GUWAHATI, Jan 30 � The latest human development report of the country, released by the Planning Commission, ranked Assam third in the rank of progress in Human Development Index (HDI) among all major states of the country, said an official release here today.
The release said that according to the report prepared by the Institute of Applied Manpower Research for the Planning Commission, said that Assam achieved a rate of 32.1 per cent progress in HDI for the period 1999-2008.
The release revealed that the HDI reflects three main components of human development, that is, education, health and per capita income. The report further said that if Assam manages to maintain the growth rate for another decade, there is strong possibility that the overall human development of the state would be ahead of other states of the country.
The report revealed that among the three components used for HDI index, Assam has shown highest rate of progress in income index and third highest rate of progress in health index. Though Assam is still lagging behind the national average in education index, it has shown marked improvement during the period.
The official release said that as far as reducing hunger is concerned, Assam is doing better than the developed states of the country including Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Gujarat, which have much higher per capita income than Assam.
The Assam Government further clarified that the report on HDI released by the Department for Development of North East Region (DONER) on January 24 was based on data collected during the period from 1993-94 to 2004-05, while, the latest report released by the Planning Commission was based on data of 1999-2008.
