India's Extreme Poverty Fell to 2.6% by 2023, World Bank Estimates
The World Bank estimates that India's extreme poverty rate fell from 27.1% in 2011 to 2.6% in 2023, a change it says lifted 496 million people out of extreme poverty. The figures appear in the bank's April 2026 India Development Update.
Extreme poverty is a measure of people living on very little money. For this estimate, the World Bank used a threshold of $3 a day per person. The bank set that line in June 2025, replacing its previous figure of $2.15 a day. That revision raised the bank's global extreme poverty estimates by 125 million people.
Using a higher bar of $4.20 a day, the bank reports that the share of India's population living below the line fell from 57.7% to 16.1% over the same period. It projects that rate will fall further, from 14.2% in 2026 to 12.1% by 2028.
Economic inequality is a separate question. The 2026 World Inequality Report found that inequality in India remains among the highest in the world. Falling poverty and high inequality can both be true at once, because the measures track different things: the first counts people below a fixed income line, while the second compares how income is spread across the population.
India's growth over the same period has been large by the World Bank's account. Its country page says the economy has nearly quadrupled in real terms since 2000, and per capita income has almost tripled. India's share of the global economy doubled, from 1.6% in 2000 to 3.4% in 2023, and the bank lists India as the world's fifth-largest economy.
The bank also sets out what it says India would need to keep that momentum. To become a high-income economy by 2047, India would need to sustain average annual growth of 7.8% over the next two decades, according to the bank. It would also need to raise its real investment rate from around 33.5% of GDP, the total value of goods and services produced, to 40% by 2035. Female labour force participation, now at 35.6%, would need to reach 50% by 2047.
The World Bank Group's new Country Partnership Framework for India, its planning document for lending and support, covers fiscal years 2026 to 2031.
