15_Finance_32
15_Finance_32
15_Finance_32
(2010-11)
Ministry of Planning
1
THIRTY SECOND REPORT
Ministry of Planning
2
CONTENTS
Page No
COMPOSITION OF THE COMMITTEE (iii)
INTRODUCTION (v)
REPORT
PART - I
BACKGROUND ANALYSIS
Sl.No Subject
A. Introduction 1
(i) Definition of Poverty Line 1
(ii) Estimation of Poverty 6
(iii) Identification of Below Poverty Line (BPL) 12
(iv) Unit of ‗Household‘ in BPL Census 14
(v) Poverty Alleviation Programmes – Role of BPL 16
Criteria
B. BPL Identification – Criteria 17
(i) Evolution of BPL Criteria 17
(ii) Conducting next BPL Census 26
(iii) Proposed Food Security Act 28
3
(iv) Antyodaya Anna Yojana 45
(v) National Rural Health Mission 46
(vi) Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment 47
Guarantee Act (MGNREGA)
(vii) Monitoring of Welfare Schemes 48
Part II
Recommendations/Observations of the Committee……………………………… 51
ANNEXURES
4
COMPOSITION OF STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE – 2010-2011
MEMBERS
LOK SABHA
RAJYA SABHA
* Nominated to this Committee w.e.f. 28.01.2011 vice Shri Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, ceased
to be a member of the Committee on his resignation from Lok Sabha
5
INTRODUCTION
I, the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance, having been authorized by the
Committee, present this Thirty-Second Report on ‘Appraisal of BPL Criteria‘.
2. The Committee obtained Background note and written information on the subject
from the Ministry of Planning, Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation, Ministry of Rural
Development (Department of Rural Development), Ministry of Statistics and Programme
Implementation and various States and Union Territories.
3. Written views/memoranda were received from Prof. M.H. Suryanarayana, IGIDR,
Mumbai, Dr. Himanshu, JNU, Delhi, Dr. Suranjan Sengupta, Kolkata and Prof. Indrani Gupta, IEG,
Delhi.
4. The Committee, at their sitting held on 31 May, 2010 took evidence of the representatives
of the Ministry of Planning and Ministry of Rural Development (Department of Rural Development).
On 14 July, 2010, the Committee heard the views of Dr. Shubhasis Gangopadhyay, Prof. M.R. Saluja
and Prof. Indrani Gupta on the subject. They also took evidence of the representatives of the Ministry
of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation.
5. The Committee took further evidence of the representatives of the Ministry of
Planning and Ministry of Rural Development (Department of Rural Development) on 29 September,
2010.
6. The Committee, considered and adopted the draft report at their sitting held on 15
March, 2011.
7. The Committee wish to express their thanks to the officials of the Ministry of
Planning, Ministry Rural Development (Department of Rural Development), Ministry of Housing &
Urban Poverty Alleviation for appearing before the Committee and furnishing the requisite material
and information which were desired in connection with the examination of the Bill.
8. The Committee also wish to express their thanks to Prof. M.H. Suryanarayana,
IGIDR, Mumbai, Dr. Himanshu, JNU, Delhi, Dr. Suranjan Sengupta, Kolkata, Prof. Indrani Gupta,
IEG, Delhi. Dr. Shubhasis Gangopadhyay, IDF, Gurgaon and Prof. M.R. Saluja, IDF, Gurgaon, for
placing before them the requisite material and their considered views in connection with the
examination of the subject.
6
Report
Part I
Background Analysis
A. Introduction
7
the methodology for estimation of poverty and to redefine the poverty line, if
necessary. The Expert Group recommended that Task Force Poverty line which
quantified at the national level separately in rural and urban areas be adopted.
Further, the Expert Group disaggregated the National Poverty lines separately in
rural and urban areas into States specific poverty lines in order to reflect the inter
state price differentials.
1.4 Major recommendations of the Expert Group are as follows:
(a) ―The Poverty Line recommended by the Task Force on projection of
minimum needs and effective consumption demand, namely a monthly per
capita total expenditure of Rs.49.09 (rural) and Rs.56.64(urban) rounded
respectively to Rs.49 and Rs.57 at all India level at 1973-74 prices be
adopted as the base line. This was anchored in the recommended per
capita daily intake of 2400 calories in rural areas and 2100 calories in
urban areas with reference to the consumption pattern as obtained in
1973-74. The Group recommends that these norms may be adopted
uniformly for all State.
(b) Given that much systematic work has already been done with the base
1973-74, the Group is in favour of continuing it as the base year for
estimating the poverty line.
(c) State-specific poverty line should be estimated as follows. The
standardised commodity basket corresponding to the poverty line at the
national level should be valued at the prices prevailing in each State in the
base year, i.e., 1973-74. For updating poverty line to the current prices in
a given year, a State-specific consumer price-index needs to be formed.
For this purpose, the observed all-India consumption pattern of the 20 to
30 per cent of the population around the poverty line in 1973-74 should
constitute the State-specific weighting diagram. This diagram should be
used in the construction of State-specific price index over the years using
the disaggregated commodity indices from the consumer price- index for
the agricultural labourers (rural) and consumer price index for the
industrial workers and non- manual employees (urban).
(d) After considering various possible choices for the deflator, the Group
came to the conclusion that it would be most suitable to rely on the
disaggregated commodity indices from Consumer Price Index for
Agricultural Labourers (CPIAL) to update the rural poverty line and a
simple average of suitably weighted commodity indices of consumer price
index for industrial workers (CPIIW) and consumer price index of non-
manual employees (CPINM) for updating the urban poverty line.
(e) Given the updated State-specific poverty lines and the corresponding size
distribution of per capita consumption expenditure (PCTE) of National
Sample Survey (NSS), the number of poor as a percentage of total
population or the poverty ratio should be calculated separately for rural
and urban areas for each State. The absolute number of poor in each
State in rural and urban areas should be calculated by applying the
8
poverty ratio to the estimated population as given by the Registrar General
of Census. The all-India (rural or urban) poverty ratio should be derived as
a ratio of the aggregate number of State-wise poor persons to the total all-
India (rural and urban) population. The implicit all-India poverty line may
be worked out, given the all- India poverty ratio and the all- India
distribution of population by expenditure classes obtained from the same
NSS survey.
(f) (i) The poverty-ratio of Assam has been adopted for Sikkim and the
North-eastern States namely, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram,
Manipur, Nagaland, and Tripura. In case of Manipur, the population
distribution by expenditure classes and the price indices, both are
available. But the use of such information for estimating the incidence of
poverty in Manipur gave poverty ratios which were completely out of line
with the poverty ratios in the other North-Eastern States and also the
numbers and the ratios were not very consistent over the years. This
happened because of the sample size. Hence the Group preferred to
adopt the poverty-ratio of Assam for Manipur also.
(ii) For Goa, Daman and Diu, the poverty line of Maharashtra and the
population distribution by expenditure classes for Goa was used.
(iii) Among the Union Territories, for Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the
poverty -ratio of Tamil Nadu, for Lakshdweep the poverty ratio of Kerala,
for Dadra and Nagar Haveli the poverty-ratio of Goa, and for Pondicherry
the poverty ratio of Tamil Nadu was used. For rural and urban Chandigarh
the Group used the urban poverty-ratio of Punjab‖.
1.5 The estimates of the proportion and number of poor based on the
methodology recommended by this Group are as given below:
Year Rural % of persons Urban % of Combined % of
persons persons
1973-74 56.44 49.23 54.93
1977-78 53.07 47.40 51.81
1983 45.61 42.15 44.76
1987-88 39.06 40.12 39.36
1.6 The Group also suggested certain priority areas for research and data
improvement for improving poverty estimates in future. These are as follows:
(a)―Non -availability of appropriate State-specific cost of living
indices is an important gap in data availability for making
State-specific estimates of poverty. This Group
recommends taking immediate steps to construct the price
indices representing changes in consumer prices of the
poor at relevant disaggregated levels.
(b) The estimates of the poverty-ratio derived from the NSS
9
provide a composite picture of the number of people whose
per capita consumption expenditure is below the level
corresponding to the basket of commodities constituting the
desired minimum. It does not, however, provide a complete
picture of the State of well-being of the population.
Therefore, the estimates of the proportion and number of
poor needs to be supplemented with the assessment of the
following aspects in order to capture a fuller picture of the
living conditions and well being of the poor:
(i) The composition of the poor population in terms of dominant
characteristics, i.e., their distribution by region, social group,
family characteristics (e.g., size, education, age, sex of
household head, dependency ratio) and the way this is
changing over time. Much of this can be done by appropriate
tabulation of NSS employment and consumption survey
data.
(ii) Nutritional status of the population: levels of intake of
principal nutrients, incidence of malnourishment,
anthropometric measurements and activity patterns by age,
sex and socio-economic categories. This can be done by the
National Institute of Nutrition.
(iii) Health status: mortality (overall, infant and child,
maternal); morbidity; access to and use of health services
(public and private) and costs. The quinquennial surveys of
public consumption as well as the mortality indicators based
on the Sample Registration System and the morbidity
surveys of NSS need to be put on a systematic and
continuing basis.
(iv) Educational status: school enrolment by region, sex and
age group and by economic-social class; reach and quality
of public education services and costs. Here again
information from the NSS social consumption enquiries and
the all-India Education Survey suitably restructured would
provide the basic data.
