Congress slams NITI report stating 24.8 crore people moved out of multidimensional poverty

New Delhi: The Congress on Thursday termed as “jumla” a Niti Aayog report that claimed 24.82 crore people have been moved out of multi-dimensional poverty in nine years to 2022-23, and alleged that the government was hatching a “conspiracy” to exclude these people from the safety net of welfare schemes and free ration.

The Congress’ attack came a day after the report said as many as 24.82 crore people moved out of multidimensional poverty in nine years to 2022-23, with Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh registering the largest decline.

According to the NITI discussion paper, multidimensional poverty in India declined from 29.17 per cent in 2013-14 to 11.28 per cent in 2022-23, showing a reduction of 17.89 percentage points, with about 24.82 crore people moving out of the bracket during this period. Addressing a press conference at the AICC headquarters here, Congress spokesperson and social media department head Supriya Shrinate said the claim that 24.84 crore people have been moved out of multidimensional poverty was the “latest jumla in a list of jumlas” that will be seen up until election.

‘The truth cannot be further away from this and the reality is how NITI Aayog has arrived at these numbers -- it has changed the established criteria of how poverty is calculated and neither the World Bank nor the IMF have cited any third party stories on it,’ she said.

‘It was a report prepared by the NITI Aayog, a survey done by them and reported by them but the reality on the ground is extremely stark,’ she said, adding that the figures were nothing but “blatant lies of the BJP ecosystem”.

The survey essentially establishes there is no unemployment on the ground when the reality is that there are high prices, unemployment, income inequality, lower wages and extreme poverty.