India's top 63 billionaires have more wealth than 2018-19 Budget outlay

The gap between the top 1 per cent and the bottom 50 per cent of the population just keeps expanding, global non-profit organisation Oxfam said in its latest annual report on income inequality.

India’s billionaires hold a combined total wealth that is more than the Union Budget outlay.

The gap between the top 1 per cent and the bottom 50 per cent of the population just keeps expanding, global non-profit organisation Oxfam said in its latest annual report on income inequality.

“The combined total wealth of 63 Indian billionaires is higher than the total Union Budget of India for the fiscal year 2018-19 which was at Rs 24.42 trillion,” Oxfam said in its report released on Monday.

“The wealth of billionaires rose from $325.5 billion (Rs 22.73 trillion) in 2017 to $408 billion (Rs 28.97 trillion) in 2019,” the report said. In fact, that amount is even higher than the 2019-20 Budget size of Rs 27.86 trillion, something the report did not mention.

The world’s 2,153 billionaires have more wealth than the 4.6 billion people who make up 60 per cent of the planet’s population, the report also showed.

“Our broken economies are lining the pockets of billionaires and big business at the expense of ordinary men and women. No wonder people are starting to question whether billionaires should even exist,” said Oxfam India CEO Amitabh Behar

An analysis of India’s billionaires showed that 15 of them come from the consumer goods industry and more than 10 from the pharmaceuticals sector in 2019 – a rarity among developing countries.

In fact, not just in India, but global inequality is deeply entrenched. The number of billionaires has doubled in the last decade, despite their combined wealth having declined just in the last year.

“The gap between the rich and poor can't be resolved without deliberate inequality-busting policies, and too few governments are committed to these,” Behar said.

Wealth of India's richest 1% more than 4 times that of 70% poorest: Oxfam

The report flagged that global inequality is shockingly entrenched and vast and the number of billionaires has doubled in the last decade, despite their combined wealth having declined last year.

India's richest 1 per cent hold more than four-times the wealth held by 953 million people who make up for the bottom 70 per cent of the country's population, while the total wealth of all Indian billionaires is more than the full-year budget, a new study said on Monday.

Releasing the study 'Time to Care' here ahead of the 50th Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF), rights group Oxfam also said the world's 2,153 billionaires have more wealth than the 4.6 billion people who make up 60 per cent of the planet's population.

The report flagged that global inequality is shockingly entrenched and vast and the number of billionaires has doubled in the last decade, despite their combined wealth having declined in the last year.

"The gap between rich and poor can't be resolved without deliberate inequality-busting policies, and too few governments are committed to these," said Oxfam India CEO Amitabh Behar, who is here to represent the Oxfam confederation this year.

The issues of income and gender inequality are expected to figure prominently in discussions at the five-day summit of the WEF, starting Monday. The WEF's annual Global Risks Report has also warned that the downward pressure on the global economy from macroeconomic fragilities and financial inequality continued to intensify in 2019.

Concern about inequality underlies recent social unrest in almost every continent, although it may be sparked by different tipping points such as corruption, constitutional breaches, or the rise in prices for basic goods and services, as per the WEF report.

Although global inequality has declined over the past three decades, domestic income inequality has risen in many countries, particularly in advanced economies and reached historic highs in some, the Global Risks Report flagged last week.

The Oxfam report further said "sexist" economies are fuelling the inequality crisis by enabling a wealthy elite to accumulate vast fortunes at the expense of ordinary people and particularly poor women and girls.

Regarding India, Oxfam said the combined total wealth of 63 Indian billionaires is higher than the total Union Budget of India for the fiscal year 2018-19 which was at Rs 24,42,200 crore.

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