Decoding India’s conundrum of free food despite falling poverty

Apr 19, 2025 | 19:26 IST

Since most voters don’t pay income tax, they don’t care if tax money is used for freebies

The Supreme Court emphasizes that subsidized food should exclusively benefit the poor, addressing concerns about diversion. Despite claims of poverty reduction, the government continues providing free rations to a vast population, raising questions of political motivation

A Supreme Court bench says free foodgrain should go only to the poor, not be diverted to the non-poor. The govt boasts that poverty has been slashed by hundreds of millions. Yet it also boasts of providing free foodgrain to 800 million poor people (57.5% of the population), a figure that never falls no matter what the decline in poverty. Is this not hypocrisy?

There are actually two separate issues here. The first set, Type A errors, represents the leakage of subsidies to the non-poor. The second set, Type B errors, represents state failure to reach every poor person.

TOI

TOI

Decoding India’s conundrum of free food despite falling poverty

The Supreme Court emphasizes that subsidized food should exclusively benefit the poor, addressing concerns about diversion. Despite claims of poverty reduction, the government continues providing free rations to a vast population, raising questions of political motivation

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TOI

Decoding India’s conundrum of free food despite falling poverty

The Supreme Court emphasizes that subsidized food should exclusively benefit the poor, addressing concerns about diversion. Despite claims of poverty reduction, the government continues providing free rations to a vast population, raising questions of political motivation

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