Bihar, Jharkhand, UP among the poorest states in India: NITI Aayog

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• Nov 27, 2021 | moderator

New Delhi: In a latest report released by Niti Aayog, Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh have emerged as the poorest states in the country. Niti Aayog’s first Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) report suggests, that states like Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh have the highest number of poor population.

As per the index, 51.91 per cent population of Bihar is poor, followed by 42.16 per cent in Jharkhand, 37.79 per cent in Uttar Pradesh. While Madhya Pradesh (36.65 per cent) has been placed fourth in the index, Meghalaya (32.67 per cent) is at the fifth spot.

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While states like Kerala, Goa and Sikkim have been found to have few numbers of poor people in their state. Kerala’s poor populace comprises of 0.71 per cent of the total general populace, Goa with 3.76 per cent and Sikkim with 3.82 per cent.

Among union territories (UTs), Dadra and Nagar Haveli (27.36 per cent), Jammu & Kashmir, and Ladakh (12.58), Daman & Diu (6.82 per cent) and Chandigarh (5.97 per cent), emerged as the poorest UTs. Puducherry having 1.72 per cent of its population as poor, Lakshadweep (1.82 per cent ), Andaman & Nicobar Islands (4.30 per cent) and Delhi (4.79 per cent) have fared better.

The report triggers a burning question on the state’s general diet consumed by the populace. Bihar has the highest number of malnourished people followed by Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.

Bihar is also the worst performer when it comes to the percentage of population deprived of maternal health, percentage of population deprived of years of schooling school attendance and percentage of population of cooking fuel and electricity.

Uttar Pradesh ranked the worst in the child and adolescent mortality category, followed by Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, while Jharkhand performed the worst when it comes to the percentage of population deprived of sanitation, followed by Bihar and Odisha.

According to the report, India’s national MPI measure uses the globally accepted and robust methodology developed by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Importantly, as a measure of multidimensional poverty, it captures multiple and simultaneous deprivation faced by households, it added.