India's poverty rate slipped to 6.3% in FY18, says Surjit Bhalla

Only 6.3 per cent people were poor in India in 2017-18, down from 22.2 per cent in 2011-12, said Surjit Bhalla, former part-time member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC), on Monday, adding that the 2011-2018 period recorded the steepest decline in poverty in the country. 

Bhalla is currently the executive director for India, Nepal and Bhutan at the International Monetary Fund (IMF). According to the definition of poverty given by the Tendulkar Committee of 2009 ($1.9 per person per day), 22.2 per cent of Indians were poor in 2011-12, while the poverty rate was 37.7 per cent