Despite the consistent experience of high growth, India still goes with the lowest indicators of human development. Examine the issues that make balanced and inclusive development elusive.
The Human Development Report indicates that the growth in the terms of GDP between 1990 to 2020 has been more than 7 times, but since 1990, HDI Value in India has increased from 0.429 to 0.645 registering an increase of merely 50%.
Reasons for Consistent High Growth and low Human Development:
1. Inequality: As per Oxfam report, in the last 5 years, 1% of the wealthiest in India has increased their share in wealth by around 60%.
2. Jobless Growth: According to the Periodic Labour Force Survey, the unemployment rates in urban areas for all categories increased by almost three times between 2011-12 and 2017-18.
3. Low Learning Outcomes: According to the ASER Report, 60% of grade-5 students can’t read grade-2 text or recognise numbers beyond 99.
4. Health and Outpatient expenditure: Catastrophic healthcare related expenditure pushes families into debt, and people are meeting their healthcare expenses through some sort of borrowing.
5. Low Skill: According to HDI Report 2020, Barely one in five Indians in the labour force is ‘skilled’.
Suggestions:
● National Health Policy: The Economic Survey 2020-21 has strongly recommended an increase in public spending on healthcare services from 1 percent to 2.5 of GDP.
● Government should follow the Sharada Prasad Committee recommendations like global alignment, strengthening of regulation and Unification of Entire Vocational Educational training system.
● To improve learning outcome, Impleme5ntation of New Education Policy is needed.
Without investing in Human capital and addressing the current economic slowdown, the goal of becoming a $5 trillion economy will remain a pipe dream for India.
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