(v) Living Environment: distribution by density of settlement;
living space per head; type of houses; access to safe
drinking water and sanitation; access to amenities (post
office, telephones, railway, pucca road, markets, etc).
© In some aspects like nutrition where basic issues concerning
the concept of under-nourishment and minimum
requirements for healthy active individuals are under
controversy, further research is necessary to improve our
understanding. Besides encouraging improvements in the
range and quality of survey data, the Planning Commission
should also support research on some of these basic issues.
The poverty line is also used for the operational identification
of poor households in order to determine their eligibility for
benefits under targeted anti-poverty schemes notably the
10
IRDP. We believe that, in principle, the improved estimates
we have recommended will make them more usable for this
purpose. In practice, however, it is difficult to estimate or
verify incomes or consumption expenditure at the level of
individual households. In these circumstances, the "first
information' indicator provided by the poverty-ratio under this
methodology needs to be supplemented and corrected with
other indicators - which may also be more readily verifiable
than income or consumption expenditure. This is important
in order to refine targeting so that the ineligible are excluded
from, and the eligible are fully covered in, the intended
benefits from targetted anti-poverty programmes.
(d) At present, the agencies concerned with the implementation
of poverty-alleviation programmes resort to special surveys
to identify the eligible households. Such surveys, besides
being expensive, cannot really give a correct picture
because they may suffer from the reporting bias which arises
when it is known to form the basis for identifying
beneficiaries of Government assistance. Analysis of data
relating to sample households obtained form the NSS can
give us an idea of certain easily identifiable characteristics of
poor households. Such analyses have already been
attempted on a limited scale and they show that the ranks of
the poor tend to have a relatively high concentration of
households with large household size, high-dependency-
ratio and female heads, rural households which do not
cultivate any land, and households belonging to scheduled
castes and scheduled tribes. It should be possible from the
NSS data to estimate,by State and region, separately for
rural and urban areas, the probability of a household being
poor for various values of each of these characteristics taken
individually and in combination. Once this is done, it should
be possible to give guidelines for identifying the poor
households in a given locality of the region in terms of the
value of specified characteristics, information on which is
already available in the population census or can be
collected without much expense. We would urge the
Planning Commission to take the initiative in exploring these
possibilities.‖
1.7 Based on the Expert Group methodology, the poverty lines in 2004-05
at all India level has been calculated by Planning Commission as Rs. 356.30 per
capita per month for rural areas and Rs. 538.60 per capita per month for urban
areas. The State specific rural poverty lines calculated by the Expert Group in 1973-
74 are updated by using state specific Consumer Price Indices of Agricultural
11
Labourers (CPI-AL). Similarly the state specific urban poverty lines are updated by
state specific Consumer Price Indices of Industrial Workers (CPI-IW).
(ii) Estimation of Poverty
1.8 Incidence of poverty is estimated by the Planning Commission on the
basis of the large sample surveys on household consumer expenditure conducted
by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) on a quinquennial basis.
12
1.11 The information collected from each surveyed household has four
parts:
(a) household characteristics other than consumption data such as
number of members, principal household industry and occupation,
social group, land possessed etc.;
(b) member characteristics such as age, sex, educational level, etc.,
collected separately for each members;
(c) data on item wise consumption by household (Total 341 items, 142
food items and 199 non food items); and
(d) possession by the household of certain specified durable goods on the
date of survey.
1.12 Of these, consumption data is the most important and elaborate and
consists of quantity and value of consumption by the household as a whole during a
specified period (reference period) for each of a large number of items which
together cover the entire range of consumer goods and services. No attempt is
made to ascertain person-wise consumption for any item. To reduce recall errors,
and also to take account of heterogeneity in consumption over different parts of the
country and different income levels, the schedule uses a very detailed item break-
up.
Existing methodology of poverty calculation
1.13 For the calculation of income poverty, one need (a) distribution of
households by size of per capita total expenditure that is generated by quinquennial
Consumer Expenditure Survey (CES) conducted by NSSO; (b) exogenously
specified poverty line; and (c) price deflator to update the poverty line to the
prevailing prices in the survey period(s) of CES. The distribution of households by
size of per capita total expenditure is obtained from NSS Consumer Expenditure
Survey (CES). The current poverty estimates are based on 61st round (2004-05)
CES data. However, in 2004-05 distribution of two Monthly Per Capita Consumer
Expenditure (MPCEs), viz., MPCE (URP – Uniform recall period) and MPCE (MRP –
Mixed recall period) were generated by NSS. Hence two poverty ratios, one using
13
MPCE (URP) and other using MPCE (MRP) were computed for each state and
sector combination and presented by Planning Commission.
1.14 Accordingly the estimates of poverty were worked out by the Planning
Commission for the years 1973-74, 1977-78, 1983, 1987-88, 1993-94 and 2004-05.
On the basis of the poverty line of Rs. 356.30 for rural areas and Rs. 538.60 for
urban areas in the year 2004-05, the percent of population below poverty line for
rural, urban and all India during 2004-05 was estimated at 28.3%, 25.7% and 27.5%.
However these estimates came in for sharp criticism as the poverty line did not allow
the consumption of required calorie norms and the periodic price corrections, carried
out to update the poverty lines were found to be inadequate and inappropriate.
Therefore the Planning Commission constituted an Expert Group under the
Chairmanship of Prof. Suresh D. Tendulkar in 2005 to review the methodology for
estimation of poverty.
14
based estimates of consumption expenditure as the basis for future
poverty lines as against the previous practice of using Uniform
Reference Period estimates of consumption expenditure.
4. Underlying consumption poverty line is the reference poverty line
basket (PLB) of household goods and services consumed by those
households at the borderline separating the poor from the non
poor. In the interest of continuity as well as in view of the
consistency with broad external validity checks with respect to
nutritional, educational and health outcomes, it was decided to
recommend MRP equivalent of urban PLB corresponding to 25.7
per cent urban headcount ratio as the new reference PLB to be
provided to rural as well as urban population in all the states after
adjusting it for within state urban relative to rural and rural and
urban state relative to all India price differentials.
5. It may be noted that while the new poverty lines have been arrived
at after assessing the adequacy of private household expenditure
on education and health, the earlier calorie anchored poverty lines
did not explicitly account for these. The proposed poverty lines are
in that sense broader in scope.
6. It may be noted that although those near the poverty line in urban
areas continue to afford the original calorie norm of 2100 per capita
per day, their actual observed calorie intake from 61st Round of
NSS is 1776 calories per capita. This actual intake is very close to
the revised calorie intake norm of 1770 per capita per day currently
recommended for India by the Food and Agriculture Organization
(FAO). Actual observed calorie intake of those near the new
poverty line in rural areas (1999 calories per capita) is higher than
the FAO norm.
7. The proposed reference PLB is situated also in the latest available
data on the observed consumption patterns from the household
consumer expenditure survey of NSS for the year 2004-05 and
takes into account all items of consumption (except transport and
conveyance) for construction of price indices. Separate allowance
for private expenditure on transport and conveyance has been
made in the recommended poverty lines.
8. The proposed price indices are based on the household level unit
values (approximated price data) obtained from the 61st round
(July 2004 to June 2005) of NSS on household consumer
expenditure survey for food, fuel and light, clothing and footwear at
the most detailed level of disaggregation and hence much closer to
the actual prices paid by the consumers in rural and urban areas.
Price indices for health and education were also obtained from unit
level data from related National Sample Surveys. The
recommended price indices take care of most of the criticisms of
the earlier population segment specific consumer price indices with
outdated base used for updating poverty lines. An added and a
significant advantage is that the recommended procedure permits
the derivation of new poverty lines and the corresponding
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headcount ratios for all the states including the north eastern
states. In the judgment of the Expert Group, these advantages
outweigh the problem of ignoring the quality differences in
consumption of commodities across households that is involved in
equating unit values with approximated prices.
9. The new poverty lines seek to enable rural as well as urban
population in all the states to afford the recommended all-India
urban PLB after taking due account of within-state rural-urban and
inter-state differentials (rural and urban) incorporating observed
consumer behaviour both at the all India and state levels.
10. The new poverty lines have been generated for all the states
including the north eastern states. However, in the absence of
adequate data, the expert group has suggested use of poverty line
of the neighbouring states for union territories‖.
1.16 The all-India rural headcount ratio using the recommended procedure
is 41.8 per cent in comparison with 28.3 per cent. The expert group re-estimated
poverty for states and all India for 2004-05. A preliminary exercise for 1993-94 has
been carried out by the Expert Group to facilitate a broad two point comparison of
changes in headcount ratios. By this exercise, poverty at all India level in 1993-94
was 50.1% in rural areas, 31.8% in urban areas and 45.3% in the country as a whole
as compared to the 1993-94 official estimates of 37.2 per cent rural, 32.6 per cent
urban and 36.0 per cent combined.
1.17 On the basis of above methodology, the all-India rural poverty
headcount ratio for 2004-05 is estimated at 41.8 %, urban poverty headcount ratio at
25.7% and all India level at 37.2%. Tendulkar Committee’s estimates are, however,
not strictly comparable to the present official poverty estimates because of different
methodologies. The divergent estimates for 1993-94 and 2004-05 are given below.
Poverty Ratios
1993-94 2004-05
Year Rural Urban Total Rural Urban Total
Planning 37.3 32.4 36.0 28.3 25.7 27.5
Commission (URP)
Tendulkar 50.1 31.8 45.3 41.8 25.7 37.2
Estimates (2004-
05) (MRP)
16
N.B.: 1. URP = URP consumption = Uniform Recall Period consumption in which the consumer
expenditure data for all the items are collected from 30-day recall period.
