AP examines debate over India's poverty line

The Associated Press examines the debate over the poverty line in India, noting that a commission that helps set the country's economic policy told the Supreme Court earlier this month that the poverty line in cities was 578 rupees ($12.75) per person per month, and about 450 rupees ($9.93) per person per month for rural areas.

"The revelation set off an angry debate in a country with soaring economic growth that has brought Ferrari dealerships and Louis Vuitton stores to cater to the new urban rich but left hundreds of millions of others struggling without access to adequate food and clean water," the AP writes, adding that the World Bank's global poverty level of about $38 per month "is three times higher than India's urban level. Local activists say a better name for India's standard would be 'the starvation line'" (Naqvi, 5/27).