All South Asian countries improve HDI ranking except the 'Sick Man of South Asia' - India
The Sikh nation wants OUT of the squalor, pain & misery that is India where 756 million Indians (72% of population) have no access to sanitation, 536 million (51% of pop.) have no access to affordable essential drugs, where 378 million (35% of the pop.) live on less than US $. 1 a day, & over 830 million (79.9% of pop.) live on less than US$. 2 a day, where over 300 million Indians are illiterate, and 180 million 'Untouchables' are treated like slaves not to mention over five million AIDS victims
Washington, D.C., Wednesday, August 11, 2004 - The central message from the latest UN's Human Development Report-2004, (an annual 'yardstick' and a comparison of human progress in various countries of the world - from the richest to the poorest) which was recently released in Washington DC, was, that the much trumpeted slogan of 'India-shining' was a fraud as India (unlike ALL its South Asian neighbours, who improved their HDI ranking this year) is stuck at its 2003 HDI rank of 127th rank for the second year in a row despite the fact that the number of countries surveyed this year have increased from 175 to 177. To read the UN's Human Development Report-2004, in detail please click at: http://hdr.undp.org/reports/global/2004/pdf/hdr04_HDI.pdfAll South Asian countries, except the 'Sick man of South Asia', India, drowning in an AIDS epidemic, improved their HDI (Human Development Index) ranking (last year's ranking are in brackets) in the UN's Human Development Report - 2004 like China, which improved its ranking from 104th in 2003 to 94th in 2004, a leap of ten points in one year:-
Bangladesh-138th (139th); Bhutan-134th (136th); INDIA 127th (127th); Maldives-84th (86th); Nepal-140th (143rd); Pakistan 142nd (144th); and Sri Lanka at 96th (99th). China 94th (104th).
The UN's Human Development Program is the process of enlarging people's chances, what people do and can do in their lives in pursuit of happiness as human progress is shaped by political power and institutions. The United Nation's Human Development Report-2004 issued annually (which examined 177 countries for its 2004 report released recently) is all about - to use an _expression of the UNDP - "what it will take for countries to establish democratic governance systems that advance the human development of all people - in a world where so many are left behind."
Since it was first published in 1990, the UN's Human Development Report has developed and constructed several composite indices to measure different aspects of human development. The Human Development Index (HDI) has been constructed every year, since 1990, to measure average achievements in basic human development in one simple composite index and to produce a ranking of countries. A cross section of which is reproduced below (and in the chart) gives an idea where India stands in the world after fifty seven years of rascal-rule - most of it dynastic - after socalled Independence granted by the Colonial British in 1947. The UN's Human Development Report for the year 2004, measures human development in 177 countries in such areas as, % of literacy, % of population living below the poverty lines of $. 2 and $. 1 per day, % of population using adequate sanitation facilities, % of population with access to essential drugs, % of under-weight children under 5 years of age etc., etc.
Chapter one of this year's Human Development Report-2004 has been contributed by the 1998 Nobel Prize winner for Economic Sciences, Amartya Sen, who is described in the Foreword by the Administrator, UNDP, Mr. Mark Malloch Brown, as one of the grandfathers of human development. Mr. Amartya Sen writes that, "Human development can occur in many ways, some more remedial than others. The human development approach has been extensively used in the development literature (including earlier Human Development Reports) to analyze several prominent sources of affliction, ranging from illiteracy and a lack of health care to unemployment and indigence. In this year's Report there is a substantial expansion of coverage and reach focusing in particular on the importance of cultural liberty and on the personal and social loss that can result from its dearth... The underlying motivation continues to be the search for ways of enhancing people's lives and the freedoms they can enjoy... In the chapters that follow the different forms of exclusion, and their implications for human deprivation are extensively investigated and assessed. attention is paid to institutional features as well as values that profoundly influence human lives. The practical importance of multiculturalism and cultural diversity figures in these analyses."