2. MRP = MRP consumption = Mixed Recall Period consumption in which the consumer expenditure
data for five non-food items, namely, clothing, footwear, durable goods, education and institutional
medical expenses are collected from 365-day recall period and the consumption data for the
remaining items are collected from 30-day recall period.
1.18 Following major departures were suggested by the Expert group from
the earlier methodology followed by Lakdawala Committee:
i. Moved away from calorie anchor but included the adequacy of actual
food expenditure near the poverty line to ensure certain aggregates
like nutritional outcomes.
ii. No discrimination between the rural and the urban population and
recommended to provide a uniform Poverty Line Basket (PLB) based
in the latest available observed household consumption data to both
the rural and urban populations.
iii. Recommended a price adjustment procedure that is predominantly
based in the same data set that underlines the poverty estimation. This
has been proposed to correct for the problems associated with
externally generated population segment specific price indices with
outdated price and weight base used so far in the official poverty
estimations.
iv. Recommended to incorporate an explicit provision in price indices for
private expenditure on health and education which has been rising
over time and test for their adequacy to ensure certain desirable
educational and health outcomes.
1.19 The report of the Expert Group has been accepted by the Government.
Planning Commission is going to issue a press note on identification of the poor.
1.20 In a post evidence submission, the Ministry of Housing and Urban
Poverty Alleviation have apprised the Committee about their comments on findings
of urban poverty by Expert Group headed by Tendulkar, which were forwarded to
Planning Commission which are stated as below:
―The report submitted by the Tendulkar Committee accepts the urban
poverty ratio at 25.7 per cent, while it increases the figure for rural
17
poverty to 41.8 per cent on the basis of a uniform Poverty Line Basket
(PLB)… the figures for rural poverty have mainly increased due to the
adjustment process that basically takes care of the expenditure on
health, education and other non-food items by the poor due to the fact
that public provision on these accounts in rural areas have not kept
pace. Similar adjustment, however, has not been done for urban areas
because the urban poverty figures have been taken on ―as is given
basis‖ as reference for computation of rural poverty… urban poverty
also needs redefinition and adjustment, especially if we accept the
Tendulkar Committees‘ own argument that ―the composition of the
minimal basket of human needs that the society would expect every
citizen to satisfy may be expected to keep expanding with economic
and social progress in society‖. We do know from simple everyday
knowledge that there have been changes in the consumption
behaviour and consumption patterns of residents in cities, with housing
shortages and high level of house rents, especially for EWS and LIG
categories and with shrinking access to free health, education and
rising transportation costs. Expenditure on account of education,
health, housing and transport that the urban people are required to
spend are proportionately much more as compared to their rural
counterparts. Therefore, the assumption that urban poverty figure of
25.7 per cent is acceptable while observing that for the same reasons
rural poverty figures need readjustment requires a thorough re-
examination… Further, in case of housing, transport, conveyance, rent
etc. adjustments have been done by the Tendulkar committee by
taking into account data from NSSO on actual expenditures. However,
whether these actual expenditures are adequate to meet the minimum
basic needs on these counts have not been examined… Another
issue is whether abandoning the calorie norm is a wise step. It is true
that calorie intakes were poorly correlated with nutritional outcomes.
However, abandoning the calorie norm altogether appears to be a
controversial proposition. It is unclear whether there is any robust
basis, theoretical or empirical, for this relationship to hold at all in the
years to come.‖
18
in urban areas, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation is the nodal
agency which issues guidelines for carrying out house to house survey by the
States/Union Territories on the basis of State specific poverty lines indicated by
Planning Commission.
Expert Group to advise the Ministry of Rural Development on the methodology for
conducting the BPL Census for 11th Five Year Plan
1.24 For conducting the BPL Census for the Eleventh Five Year Plan, the
Ministry, on 12th August, 2008, constituted an Expert Group, which could advise it on
the suitable methodology. The Expert Group submitted its report on 21 st August
2009 under chairmanship of Dr. N. C. Saxena. This Group suggested automatic
exclusion and inclusion criteria on the basis of which families will be selected which
will be again ranked on the basis of points given for such characteristics as caste,
tribal groups, employment and health status etc.
1.25 The report of the Expert Group has been circulated by the Ministry of
Rural Development to the State Governments/UTs and the concerned Central
Ministries for their comments.
19
(iv) Unit of „Household‟ used in BPL Census
1.26 As per the instructions issued by the Ministry of Rural Development for
BPL Census 2002, a household is defined as a group of persons who commonly
reside together and would take their meals from a common kitchen, unless the
exigencies of work prevented any of them doing so. The household may comprise of
persons related by blood or of unrelated persons or combination of both.
1.27 As an effort to make the system of identifying the BPL families in the
rural areas more accurate, methodology for conducting the BPL Census is examined
and reviewed from time to time.
1.28 The Expert Group headed by N.C.Saxena had also recommended the
following definition of household for the BPL Census:
A joint family comprising all adults and children who eat from a common
hearth and reside under a common roof.
However for the purpose of inclusion and survey (but not exclusion), within
households which may even share a kitchen and roof, the following will be
treated as separate households:
o a single woman;
o old individuals or couples in which one or both are beyond the age of 60
years
o every adult with TB, leprosy, disability, mental illness or HIV AIDS with
spouse and children; and
o bonded labourers with spouse and children.
In case a minor has these afflictions, his/her parents and siblings will
constitute the household. This logic will also apply to bonded child workers.
1.29 The Ministry has consulted with experts and States and it has been
decided to conduct a pilot survey to arrive on the methodology for the forthcoming
BPL Census which will also include definition of households.
BPL Census for urban areas
1.30 In respect of BPL in urban areas, the guidelines issued by Ministry of
Housing and Poverty Alleviation (HUPA) for identification of BPL families in urban
areas are relevant. These stipulate that house to house survey is to be carried out
20
by the States/UTs. for identification of genuine beneficiaries on the basis of State
specific poverty lines indicated by Planning Commission from time to time. During
door to door survey focus has to be on slums and low income settlements. The
model formats & general guidelines for conducting slum survey, household survey
and livelihood survey are issued by Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation
(HUPA). In addition to economic criteria of urban Poverty Line, non- economic
parameters are also suggested to be applied for identification of urban poor. The
States and UTs have the flexibility to use the parameters of their choice to identify
urban poor for providing assistance under poverty alleviation programmes on priority
basis.
1.31 Keeping in view the need to review and revisit the methodology for
identification of urban poor, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation
(HUPA) had requested the Planning Commission to initiate efforts. Accordingly, the
Planning Commission has constituted an Expert Group recently to recommend
suitable methodology for identification of BPL families in urban areas under the
chairmanship of Prof. S.R. Hashim, Ex-Member, Planning Commission vide
notification dated 13th May 2010. The Terms of Reference of the Expert Group are:
(i) To recommend appropriate detailed methodology with simple, transparent
and objectively measurable indicators to identify Below Poverty Line (BPL)
households in Urban Areas for providing assistance under various schemes
targeted at the urban poor.
(ii) To recommend periodicity for the conduct of BPL Survey in Urban Areas or
the mechanisms to review such BPL list;
(iii) To recommend suitable institutional mechanism for the conduct of BPL
survey, survey questionnaire, processing of data, training, validation and
approval of urban BPL list at various levels;
(iv) To recommend suitable institutional mechanism to address grievances of
public on exclusion/ inclusion in the urban BPL list.
(v) Any other suggestions/recommendations to make the exercise of Urban BPL
survey simple, transparent and acceptable.
21
1.32 Initially the Group was given four months period for submitting the
report, which has now been extended and the Group is expected to submit its report
by 12 January, 2011.
22
1.36 Major shortcomings/problems which were highlighted during the
examination of this subject included multiple indicators/criteria used for identification
of poor, divergence of official estimates of poverty ratio with the actual incidence of
poverty, use of different methodologies for estimation and identification of poverty,
restricting the identification of poor in States to the cap fixed by the Planning
Commission, lack of proper implementation of various welfare schemes directed to
poor etc. The Committee have examined these issues in detail in subsequent
sections.
2.0 The Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) was the first
programme targeted to rural poor and aimed at providing self employment to the
poor through acquisition of productive assets or appropriate scheme which would
generate additional income on a sustained basis to enable them to cross the poverty
line. It was launched in 1980 in all the blocks of the country. Rural families having
annual income below Rs. 4800 were to be assisted under IRDP. But families with
an annual income upto Rs. 3500 were to be assisted first. Thus the focus was
centred on poorest of the poor. However, no census or survey was carried out to
identify poor families. It was found later that a large number of ineligible people got
benefits of this programme. Therefore the issue of devising criteria to identify poor
assumed great significance. With the objective of identifying poor, the Ministry of
Rural Development has conducted three BPL Census in rural areas since 1992. It
also provides technical assistance, in shape of methodology and guidelines, survey
instrument, training etc. to the States and UTs to conduct the BPL Census.
2.1 The BPL survey of 1992 used income criterion to determine poverty.
This survey determined the poor using the family based income level of Rs. 11000
per year. However this criterion could not reflect the true picture of poverty. In the
next BPL census of 1997 consumption criteria was adopted to identify poor. Also
exclusion criteria was used to rule out ineligible families in the first place. This
Census was also criticized for the use of exclusion criteria.
