Covid-19 pandemic pushed 3.2 cr Indians below middle class: study

Undoing years of economic gain, financial woes brought by a single year of the coronavirus pandemic pushed about 3.2 crore Indians out of the middle class, according to the US-based Pew Research Centre.

A year into the pandemic, the numbers of those in the middle class has shrunk to 6.6 crore, down a third from a pre-pandemic estimate of 9.9 crore, the report added.

India is estimated to have seen a greater decrease in the middle class and a much sharper rise in poverty than China in the Covid-19 downturn, the report said, citing the World Bank’s forecasts of economic growth.

Nearly 5.7 crore people had joined the middle income group between 2011 and 2019.

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