Income of 84 % Indian Households fell In 2021: Oxfam report

Ground Report | New Delhi: Indian Households income fell; The latest Oxfam report said that the income gap widened during the Covid epidemic, causing a decline in the income of 84 percent of households in India in 2021, but at the same time the number of Indian billionaires increased from 102 to 142.

Indian Households income fell

Oxfam's report, "Inequality Kills," released Sunday ahead of the World Economic Forum's Davos Agenda, also found that while Covid continued to ravage India, the country's health care budget saw a 10% decline from RE (Revised Estimates) from 2020-21 There was a 6% cut in the allocation for education, says the Oxfam report, while the budget allocation for social security plans was reduced from 1.5% of the total budget of the Union at 0.6%.

The Oxfam report said that the allocation for education was cut by 6%, while the budgetary allocation for social security schemes came down from 1.5% of the total Union budget to 0.6%. (Indian Households income fell)

The report also said that in 2021, the collective wealth of India's 100 richest people reached a record high of Rs 57.3 lakh crore (USD 775 billion). Whereas in the same year, the share of the bottom 50 percent of the population in the national wealth was only 6 percent.

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The report said that during the pandemic (from March 2020 to November 30, 2021), the wealth of Indian billionaires increased from Rs 23.14 lakh crore ($ 313 billion) to Rs 53.16 lakh crore ($ 719 billion). Meanwhile, over 46 million Indians are projected to fall further into poverty in 2020. According to the United Nations, this will be about half of the new poor in the whole world.

Number of billionaires

India has the third-highest number of billionaires in the world, behind only China and the United States, the report says, with more billionaires than France, Sweden and Switzerland combined: a 39 percent increase in the number of billionaires in India in 2021.

The report says: "The increase comes at a time when India's unemployment rate was as high as 15 percent in urban areas and the health system was on the brink of collapse."

Oxfam has pointed out that about a fifth of the increase in the wealth of the 100 richest families was due to the increase in the fortunes of a single individual and trading house: the Adanis.

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“Gautam Adani ranked 24th globally and 2nd in India, witnessed his net worth multiply eightfold in a span of a year; from $8.9 billion in 2020 to $50.5 billion in 2021. According to real-time data from Forbes, as of November 24, 2021, Adani's net worth is $82.2 billion. This tremendous growth in a span of eight months, during India's second deadly wave, also includes returns from Adani's newly purchased Carmichael mines in Australia and an acquired 74 percent stake in Mumbai airport. At the same time, Mukesh Ambani's net worth doubled in 2021 to $85.5 billion from $36.8 billion in 2020," the report says.

Gender inequality

On gender inequality, Oxfam India said that women accounted for 28 percent of all job losses and lost two-thirds of their income during the pandemic. He further said that India's 2021 budget allocation for the Ministry of Women and Child Development is less than half of the total accumulated wealth of the bottom ten of India's billionaires' list and only a tax of 2 percent on people with an income of more than Rs 10 crore could increase. the ministry's budget by a staggering 121 percent.

If the wealth of the top 100 billionaires are accumulated, they could finance the National Rural Livelihoods Mission scheme, responsible for creating Self Help Groups for women, for the next 365 years. On health inequality, the report said a 4% wealth tax on India's 98 richest families would fund the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for more than 2 years, noting that their combined wealth is 41% higher than the budget of the Union of India.

On educational inequality, the study says that a 1 percent tax on the wealth of India's 98 billionaires can fund the entire annual spending of the Ministry of Education's school education and literacy department, while the 4 percent tax on his wealth he can run the country's Mid-Day-Meal program for 17 years or Samagra Sikshya Abhiyan for 6 years. Similarly, a 4 percent tax on the wealth of 98 billionaires would be enough to fund the POSHAN 2.0 Mission, which includes Anganwadi Services, POSHAN Abhiyan, Adolescent Girls Scheme, and National Nursery Scheme, for 10 years.

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