This year saw two new countries - Tonga & Timorleste - join the UNDP ranking to make the number of countries ranked to 177. Albania showed the most improvement this year when it leapt from 95th in 2003 to 65th in 2004. Belize in Central America was the worst performer when it dropped 32 places from 67th in 2003 to 99th in 2004. Other countries which showed good improvement were Armenia from 100th in 2003 to 82nd in 2004; St. Kitts plus 12 points, China & Suriname plus 10 points; Turkey plus 8 points, Russia plus 6 points and Iran plus 5 points. India is ranked (in the latest UN's Human Development Report -2004) at 127th - out of 177 countries surveyed this year - BELOW countries like Namibia at 126th, Morocco at 125th, Gabon at 122nd, Guatemala at 121st, Egypt at 120th, South Africa at 119th, Nicaragua at 118th, Mongolia at 117th, Bolivia at 114th, Viet Nam at 112th, Indonesia at 111th, Algeria at 108th, Syria at 106th, Occupied Palestine Territories at 102nd, Iran at 101st, Ecuador at 100th, Dominican at 98th, Sri Lanka at 96th, China at 94th, Turkey at 88th, Peru at 85th, Maldives at 84th, Philippines at 83rd, Lebanon at 80th, Thailand at 76th, Brazil at 72nd, Suriname at 67th, Bosnia at 66th, Mauritius at 64th, Malaysia at 59th, Mexico at 53rd, Chile at 43rd, Argentina at 34th, South Korea at 28th, Italy at 21st, New Zealand at 18th, France at 16th, U.K. at 12th, Japan at 9th, USA at 8th, Canada at 4th, Australia at 3rd, Sweden at 2nd and Norway is first.
INDIA, at 127th HDI ranking was placed above, but very close, to the following third world countries:- Botswana at 128th, Vanuatu at 129th, Cambodia 130th, Ghana at 131st, Myanmar at 132nd, Papua New Guinea at 133rd, Bhutan at 134th, Laos at 135th, Swaziland at 137th, Bangladesh at 138th, Sudan at 139th, Nepal at 140th, Cameroon at 141st, Pakistan at 142nd, Congo at 144th, Kenya at 148th, Nigeria at 151st, Haiti at 153rd, Zambia at 164th, Ethiopia at 170th and Sierra Leone last at 177th. According to the UN's Human Development Report-2004, 72% of India's population (756 million Indians) have no sustainable access to improved sanitation and have to hide their shame and squalor every morning along railway lines, bushes, culvets and corners like animals. 51% of India's population (536 million Indians) have no access to affordable essential drugs and have to makedo with home remedies or depend on the neighbourhood quacks during sickness. Thirty five percent of the population - 378 million Indians mostly of the lower castes like the 180 million 'Untouchables' (http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0306/feature1/index.html) and eighty million Tribals - live below the income poverty line of one US dollar a day. The unequal distribution of wealth in India becomes evident from the UNDP statistic that 79.9% Indians (830 million) eke out a living below the poverty line of US two dollars a day. Incidently the largest number of illiterates in the world - over three hundred million of them - live in India as does the worlds biggest AIDS epidemic. (Read Ray Marcelo's report on AIDS in India in the New York Times of November 28, 2003, by clicking at: http://www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/business/FT1069493560384.html)
For a backgrounder on previous UN's Human Development Reports please see Khalistan Calling dated July 16, 2003, at; > /Main/K_Calling/kc07162003.htm < and Khalistan calling dated August 14, 2002, at: /home/khalistancalling/2002/august14.aspx and Khalistan Calling dated July 04, 2000, headlined "UN's Human Development Report-2000 released" at: /home/khalistancalling/2000/july04.aspx and also Khalistan Calling dated July 17, 1999 headlined, "World's sixth Nuclear Power Ranks 132nd in UN's Human Development Report -1999", at: /home/khalistancalling/1999/july17.aspx.
This horrible situation in the world's largest, over-populated, medieval, Brahmin Oligarchy, India, visible in the figures and charts of UNDP-2004 report will continue to persist, as it has prevailed for fifty seven years since Imperial Britain quit South Asia in 1947. Based on its half century long 'slow-march/ standing-march' past performance in Human development, caste-ridden India can NEVER, not even in a hundred years, be able to shed its caste-ridden squalor, the human misery and the lack of hope that is India to even come abreast with Sri Lanka's current HDI ranking of 96th or China's 94th. No wonder this year while India - 'The Sickman of South Asia' - was stuck in its last year's HDI ranking of 127th and showed no progress, all other South Asian countries - Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka - improved their 2004 rankings over last year's.
There is no way Indian Occupied Sikh Homeland of Punjab can prosper, (reduce its unemployment, repossess its life-giving saleable river waters, currently being 'stolen' free of charge by non-riparian states of Rajasthan and Haryana, export its surplus foodgrains, light industrial goods and expertise to the 'Stans' of Central Asia & import their surplus oil and gas) and improve the lot of Sikh majority Punjab as long as the present 57 years old unequal political arrangment with Caste-ridden medieval India continues. (For vivid examples of India's medievalism click at: http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/6253_150380,00160003.htm and http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20030310&fname=Cover%20Story%20(F)&sid=3 and http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2024/stories/20031205002510100.htm)