23
2.2 For the BPL census of 2002, the Ministry of Rural Development
adopted a methodology of score- based ranking of household, as suggested by an
Expert Group, headed by Dr. P. L. Sanjeev Reddy. Thirteen socio economic
indicators were used to identify the poor families. These were:
1. Land holding
2. Type of House
3. Availability of Clothing
4. Food Security
5. Sanitation
6. Ownership of consumer durables
7. Literacy status of highest literate
8. Status of Household Labour
9. Means of Livelihood
10. Status of Children
11. Type of indebtedness
12. Reason for migration
13. Preference for Assistance
2.3 For each of these thirteen indicators, the households are awarded
scores in a five-point scale from 0 to 4. The scores are inversely related to the
poverty and deprivation of the household. A low score indicates a higher level of
poverty and deprivation and vice-versa. For each household, the scores from these
13 indicators are summed up to get the aggregate score of the household. The
aggregate score of a household can range from a minimum of zero to a maximum of
52. The households are arranged in ascending order to get BPL List with the State
wise upper limits defined by the poverty ratios released by the Planning
Commission.
2.4 However, using this criterion, errors of inclusion and exclusion far
exceeded the acceptable limits. One of the important feature of the guidelines issued
for BPL census 2002 was to put the ceiling on the number of BPL households to be
identified in conformity with the poverty estimates of Planning Commission. The
State Governments were asked to select the poorest households such that the total
percentage of such families did not cross the limit fixed by Planning Commission.
24
However several States selected more than this limit and many of them objected to
the cap imposed by the Planning Commission.
2.5 During the examination of the Demands for Grants (2010-11), the
Ministry of Planning explained the reasons for divergence in variation in the
estimates of BPL population as brought by the State Governments, Ministry of Rural
Development and the Planning Commission, as under:-
―It may be clarified that Planning Commission is the nodal agency to
estimate poverty in the country. The Ministry of Rural Development
undertakes an exercise through the States and UTs to identify the BPL
families in the rural areas for targeting them under its various
programmes which is different from estimation of poverty. For BPL
census 2002 conducted by the Ministry of Rural Development, the
States were provided enough flexibility to identify the number of BPL
households in rural areas. The States were given the option to identify
the number of BPL families equal to the poverty estimates of 1999-
2000 or the adjusted share worked out by the Planning Commission,
whichever is higher. Further, additional 10% was allowed to account
for the transient poor‖.
25
report on 21st August 2009 under chairmanship of Dr. N. C. Saxena. This group
suggested a higher percentage of poverty, as stated below:
―The percentage of rural population that is poor, and is not able to
satisfy the minimum required calorie needs, nor is able to consume the
minimum cereal required for healthy living, is far greater than the
present cut-off line of 28.3%. The Committee would therefore strongly
recommend that the percentage of people entitled to BPL status
should be drastically revised upwards to at least 50%, though the
calorie norm of 2400 would demand this figure to be about 80%.”
Automatic exclusion
The households which fulfill any one of the following conditions will not be
surveyed for BPL status:
a) Families who own double the land of the district average of the agricultural
land per agricultural household if partially or wholly irrigated (3 times if
completely un-irrigated).
b) Families who have three or four wheeled motorized vehicles, such as jeeps,
SUVs etc.
c) Families who have at least one mechanized farm equipment, such as
tractor, power tiller, thresher, harvester, etc.
d) Families who have any person who is drawing a salary of over Rs. 10,000
per month in non-government/ private organizations or is employed in
government (including para-statals) on a regular basis with pension or
equivalent benefits.
e) Income tax payers.
Automatic inclusion
The following would be compulsorily included in the BPL list:
a) Designated Primitive Tribal Group
b) Designated most discriminated against SC groups, called ‗Maha Dalit
Groups‘, if so identified by the state
26
c) Single women headed households
d) Households with disabled persons as bread-earner
e) Household headed by a minor
f) Destitute households which are dependent predominantly on alms for
survival
g) Homeless households
2.10 An expert, Prof. Indrani Gupta, in her note submitted to the Committee
stated that at present there are two approaches for identification of poor; one
suggested by Shri N.C. Saxena and other suggested by Jean Dreze and Reetika
Khera. The approach of Dreze and khera has been stated as follows:
27
suggests binary scoring, which is giving a single mark to each of the
five indicators. Anyone with even one score gets a BPL card and two
scores get an Antyodaya card. The experts also suggest an option of
exclusion based on three other criteria; one, possession of car,
refrigerator, colour TV, scooters, and landline phone; second, having
piped water, power and flush toilet; and thirdly, ownership of multi-
room house or multi-storied house.‖
28
registration moves to completion. Since the Unique Identification will
not, in itself, have information on people‘s poverty status, these kinds
of tailoring of information will need to be added on to the UID System.
Further, since households do move in and out of BPL status there has
to be provision for updating on information. However, it is not
necessary to wait for the entire UID System to be in place to begin the
switch to the coupons system. This is because even our current
method of rations relies on ration shops having with them lists of BPL
customers whom they are meant to serve. So some identification of
BPL citizens is already available and this can be used to hand over
coupons to these individuals.‖
29
Ratio of total household members to the total working members: While
the inclusion criteria of landless household with no adult educated
beyond class V is useful, it may not be sufficient if the same household
members happen to be engaged in some economically productive
occupation or are self-employed. Instead, the criterion could look at
the ratio of total household members to the total working members in
the household. For example, if the household size is 8 and there are
only 2 working members, this ratio would be 4, i.e. 4 members to be
supported by each working member.
Dependency ratio: (a) the number of children and (b) the number of
elderly per earning household member, which would indicate the
economic strain on a household. These are also useful indicators
because these would in turn determine to a certain extent the
additional burden emanating from schooling of children and ill health of
children but especially the elderly, the latter due to chronic conditions.
In fact the demographic composition of the household along with
information on work status is going to remain a key variable for
identification of vulnerable households.
Operational methodology
30
Whether household has any large debts (a cut off for the
amount may be decided)
Whether sold one or more of the following in the last one year:
o Land
o House
o Farm animals
o Agricultural implements
o Jewellery
31
Should not be a disincentive (rules out indicators such as child
labour, availability of toilets etc.)
Should be stable in the medium run if not in the long run
(ownership of durables)
It should be verifiable using secondary data such as land, using
visual inspection such as housing characteristics, using
community institutions such as Gram Sabha or Panchayats‖
2.17 In the pilot survey, the Ministry would take recommendations of Dr.
N.C. Saxena led Expert Group as reference point and various other parameters
suggested by States/UTs and experts to arrive at most suitable methodology. The
32
pilot would be conducted in around 260 villages, selected from list of sample villages
of NSSO for 66th round, of almost all the States. A PRA exercise to corroborate the
results of pilot survey will also be carried out.
2.18 When the Committee pointed out that there was delay in conducting
next BPL Census, the Secretary, Ministry of Rural Development, while tendering
evidence on 31.5.2010, stated as below:
―We will start the BPL census in the year 2011, that is, as soon as the
main census 2011 is concluded. One novel feature in this is that we have
tied up with the Unique Identity Authority, and we are also having a
census together with them so that the exercise is not repeated and every
BPL person in the rural area is able to have a UID number straightaway.
Another feature in it is that we propose to use the households listed by the
census operations, so that we do not have to repeat the exercise.
However, there is a debate going on as to what should be the definition of
the household that should be taken, namely, whether it should be the
census household or whether it should be a further nuclear household. We
will be able to conclude it only when we have seen the results of the pre-
testing. This is in summary the measures that we have taken, and we are
open to guidance from this hon. Committee.‖
―The BPL pilot survey is at a very advanced stage right now. It has
already been completed in most of the States. We hope that by the
end of next week or so, most of the States would have completed the
survey. There is a different methodology now. It is called the Rural
People‘s Participation Appraisal. So, that is the alternative method
which has evolved very recently, particularly for doing this kind of a
survey. That is very useful. So, we want to corroborate whatever the
findings are there on the basis of the survey by this methodology.‖
33
―You are absolutely right that this 37.2 per cent is somewhat applicable
and not applicable, but the Ministry of Rural Development is saying
that because Tendulkar was requested to suggest the methodology
based on the consumption pattern and they have come up with the
figure of 37.2 per cent for 2004-05. Right now, the Ministry of Rural
Development is trying to do for 2010. You are absolutely right that the
figure that they would come up with after the pilot survey could be
different.‖
2.21 Asked about the status of proposed Food Security Act and target
group, the Planning Commission, in their written submission, informed as under:
―The issue of proposed legislation on Food Security has been
referred to the Empowered Group of Ministers (EgoM) which has
discussed it during its meetings. The National Advisory Council
(NAC) is also examining the matter and final view will emerge after
the consultation process is completed. The decision on the
magnitude of population to be covered under the proposed
legislation has been one of the issues discussed by the EgoM.
