How to Identify Rural Poor? An Alternative Approach

This paper delineates a set of non-monetary indicators for identification of rural poor households through the scientific method ‘Discriminant Analysis’. An analysis of the NSS household data brings out a different set of indicators with varying degrees of discriminating power for the selected five states. This paper suggests a feasible, reliable and alternative approach through which 85 - 90 per cent of the poor households in rural areas can be correctly identified as poor.