The opposite of poverty is not wealth.

The opposite of poverty is not wealth

Hypothetically assume a case. A man named Ram singh is a poor daily wage labourer. Due to some uncertain things he looses his jobs as it was unorganized. Now he becomes eligible for Universal Basic Income. Ram singh is given some amount so that he & his family can live with dignity. But after getting the amount he tries to double it through gambling. To forget the pain of losses he even starts

drug abuse and then vents out his frustration to his wife and children by beating them.

This become the story of every month and he gets addicted to gambling as well as drugs abuse.

Earlier Ram singh's family used to have access to two times meal through wages and his child used to go a nearby public school as well. But Now, after the income support, he neither tried to find a new job, nor gave that money at home for household expenditure and child's education. Thus worsening their condition more. Making them more poor and also causing learning poverty of his child.

This case shows how money/wealth can't be the answer of poverty. Curing poverty needs different interventions.

In this essay we will explore various dimensions like what one means by poverty?, why can't wealth be the opposite of poverty?, Then what is the role of wealth? and lastly what interventions needed to cure different types of poverty.

Lets start by knowing what poverty means. According to Amartya sen poverty is a situation where people don't have access to basic things required for survival life, not only for survival but also for a dignityful life which provide fuller participation (social, political, economical) to people.

Poverty also means deprivation. Deprivation which leads to inaccessibility of resources.

According to Mahatma Gandhi "poverty is the most worst form of violence".

i.e great inequality is created by poverty that it leads to a form of violence as per Gandhiji. Then the question arises what's the cure?, WEALTH?, CAN WEALTH CURE POVERTY?

To answer these question we will have to analyze poverty and its various forms. Poverty is of various kinds and no one reason is cause of poverty. Infact there are multiple causes and multiple forms which simultaneously impacts the individual & causes poverty.

And thus UNDP & OPHI brings

Multidimensional poverty Index which shows that poverty is not all about Economic poverty but also social (Health & education) & political (representation) also to some extent. MPI shows 22% people in India suffer from absolute poverty.

The indx show how various other parameter also contribute towards poverty like sanitation, cook fuel etcisting constituting Basic necessity of individual which was again measured in terms of Basic Necessity Index (Economic survey 2021).

Wealth just can't bridge every cause of poverty that exist at individual societal and National or international level.

Looking at the individual level poverty is caused when one doesn't get access to better education, Health facilities, skill sets due to many structural issues like caste discrimination, inequality.

lack of institutional capabilites etc. Not just this but also harsh environmental conditions (Delhi floods), poor technological or digital penetration or awareness also causes poverty. And these causes can't be just tackled by wealth.

At social and national level too, various causes like restricted social mobility, lack of opportunity, prevalent inequality and social injustice can't be heated through wealth. For example Oxfam report shows top 1% of the population holds 40% of national wealth while bottom 50% have only 6%. This occurs due to structural problems entrenched in the social system.

Lastly poverty at International level also prevails. Many countries like Global south nations are least developed and are poor marred with multiple challenges

like political interventions & dominance by developed countries, Environmental Racism where developed countries use these least developed or poor countries as dumpyard to throw their wastes. Digital divide at international level also causes learning poverty and the technological poverty. Then what can wealth do?

Wealth is not opposite of poverty for sure. But yes, wealth can help in reducing the impact of poverty to some extent. How?, lets see.

Through wealth an individual feels empowered to have access to at least basic requirement through which he/she can live with dignity (Art 21). It gives purchasing power to have clean fuel (instead of cow dung), better health, better education and skill set. Also an individual can get technological learnings thus reducing digital divide.

which helps in dealing with Learning Poverty (A huge challenge as per world bank.)

Wealth can also give access to new age technologies which makes life easier and can help women by reducing their time in household chores thus tackling Time Poverty. According to Time use survey wome in general sacrifice their 2 hr sleep daily to complete their household works along with office work.

Not only at individual level but also at societal or National level wealth can create better opportunities by increasing capital expenditure and creating infrastructure which has multiplier effect and will help reducing poverty. this is the reason Budget 2023 enhanced its capital expenditure to 10 Lakh crore (3.3% of GDP.)

Moreover wealth can help bridging the developmental gaps between developed and less developed countries through means like climate financing (Loss & Damage fund created in COP27), Technology transfer, Developmental projects & help during crisis (India gave $4bn to Sri Lanka during crisis). Investments by India & Japan in African nation can reduce poverty intensity.

If not wealth, then what constitute as opposite to poverty? The answer is no one intervention can lead to deal with poverty. As poverty is a multi-dimensional phenomena, we also need multipronged and multistakeholder approach to deal with it because "Poverty anywhere is threat to Prosperity everywhere." -Kofi annan

And to deal with this threat to prosperity we need holistic approach involving various sectors.

At governance level we need to check targetted use of our wealth which should be reached to the most needy people eliminating all leakages and duplications. for example Justice G. Rohini commission was set up to further categorized OBC to provide benefits of reservation to the needy section.

Economic reforms and interventions have direct bearing on tackling with poverty. Better social as well as physical infrastructure (connectivity, Public transport), skill improvements through formal education and training (NEP2020 talks about vocational training) and employment creation through labour entensive sectors like Textile, food processing and promoting MSMEs.

When talking about environment we need to make our infrastructure resilient to disasters. 70% of area of Country is prone to one or multiple disaster pushing millions of people into extreme poverty every year.

We need to ensure better food and drinking water access as everything is directly linked to poverty.

Last but not the least, when the world is moving towards Industrial Revolution 4.0, we need to empower people through digital education bridging the digital divide across all dimensions, be it Rural-Urban gender divide where 24% urban and only 4% Rural households have own computer (NSSO) and also at gender level (only 1/3rd women use internet).

Empowerment of every section beyond gender (male, female, LGBTQ), beyond physical/geographical reach (rural, urban, fringe areas), transcending all the regional or ascribed identity (caste, class, religion, ethnicity, race etc) is the need of the hour.

"As long as poverty, injustice and gross inequality resists in the society, none of us can truely rest" - Nelson Mandela

thus we need to remove poverty, we need to put efforts for a better future ahead. As seen in the case of Ramsingh its not only the wealth but multidimensional & structural reforms which can remove poverty.