There may be different approaches such as adopting a targeted
approach, or universalizing the food security keeping in view the
impact of food subsidy, availability of food grains stocks and
efficient public distribution system etc. For identification of targeted
beneficiaries under the proposed legislation, the Ministry of Rural
Development is working on finalizing the methodology for
identification of BPL households for the rural areas and the
Planning Commission has constituted an Expert Group under the
chairmanship of Prof S.R. Hashim for the urban areas. The Ministry
of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution has already
circulated a concept note on the proposed legislation and also held
consultations with the State governments.‖
34
C. Divergence between estimated and identified population Below
Poverty Line (BPL)
3.1 The poverty ratio at the national level for the year 1993-94 and 2004-
05 are as given below:
Percentage and Number of Poor
Poverty Ratio (%) Number of Poor (million)
Year Rural Urban Total Rural Urban Total
1973-74 56.4 49.0 54.9 261.3 60.0 321.3
1977-78 53.1 45.2 51.3 264.3 64.6 328.9
1983 45.7 40.8 44.5 252.0 70.9 322.9
1987-88 39.1 38.2 38.9 231.9 75.2 307.1
1993-94 37.3 32.4 36.0 244.0 76.3 320.3
2004-05 28.3 25.7 27.5 220.9 80.8 301.7
35
Survey 2008-09, brought out that based on the calculations on data on household
consumption expenditure for 2004-05 (NSS 61st round-2004-05), the population with
less than Rs 20 per day per capita consumption expenditure was 60.5% only. In any
case, the above observation in the report of National Commission for Enterprises in
the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS) is based on the criterion which is different from
the poverty line adopted by the Planning Commission. The Saxena Committee
which was constituted to recommend a suitable methodology for identification of
rural poor suggested assuming poverty ratio at national level as 50% merely relying
on the criteria of calorie intake. There has been a consistent decrease in the calorie
intake among all the sections of the society over the years. Therefore, merely relying
on the criteria of calorie intake for defining a poverty line is a debatable issue. The
World Bank poverty estimates of 41.6% are based on the world poverty line of $
1.25 per capita per day income at 2005 prices. The Tendulkar Committee which was
constituted by the Planning Commission to look into all these issues has
recommended to adopt a new Poverty Line Basket (PLB) and thus, redefined the
poverty line which gives the poverty ratio of 37.2% in 2004-05.
36
―Planning Commission is the nodal agency in the Government of India
to release the Official Poverty Estimates. A time series estimates of
poverty since 1973-74 have been released by the Planning
Commission. The other agencies/Committees have indicated different
numbers based on different assumptions, perceptions and context. Till
now the official estimates released by Planning Commission have
been based on the methodology recommended by the Expert Group
(Lakdawala Committee). Now the Tendulkar Committee has given its
recommendations and once a decision is taken, there will be a uniform
methodology for estimation of poverty and there are no contradictions.‖
37
3.6 The above table shows wide divergence in the total number of BPL
population from the estimates of Planning Commission. In reply to a query of the
Committee on reasons for divergence of estimates of Planning Commission and
those of State Governments, the Ministry of Planning, in their post evidence written
submission, stated as under:
―While the estimation of poverty is done by the Planning Commission
based on the poverty line defined by the Expert Group (Lakdawala
Committee), the Ministry of Rural Development identifies the BPL
households in the rural areas through the state governments and UT
administrations. The last BPL census to identify the rural BPL households
was conducted in 2002 and it is reported that the states and UTs have
identified 5.51 crore households as BPL in the rural areas. The estimation
of poverty and identification of BPL households are two separate
exercises‖.
3.7 The Planning Commission uses the poverty ratio of Assam for
estimating poverty in Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Manipur,
Nagaland and Tripura. Poverty line of Maharashtra and expenditure distribution of
Goa is used to estimate poverty ratio of Goa. Poverty ratio of Tamil Nadu is used for
Pondicherry and Andaman and Nicobar island. Urban Poverty ratio of Punjab has
been used for both rural and urban poverty of Chandigarh. Poverty line of
Maharashtra and expenditure distribution of Dadra and Nagar Haveli is used to
estimate poverty ratio of Dadra and Nagar Haveli. Poverty ratio of Goa is used for
Daman and Diu. Poverty ratio of Kerala is used for Lakshadweep. Annexure –I
shows the poverty ratio of various States estimated by the Planning Commission in
2004-05.
3.8 When the Committee pointed out the variation in estimates of poverty
in North Eastern States and desired to know the reasons for estimation done on the
basis of sample data of Assam, the Member Secretary, Planning Commission,
deposed before the Committee as follows:
―I will come to the point about Tripura and about other North Eastern
States depending on the data from Assam. The point about the
inadequacy and veracity or the correctness of statistics in our country
continues to be a tremendous problem.
Sir, as regards the North Eastern States, I have actually checked up
with my officers. They have to rely on Assam data because either the
data is not available or the sample size of the NSSO is so small as to
38
be virtually unusable. It is not statistically significant, and it is here I
want to start at the last issue about the applicability of Assam data to
eight States. Sir, in fact to any reasonable person‘s mind, this is not the
really correct thing to do.‖
―It may be pointed out that the poverty line approach has its limitations.
Even the report of the Expert Group (Lakdawala) accepts it and
acknowledged that the poverty line is not a true indicator of
malnourishment which it might be mistaken for. It also acknowledges
that the poverty line may not capture important aspects of poverty such
as ill health, low educational attainments, geographical isolation,
powerlessness in civil society, caste or gender based disadvantages
and so on. Furthermore, the per capita NSDP may not truly represent
the incidence of poverty in a state.‖
39
interpretation of household which is different in the case of secondary
data but is different for operational purposes.
Cross check with secondary data (National Sample Survey/National
Family Health Survey/District Level Household and Facility Survey)
suggest that majority of exclusion/inclusion errors are attributable to
implementation problems and not so much because of design
problems. However there are some design problems which need to be
improved.‖
3.12 When asked whether economic census will be more effective in better
projection of poverty in the Country, the Ministry, in their written submission, stated
as under:
40
D. Implementation of Welfare Schemes for the Poor
4.0 At present 139 Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) with a total outlay
of Rs. 157051.40 crore are being operated, out of which three schemes are being
operated by the Ministry of Rural Development for directly benefiting the BPL in rural
areas. The Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation administers one
scheme, namely Swarna Jayanti Shahari Rozgar Yojana (SJSRY) for improving the
condition of urban BPL. The performance of these programmes since 2007-08 is as
given below:
PERFORMANCE OF MAJOR PROGRAMMES
(Rs. in Crores)
Swaranjayanti Indira Awaas National Swarna
Gram Yojana (IAY) Social Jayanti
Swarozgar – Ministry of Assistance Shahari
Yojana Rural Programme Rozgar
(SGSY) – Development (NSAP) – Yojana
Ministry of Ministry of (SJSRY) –
Rural Rural Ministry of
Development Development Housing and
Urban
Poverty
Alleviation
Eleven (06-07) 15740.53 23767.92 15691.00 1547.26
Plan
Project (Current 17803.00 26882.21 17746.98 1750.00
41
(i) Welfare Schemes for Rural Poor
4.1 The Ministry of Rural Development implements three programme for
the benefit of BPL Households. These are Swaranjayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana
(SGSY) which is a self employment programme, Indira Awaas Yojana (IAY)
providing assistance to BPL households for housing and National Social Assistance
Programme (NSAP).
42
to be shared between centre and state, except for north eastern states, in the ratio of
75:25. The ratio of sharing of funds between Centre and north eastern states
including Sikkim is 90:10.
43
(PLR), will be provided to the poor households for every loan accessed from
the banks, up to a limit of Rs 1 lakh per household.
It is proposed to provide flexibility to the States for formulating their own
poverty alleviation plans on the basis of available resources and skills.
It is now proposed to make special projects as a subset of NRLM and
earmarking 20% of allocation for special projects.
Presently evaluation of SGSY is done by commissioning studies through
NIRD and other reputed organizations and the programme is monitored
through online Monthly Progress Report, regular meetings of the Performance
Review Committee, visit by Area Officers and the mechanism of DLMs
(District Level Monitors), NLMs (National Level Monitors) etc. In addition to
these, NRLM will put in place a (i) a comprehensive MIS encompassing
database of SHG profiles, federations, training institutions and activities,
placements of trained beneficiaries, marketing of products etc., (ii), concurrent
and mid-term evaluations, (iii) social accountability practices like social audits
etc. to facilitate monitoring & bring in transparency in program
implementation.
A mission approach will enable time bound achievement of the goals of
N.R.L.M.
NRLM will have partnerships with:
a) Civil Society Organizations
b) Industries
c) Educational Institutions
d) Other resource organizations.
4.5 With a view to meeting the housing needs of the rural poor, Indira
Awaas Yojana (IAY) was launched in May 1985 as a sub-scheme of Jawahar
Rozgar Yojana. It is being implemented as an independent scheme since 1 January
1996. The Indira Awaas Yojana aims at helping rural people below the poverty-line
belonging to SCs/STs, freed bonded laboureres and non-SC/ST categories in
44
construction of dwelling units and up gradation of existing unserviceable kutch
houses by providing grant-in-aid.
Under IAY, a rural Below Poverty Line(BPL) family is given grant of Rs. 45000/-
in plain areas and Rs.48,500/- in hilly/difficult areas for construction of a house.
IAY houses have also been included under the Differential Rate of Interest (DRI)
scheme for lending by Nationalized Banks upto Rs.20,000/- per unit at an
interest rate of 4% in addition to financial assistance provided under IAY.
The criteria for allocation of IAY funds to the States & UTs involves assigning
75% weightage to housing shortage and 25% to poverty ratio. The allocation
amongst districts is based on 75% weightage to housing shortage and 25%
weightage to SC/ST component.
