Actual household consumption data point to a decisive shift in India’s growth trajectory, with the Bottom 40% (B40) of the population accumulating wealth and assets far faster than the Top 20% (T20), driving a sharp compression in inequality, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Monday.
Replying to the debate on the government’s first supplementary demand for grants for net additional spending of Rs 41,455 crore in 2025-26, she said the decline in asset gaps is especially pronounced in urban India, where disparities in ownership of motor vehicles and refrigerators have narrowed dramatically.
Data on motor vehicle ownership
Between 2011-12 and 2023-24, motor vehicle ownership among the rural B40 rose sevenfold, from 6.2% to 47.1%. Refrigerator ownership expanded nearly eight-fold, from 2.9% to 22.5%, while mobile phone ownership became almost universal, climbing from 66.5% to 94.3%, she said.
Urban consumption trends reinforce the scale of convergence. For the first time, the urban Bottom 40% owns more televisions (77.4%) than the Top 20% (72.1%), she said. The ownership gap for aspirational goods such as refrigerators collapsed from 46.3 percentage points in 2011-12 to just 12.3 points in 2023-24, she noted.
Asset poverty
Perhaps most tellingly, “asset poverty”—households owning none of the key assets—has been virtually eliminated among the rural poor, plunging from around 30% to just 5%. The data underscore a decade in which growth has not only been strong, but widely shared, she added.
The supplementary demands span 72 grants and one appropriation, reflecting higher-than-anticipated requirements across key sectors such as fertilisers, petroleum, home affairs, external affairs, higher education, and financial services.
A major share of the fresh spending requirement arises from the fertiliser subsidy, with the additional outlay amounting to Rs 18,525 crore for subsidy towards imported urea and P&K fertilisers (nutrient-based).
The government has also earmarked Rs 5,219 crore towards compensation to oil marketing companies for under recoveries in domestic LPG and other heads.
An amount of Rs 2,198 crore has been provided for a special rehabilitation and security package for Manipur, covering security-related expenditure, prepayment of old loans, rehabilitation of internally displaced persons, rebuilding of damaged houses, support to resettled communities, and deployment of Central Armed Police Forces.