvement was instrumental in shifting the national poverty narrative.
When assessed using the older $2.15/day standard (based on 2017 price levels), India’s extreme poverty rate declined even more sharply—from 16.2% to 2.3%. This represents a drop in the number of people living below that threshold from about 206 million to 34 million, indicating that 172 million individuals crossed that benchmark.
Furthermore, the poverty threshold for lower-middle-income countries has now been updated to $4.20 per day, up from $3.65. Based on this new measure, the share of Indians living below this line has decreased from 57.7% in 2011-12 to 23.9% in 2022-23. In actual numbers, this drop represents a shift from 732 million to 342 million.
Globally, the World Bank adjusted the international extreme poverty rate for 2022 from 9% to 10.5%, raising the number of people living below the poverty line worldwide from 713 million to 838 million.