In order to introduce transparency in selection of beneficiaries permanent IAY
waitlists have to be prepared gram panchayat wise by the States/UTs. These
lists contain the name of deserving BPL families who need IAY houses in order
of their poverty status based on the BPL list 2002.
Necessary instructions have been issued to all the DRDAs regarding
Convergence of various Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) with IAY. IAY
beneficiaries can get the benefits available under Rajiv Gandhi Grameen
Vidyutikaran Yojana (RGGVY), Total Sanitation Campaign (TSC), Janshree and
Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana and Differential Rate of Interest (DRI) Scheme etc.
45
have been released to the Govt. of Gujarat for construction of additional 33154
houses under IAY.
46
National Family Benefit Scheme (NFBS)
4.12 Under NBFS a grant of Rs. 10,000 in case of death of ―Primary
breadwinner‖ is provided to the bereaved household. The primary breadwinner as
specified in the scheme, whether male or female, had to be a member of the
household whose earning contributed substantially to the total household income.
The death of such a primary breadwinner occurring whilst he or she was in the age
group of 18 to 64 years i.e., more than 18 years of age and less than 65 years of
age, made the family eligible to receive grants under the scheme.
Annapurna Scheme
4.13 Annapurna Scheme was introduced in April 2000 for persons not
covered under Old Age Pension Scheme. Under Annapurna Scheme 10 Kg. of food
grains per month is provided free of cost. The total number of Annapurna
beneficiaries was estimated as 20% of the persons eligible to receive old age
pension under the then National Old Age Pension Scheme ( NOAPS).
47
providing them assistance through a revolving fund for thrift & credit
activities.
(iii). Skill Training for Employment Promotion amongst Urban Poor (STEP-
UP)-targets urban poor for imparting quality training so as to enhance
their employability for self-employment or better salaried employment.
(iv). Urban Wage Employment Programme (UWEP)- seeks to assist
urban poor living in towns having population less than 5 lakhs as per
1991 census, by utilizing their labour for the construction of socially
and economically useful public assets.
(v). Urban Community Development Network (UCDN) - seeks to assist
the urban poor in organizing themselves in self- managed community
structures so as to gain collective strength to address the poverty
related issues facing them and to participate in the effective
implementation of urban poverty alleviation programmes.
4.16 PDS is operated under the joint responsibility of the Central and the
State Governments. The Central Government has taken the responsibility for
48
procurement, storage, transportation and bulk allocation of foodgrains, etc. The
responsibility for distributing the same to the consumers through the network of Fair
Price Shops (FPSs) rests with the State Governments. The operational
responsibilities including allocation within the State, identification of families below
poverty line, issue of ration cards, supervision and monitoring the functioning of
FPSs rest with the State Governments.
4.17 Under the PDS, presently the commodities namely wheat, rice, sugar
and kerosene, are being allocated to the States/UTs for distribution. Some
States/UTs also distribute additional items of mass consumption through the PDS
outlets such as cloth, exercise books, pulses, salt and tea, etc.
4.18 PDS, till 1992, was a general entitlement scheme for all consumers
without any specific target. Revamped Public Distribution System (RPDS) was
launched in June 1992 in 1775 blocks throughout the country. The Targeted Public
Distribution System (TPDS) was introduced with effect from June 1997.
4.18 The scheme, when introduced, was intended to benefit about 6 crore
poor families for whom a quantity of about 72 lakh tonnes of food grains was
earmarked annually. The identification of the poor under the scheme is done by the
States as per State-wise poverty estimates of the Planning Commission for 1993-
94 based on the methodology of the ―Expert Group on estimation of proportion and
number of poor‖ chaired by Late Prof Lakdawala. The allocation of food grains to the
States/UTs was made on the basis of average consumption in the past i.e. average
annual off-take of food grains under the PDS during the past ten years at the time of
introduction of TPDS.
49
PDS from them was not considered desirable. The transitory allocation was issued
at prices, which were subsidized but were higher than the prices for the BPL quota
of food grains.
4.21 While discussing the main challenges of poverty, Economic Survey,
2009-10 has offered good exposition of the problems in Public Distribution System
and also suggested ways to tackle them so as to better target the subsidies, as
given below:
―Through a vast network of public distribution system (PDS) outlets across
the nation, we try to deliver some minimal supplies of heavily subsidized
grain to our below poverty line (BPL) households and also some to our
above poverty line (APL) households. The PDS stores are first given this
subsidized grain and then instructed to deliver it at below market price to
these specified households. It is believed many of these storekeepers (i)
sell off this subsidized grain on the open market, and (ii) then adulterate
the remaining grain and sell the diluted product to the BPL and APL
households, who have no choice in the matter. We may harangue about
the dishonesty of PDS store-keepers and all those entrusted with
delivering the subsidies. It is indeed true that personal integrity, honesty
and trustworthiness in the citizenry are vital ingredients for a nation‘s
economic progress—there is enough cross country evidence of this. But
when crafting policy, there is need to be realistic about the system within
which we work. To assume that all those entrusted with the task of
administering the programme will do so flawlessly and then to blame them
when the system fails, is not the mark of a good policy strategist. For
effective policy, what is needed is to take people to be the way they are
and then craft incentive-compatible interventions.
This paragraph outlines an altered system that, once in place, will be no
more costly to run than the existing one and is likely to be much more
effective. The plan suggested here is not novel and has been suggested
on occasion by Indian policymakers and even in Budget documents.
However, it has never been fully spelled out. The two planks of this
system are (i) the subsidy should be handed over directly to the
households, instead of giving it to the PDS store-keeper in the form of
cheap grain and then have him deliver it to the needy households and (ii)
the household should be given the freedom to choose which store it buys
the food from. Suppose the BPL household gets a net subsidy of Rs x for
wheat each month. Instead of giving this by charging the household less
than the market price for wheat, it should be given coupons worth Rs x,
which can be used at PDS stores in lieu of money when buying wheat.
Under this new system no grain will be given at a subsidized rate to the
PDS stores and they will be free to charge the market price when selling
grain irrespective of who the customer is. The only change is that the PDS
stores are now allowed to accept these coupons which they can then take
to the local bank and change to money, and the banks, in turn, can go to
50
the government and have them changed to money. Further, households
that get these coupons should be allowed to go to any PDS store of their
choice.‖
4.23 The scale of issue that was initially 25 kg per family per month has
been increased to 35 kg per family per month with effect from 1st April, 2002. The
AAY Scheme has been expanded in 2003-2004 by adding another 50 lakh
households from amongst the BPL families. The Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) has
further been expanded with effect from 1st August, 2004 by another 50 lakh BPL
families by including, inter-alia, all households at the risk of hunger.
51
snake charmers, rag pickers, cobblers, destitutes and other similar categories
in both rural and urban areas.
Households headed by widows or terminally ill persons/disabled
persons/persons aged 60 years or more with no assured means of
subsistence or societal support.
Widows or terminally ill persons or disabled persons or persons aged 60
years or more or single women or single men with no family or societal
support or assured means of subsistence.
All primitive tribal households.
4.25 Allocation of food grains under the scheme is being released to the
States/UTs on the basis of issue of distinctive AAY Ration Cards to the identified
Antyodaya families. The present monthly allocation of food grains under AAY is
around 8.50 lakh tons per month. As announced in the Union Budget 2005-06, the
AAY has further been expanded to cover another 50 lakh BPL households thus
increasing its overage to 2.5 crore households.
52
Development. The programme has been able to put in place about 8.10 lakh
community health workers i.e. ASHAs at village level, across the country. They have
contributed in a major way to improve utilisation of health facilities and increase
health awareness. Large number of medical and paramedical staff has been taken
on contract to meet the human resources shortages. During the year 2009-10, about
2475 MBBS doctors, 160 specialists, 7136 ANMs, 2847 staff nurses, 2368 AYUSH
doctors and 2184 AYUSH paramedics were appointed. Further, out of 1,45,894 Sub-
centres functioning across the country, 1,38,119 are having at least one ANM.
40,730 sub-centres are having second ANM also. 8341 Primary health Centres are
functioning 24 X 7 basis as on 30th June 2010 as against 1263 Primary health
Centres at the initial year of the NRHM (2005).
4.27 The CAG report had examined the implementation of NRHM during the
period from 2005-06 to 2007-08. CAG looked into the various aspects of the
programme viz. planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation procedures
from village level to Centre level, community participation in planning, convergence
with other departments, health spending, capacity building and strengthening of
physical and human infrastructure, procurement and supply of equipments, drugs
and services, health awareness issues through Information, Education and
Communication (IEC) activities and performance indicators for reproductive and
child healthcare and disease control programmes. Besides recommendations to
overcome the shortcomings in implementing NRHM, CAG Report had also brought
out some positive findings in terms of completion of district as well as block level
computerization of health facilities in 13 States/UTs, Rogi Kalyan Samitis formed at
every health centre in 10 States, constitution of Village Health and Sanitation
Committees in all villages of 5 states, the increased patient in flow at PHCs and
CHCs and improved institutional deliveries and immunisation efforts.
53
wage employment in every financial year to every rural household whose adult
members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. The vision of MGNREGA is that no
vulnerable household in rural India goes hungry due to lack of income earning
opportunities. One of the basic entitlements under MGNREGA is employment within
15 days of application by anyone who demands employment (at any time of the
year), failing which s/he is eligible for an unemployment allowance. Therefore, under
the extant provisions of the Act, Planning Commission cannot put the condition to
the State Governments to implement MGNREGA during non agricultural season.
