About Us

Current Scenario

According to a report by the Johannesburg-based company New World Wealth, India is the second-most unequal country globally, with millionaires controlling 54% of its wealth. With a total individual wealth of $5,600 billion, it’s among the 10 richest countries in the world – and yet the average Indian is relatively poor. Compare this with Japan, the most equal country in the world, where according to the report millionaires control only 22% of total wealth.

In India, the richest 1% own 53% of the country’s wealth, according to the latest data from Credit Suisse. The richest 5% own 68.6%, while the top 10% have 76.3%. At the other end of the pyramid, the poorer half jostles for a mere 4.1% of national wealth. What’s more, things are getting better for the rich. The Credit Suisse data shows that India’s richest 1% owned just 36.8% of the country’s wealth in 2000, while the share of the top 10% was 65.9%. Since then they have steadily increased their share of the pie. The share of the top 1% now exceeds 50%. This is far ahead of the United States, where the richest 1% own 37.3% of total wealth. But India’s finest still have a long way to go before they match Russia, where the top 1% own a stupendous 70.3% of the country’s wealth.

The India Exclusion Report 2016 says the post-1990 growth was up to three times of the levels in the first four decades since Independence but the rate of poverty reduction slowed down from 0.94% per annum during 1981-1990 to only 0.65% between 1990 and 2005. The high growth led to 12-fold increase in wealth for the richest 10% people since 2000, while for the poorest 10% the income jumped by just three times and the reason was dismal new job creation. The report also points that half of India’s 103 million elderly are outside any social security scheme, 40% of disabled women in rural India without jobs and exclusion of the poor on account of digital illiteracy as government pushes Digital India.