Rajeev Chandrasekhar accuses Kerala govt of propaganda over claims of eradicating extreme poverty

Dismissing the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government’s claims of eradicating extreme poverty as “mere propaganda”, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Kerala president Rajeev Chandrasekhar has said that the reduction in poverty in the State is “due to the schemes sponsored by the Union government.”

Addressing a press conference here on Monday (October 27, 2025), Mr. Chandrasekhar said that the poverty levels in Kerala were low even in 2014 and accused the State government of taking “an undue amount of time of over a decade” to eradicate this miniscule level of poverty.

“The extreme poverty level in Kerala was 1.24%. Why did the government take over 10 years to eradicate this? Why was over ₹1,000 crore spent for this purpose? Compared to this, the Narendra Modi government at the Centre has reduced extreme poverty in India during the same period from 16.2% to 2.3%, uplifting 17 crore Indians from extreme poverty. In Kerala, only 2.72 lakh people were uplifted from poverty during this period,” he said.

Mr. Chandrasekhar said that Union government’s schemes, including Pradhan Manthri Awaz Yojana, Pradhan Manthri Gareeb Kalyan Anna Yojana and Ayushman Bharat, have contributed to the eradication of extreme poverty.