However, Section 27(1) of the Act provides that the Central Government may give
such directions as it may consider necessary to the State Governments for effective
implementation of the provisions of the Act.
(vii) Monitoring of Welfare Schemes
4.29 Asked, as to whether any survey/study/evaluation of the welfare
schemes have been done to assess their impact, the Ministry of Planning, in their
written replies, stated as under:
―During the course of the implementation of the scheme of Swarna Jayanti
Shahari Rozgar Yojana (SJSRY), an independent evaluation of the
scheme in 9 representative States/UTs was carried out in 2006-2007, by
an independent agency named M/s Access Development Services
Limited, New Delhi. Based on the outcome of the evaluation study as well
as suggestions received from the States/UTs and other stakeholders, the
scheme of SJSRY was comprehensively revised with effect from 2009-
2010.
The study by M/s Access Development Services Ltd. did not
address the issue of how many BPL were upgraded to APL. It focused on
the scheme parameters and problems faced in the implementation of the
scheme. However, the following conclusions of the evaluation study are
worth noting:
(i). In order to have better impact of the programme, a ―Mission
Mode‖ should be followed for SJSRY rather than a centrally
sponsored scheme.
(ii). More stringent beneficiary identification system for optimum
allocation of resources under the scheme.
(iii). Capacity building of local governmental bodies is recommended
for processes like monitoring and reporting of the scheme.
(iv). Focus should be on self-employment component of the scheme.
54
the country. As per the MoRD, a view to assess the Impact of
Swarnjayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana (SGSY) on rural poor, Concurrent
Evaluation was conducted during 2001-02. One of the findings of the
study indicated that among the total Swarojgaris (individuals and Groups)
who reported income generated from their SGSY activities, at the National
Level 37.24 % of individual Swarojgaris and 15.09 % members of the Self
Help Groups (SHGs) crossed the poverty line through the assistance
provided to them in the form of subsidy and institutional credit.‖
55
―The focus on allocations of money on the funds which are going, I crave
your indulgence to say that what is going is not getting spent well and
sometimes it not reaching also. It is not that it is getting embezzled on the
way, but it is getting blocked up on the way. Either the money is given
from the Centre to the State or from State it goes to the District and then
from District to the Intermediate Panchayats and Village Panchayats wait
to get the allocations. There is some delay in that. The Budget year is the
end loss. The next year, the release is dwindled because the opening
balance is very large or the money which is received only in the last week
of March is not spent. So, there are certain flow problems which can be
handled. These are not policy issues, but these are issues of mechanism
of ensuring that money reaches.‖
4.33 Ensuring that every rupee reaches the person it is meant for, as
Brazil's popular cash-transfer scheme Bolsa Famila Programme (BFP) shows, can
strengthen India's fight against poverty. BFP transfers cash via banks to poor
Brazilian families on the condition that their children attend school and are
vaccinated. According to a World Bank study, BFP, which reaches 12.7 million
families, helped lift 20 million people out of poverty between 2003 and 2009. In that
time, poverty - based on a purchasing power parity of less than $2 a day - fell from
22% of Brazil's population to 7%. The income of Brazil's poor grew seven times
faster than that of the rich, and three times the national average. Inequality in the
country is now at a 30-year low. Brazil has 12.71 bank branches per 1,000 adults;
India has 10.11.
4.34 During the recent study tour of the Committee to Mumbai discussions
were held with the representatives of the Life Insurance Corporation of India and
the Ministry of Finance (Department of Financial Services) on the subject ‗Social
Insurance‘ on 31st January, 2011. In their deliberations the Committee found to their
dismay that the coverage of BPL households under social insurance schemes such
as Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY) was quite negligible and far from achieving the
BPL target.
56
OBSERVATIONS / RECOMMENDATIONS
reality that large number of our people are forced to live in abject poverty. It is
disconcerting that we still have not yet arrived at a flawless and acceptable
on the one hand and the States on the other, which again, may be at variance
with the actual incidence of poverty. Several States have questioned the
spent over the years have not yielded the desired and tangible results. This
obviously raises issues inter-alia about the role, mandate and functioning of
the Planning Commission and the efficacy of the planning process per se.
point, the Committee would like to emphasise in this Report, the key concern
57
schemes and suggest ways to overcome the discrepancies, mis-match and
out for the years 1973-74, 1977-78, 1983, 1987-88, 1993-94, 1999-2000 and 2004-
05. The latest poverty estimates have been made for the year 2004-05 based
on the poverty line adopted at all-India level as Rs. 356.30 per capita per
month at 2004-05 prices for rural areas; and Rs. 538.60 per capita per month
for urban areas. On this basis, the percentage of population below poverty
line for rural, urban and all India during 2004-05 was estimated at 28.3%, 25.7%
and 27.5% respectively. While the estimation of poverty in the country is done
Below Poverty Line (BPL) census to identify the BPL households in rural areas
which could be targeted under its various programmes. The Ministry of Rural
Development has thus been conducting BPL census every five years since
1992 to identify the BPL households in the rural areas. In the latest BPL
were given the option to identify the number of BPL families equal to the
to account for the transient poor. However, no such census/survey has been
conducted by the Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation for the
58
urban areas on the plea that it is very costly and that the size of urban poverty
alleviation programme handled by the Ministry had hitherto been very small.
poverty line‟ assumes significance in view of its crucial role in the efficacy and
welfare schemes of the Government. The BPL Survey done by the Ministry of
This survey determined the poor using the family based income level of Rs.
11000 per year. However, the Committee note that in the next BPL census of
1997, the consumption criterion was adopted to identify the poor. Also, for the
first time, exclusion criterion was used to rule out ineligible families in the first
place. For the BPL census of 2002, the Ministry of Rural Development adopted
59
to identify the poor families. The Committee, however, find that while using
this criterion, errors of inclusion and exclusion in the BPL list far exceeded
the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Rural Development for the BPL Survey
Governments were asked to select the poor households so that the total
percentage of such families did not exceed the limit already fixed by the
Planning Commission. Paradoxically, this was like “the feet being made to fit
the shoe”. As was to be expected, several States fixed their BPL number in
excess of the Planning Commission limit, while objecting to the cap imposed
by the Planning Commission. The fact that a large number of complaints were
received on this mis-match in poverty estimates and also that “a part of the
BPL population had been missed out” was conceded by the Secretary (Rural
Committee were astonished to learn from the Secretary that there have been
specific findings that 86% of the APL population ended up in the BPL and
almost 17% of the richest quintile of the rural population were provided BPL
60
practical and fair that the Planning Commission should impose a ceiling or
approach can only yield the kind of distorted results evidenced so far.
furnish the total number of BPL population identified in the States/UTs in the
last BPL Census of 2002. The Committee note with surprise that there is a
is all the more glaring in respect of States like Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal
Committee are thus constrained to observe that the estimation of poverty and
worked in tandem at the ground level. This has thus resulted in unacceptably
high level of divergence in many States, thereby defeating the very purpose of
61
Arunachal Pradesh (17.60% in 2004-05), Meghalaya (18.52% in 2004-05),
the data for other States is either not available or the sample size of the NSSO
not available at all. This raises serious questions about the adequacy and
household survey, there does not appear to be any need on the part of
determining the incidence of poverty and the poor households are problem
areas that need to be addressed. The Committee would thus recommend that
a joint mechanism may be instituted for this purpose, comprising of all the
India (UIDAI) etc, the concerned state Government Departments including the
62
Since different wings of Government cannot be allowed to function at cross-
purposes and jeopardise the goal of poverty eradication, the proposed survey
context. The Expert Group headed by Prof. Tendulkar, which was constituted
estimation, suggested moving away from anchoring the poverty lines to the
the people which would reflect more accurately their nutritional status. On the
basis of their proposed methodology, the all-India rural poverty head count
ratio for 2004-05 was estimated at 41.8%, urban poverty head count ratio at
25.7% and all India level at 37.2%. The Ministry of Rural Development
Saxena to advise them on the suitable methodology for conducting the BPL
Census for the Eleventh Five Year Plan. This Expert Group suggested that
upwards to at least 50%, though the existing calorie norm of 2400 would
warrant this figure to be about 80%‟. This Group also suggested identification
The Economic Survey, 2008-09 had brought out that based on the calculations
2004-05), the population with less than Rs. 20 per day per capita consumption
63
expenditure was 60.5%. The National Commission for Enterprises in the
the Unorganised Sector‟ estimated that 77% of the population had a per capita
different sets of criteria. These facts only add credence to the emphasis
placed by the Committee on the need for harmonising the criteria for
8. The Committee would also like to point out that the existing
poverty line approach has its inherent limitations and may not capture
important aspects of the real living conditions of the people. This is also
abundantly evident from the fact that though States like Assam, Andhra
Pradesh and J&K have a high malnourishment ratio, the poverty estimates of
these States, as per the Planning Commission‟s figures are much lower. This
leads us to the key question of appropriate criteria to estimate poverty and its
have made some impact on the living standards of the people, conditions
relating to basic health, nutrition, education and social security have not
improved to the desired extent. The Committee cannot help expressing regret
64
over the fact that the criteria / approach recommended by various expert
groups set up from time to time for defining and determining „poverty‟ or
„poverty line‟ thus far have only left question marks and have failed in
and enumerating the poor. The wide variation in determining the population of
the poor is illustrated by the fact that as per one of the expert groups
80% as per the existing calorie norm of 2,400, while as per another norm it is
only 37.2%.
