Multi-dimensional Poverty Index 2018 report prepared by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative makes the following observations about India.

India has reduced its poverty rate drastically from 55% to 28% in 10 years, with 271 million people moving out of poverty between 2005-06 and 2015-16.

• India still had 364 million poor people in 2015-16, the largest for any country, although it is down from 635 million in 2005-06
• Of the 364 million people who were MPI poor in 2015-16,156 million were children whereas in 2005-06 there were 292 million poor children in India. This represents a 47% decrease or 136 million fewer children growing up in multi-dimensional poverty.
• 80% of people belonging to ST were poor in 2005-06 and 50% of them were still poor in 2015-16.
• Bihar with more than half its population in poverty was the poorest state in 2015-16.
• The four poorest states Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh were still home to 196
• million MPI poor people, which was over half of all the MPI poor people in India.
• Kerala, one of the least poor regions in 2006, reduced its MPI by around 92%.

Multi-dimensional Poverty Index 2018 Report in Tamil Nadu:

Over the last decades, Tamil Nadu has made a significant progress in poverty reduction. The districts in Tamil Nadu are classified into three categories, namely high-poverty districts (more than 40% of the population living below poverty line), moderately poor districts (30% to 40%) and low level poverty districts (below 30%).

After 1994, poverty has declined steadily in both rural and urban areas of Tamil Nadu and the state has a smaller share of India’s poor relative to its-population. After 2005, the poverty reduction in this state has been faster than in many other states in India. Tamil Nadu leads in the poverty alleviation programmes during 2014-2017. Government of India is implementing many policies and programmes to eradicate poverty. These policies and programmes, if continued, will completely eradicate the poverty in the state. In future, Tamil Nadu can become a model of development in India.