estimated objectively and realistically and the criteria therefor should stretch
beyond the current norm which lays emphasis on calorific value and reflect
faithfully the changing nutritional profile and living status of the masses. The
households into destitution and the reasons therefor; ownership and type of
65
members to the total members engaged in economically productive
children and the elderly, which would indicate the extent of economic strain
criteria for identification of the poor. The criteria may also provide for
mechanised transport vehicle, (c) income tax payees, (d) residence in a pucca
house more than specified covered area, say 1,000 sq. ft., (e) house-holds with
at least one person holding pensionable job etc. Keeping in view such a
broader approach, the Committee feel that there need not be any specific
determine poverty, which will also take into account dynamic aspects like
slipping back and forth across the poverty line as also issues relating to
empowerment of masses.
poverty are recognized and the criteria nuanced accordingly. The proposed
criteria for poverty estimation should thus be easily defined and measurable,
66
stable in the medium term and should also not become a disincentive for
progress.
vast chunk of the people, the Committee are of the view that we can make a
distinguishing the “poorest of the poor” from the general BPL will help ensure
that this particularly vulnerable category does not get marginalized in the
scheme of things. It will also help the Government devise and implement
recommend that schemes such as Indira Awas Yojana (IAY) with suitable
modifications, should be made universal for the „poorest of the poor‟, while
schemes such as NREGA should try to cover the BPL segment as well.
including the PDS, the Committee would like the Government to encourage
67
will go a long way in minimizing their mis-use, while imparting credibility and
population.
13. With a view to ensuring that every rupee reaches the person it is
meant for, the Committee would like the Government to examine direct cash-
transfer scheme as tried out successfully in large countries like Brazil. The
Committee gather that under their Bolsa Famila Programme (BFP) cash
transfers via banks to poor Brazilian families are made on the condition that
their children attend school and are vaccinated. According to a World Bank
Study, the BFP in Brazil helped lift 20 million people out of poverty between
2003 and 2009, as the income of Brazil‟s poor grew seven times faster than
that of the rich, and three times the national average. There are also
identified as „poor‟ for targeted action and the people are incentivised to come
out of the „poverty trap‟. The Committee desire that the Government should
similarly placed like ours with a large population of poor and the marginalized.
In this context, the Committee would like to emphasise that direct cash
may also be integrated with the „Aadhar‟ project of the Unique Identification
68
way in plugging the rampant leakages in the dissemination of benefits to the
poor.
14. The Committee would like to avail this opportunity to extend the
durable assets in rural areas. The Committee suggest that the Central
Government Schemes should focus on areas such as (i) rural roads (ii)
drinking water (iii) electricity (iv) irrigation (v) housing (vi) employment (vii)
health (viii) education (ix) agriculture and (x) small and cottage industries. It is
imposed on the States and levels below. Such a decentralized yet holistic
approach will also ensure better utilization of earmarked funds under the
that the coverage of BPL households under social insurance schemes such as
69
Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY) was quite negligible and far from achieving the BPL
target. Considering the absolute number of poor in the country, social insurance
surface‟. The Committee would therefore recommend that schemes such as AABY
should be made universal so as to cover the entire BPL population within a pre-
stipulated period.
16. Keeping in view the need to revisit the methodology for identification of
urban poor, the Committee learn that the Planning Commission has constituted an
families in urban areas under the Chairmanship of Prof. S.R. Hashim. While
is taken into account, the Committee would urge the Planning Commission and the
Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation to include this aspect in the terms
17. The Committee regret that no survey has so far been conducted for
establishing head count of urban poor. This has thus rendered infructuous
formulation and implementation of urban poverty schemes, which are being operated
without any scientific basis. This has obviously resulted in low urban poverty ratio
and has also led to inconsistencies such as Jharkhand having only about 20 percent
urban poor as compared to a much higher ratio for a State like Bihar. While
deprecating the Government for delay and laxity in this matter, the Committee
70
18. The Committee are also concerned about the efficacy of the
proposed Food Security Bill when the criteria of identification of the poor
remains nebulous. When this was pointed out to the Planning Commission,
they sought to shift the onus to the Department of Food and Public
inclusion and exclusion to avoid anomalies‟. The Committee would thus urge
the Government to thrash out all the issues relating to poverty criteria,
estimation, identification and targeting before finalizing the Food Security Bill.
71
Minutes of the Nineteenth sitting of the Standing Committee on Finance
The Committee sat on Monday, the 31st May, 2010 from 1100 hrs. to 1720 hrs.
PRESENT
MEMBERS
LOK SABHA
RAJYA SABHA
12. Shri Raashid Alvi
13. Shri Vijay Jawaharlal Darda
14. Shri S.S. Ahluwalia
15. Shri Moinul Hassan
16. Shri S. Anbalagan
17. Dr. Mahendra Prasad
SECRETARIAT
Part I
(1100 to 1230 hrs.)
XX XX XX XX
XX XX XX XX
72
Part II
(1245 to 1400 hrs.)
XX XX XX XX
XX XX XX XX
Part III
(1430 to 1720 hrs.)
WITNESSES
Ministry of Planning
73
date. The Committee also decided to call for information relevant to the examination of
the subject from the State Governments/Union Territory Administrations.
74
Minutes of the Twenty Second sitting of the Standing Committee on Finance
The Committee sat on Wednesday, the 14th July, 2010 from 1100 hrs. to 1630 hrs.
PRESENT
Shri Yashwant Sinha - Chairman
MEMBERS
LOK SABHA
RAJYA SABHA
12. Shri Raashid Alvi
13. Shri S. S. Ahluwalia
14. Shri Moinul Hassan
15. Shri Mahendra Mohan
16. Dr. Mahendra Prasad
17. Shri Y.P. Trivedi
SECRETARIAT
Part I
(1100 to 1200 hrs.)
WITNESSES
Experts
75
3. Prof. Indrani Gupta, Instititute of Economic Growth
2. The Committee heard the views of the Experts on the subject ‗Appraisal of
BPL Criteria‘. The major issues discussed, related to poverty line, fixation of calorie
norms, limitations of Head Count Ratio (HCR) for measurement of poverty, imperfect
targeted programmes for poverty elimination due to theoretical and statistical issues, use
of additional indicators of indebtedness, ill health, sale of assets, demorgraphic and
economic compostion of households etc. for identification of poor, problem of temporary
migration of population, collection of reliable data etc. The Chairman directed the Experts
to furnish written replies to the queries raised by Members within 10 days.
Part II
(1300 to 1405 hrs.)
WITNESSES
The Committee heard the views of the representatives of the Ministry of Housing
& Urban Poverty Alleviation in connection with examination of the subject ‗Appraisal of
BPL Criteria‘. The major issues discussed with the representatives included, need for
enumeration of BPL in urban areas as a part of National Food Security Programme,
setting up of Hashim committee in May 2010 to identify urban poor, terms of reference of
this Committee, definition of ‗urban‘, Ministry‘s role in assessment of urban poor etc. The
Chairman directed the representatives to furnish written replies to the queries raised by
Members within a week.
76
Part III
(1500 to 1630 hrs.)
XX XX XX XX
XX XX XX XX
77
Minutes of the Second sitting of the Standing Committee on Finance
The Committee sat on Wednesday, the 29 September, 2010 from 1400 hrs. to
1630 hrs.
PRESENT
MEMBERS
LOK SABHA
SECRETARIAT
1. Shri A.K. Singh - Joint Secretary
2. Shri Ramkumar Suryanarayanan - Deputy Secretary
WITNESSES
PLANNING COMMISSION
1. Ms. Sudha Pillai, Member Secretary, Planning Commission
2. Shri R.C. Srinivasan, Pr. Adviser, Planning Commission
3. Ms. Amita Sharma, Joint Secretary, (Deptt. of Rural Development)
4. Shri P.K. Padhy, Chief Economic Adviser, (Deptt. of Rural Development)
2. The Committee heard the views of the representatives of the Ministry of Planning in
connection with the examination of the subject ‗Appraisal of BPL Criteria and Impact of Planning
Process on the Common Man‘. Major issues which came up for discussion included reduction in
plan expenditure vis-à-vis increase in non plan expenditure over the years, underutilization of
78
funds provided through Centrally Sponsored Scheme, need for creation of more blocks and
panchayat samities, divergence in estimated number of BPL population and identified BPL
households in many States, public investment in agriculture, issue of migration of people from
rural areas etc. The Chairman directed the representatives to furnish written replies to the
queries raised by Members within a few days.
XX XX XX XX
XX XX XX XX
.
79
Minutes of the Fourteenth sitting of the Standing Committee on Finance (2010-11)
The Committee sat on Tuesday, the 15th March, 2011 from 1530 hrs to 1600 hrs.
PRESENT
MEMBERS
LOK SABHA
RAJYA SABHA
10. Shri Raashid Alvi
11. Shri Piyush Goyal
12. Shri Satish Chandra Misra
13. Shri Mahendra Mohan
14. Dr. Mahendra Prasad
15. Shri Y.P. Trivedi
SECRETARIAT
2. The Committee took up the draft Report on the ‗Appraisal of BPL Criteria‘ for
consideration and adoption.
3. The Committee deliberated upon the draft report and adopted the same with
minor modifications. The Committee also authorized the Chairman to present the same
to Parliament in the current session.
80