Puducherry best-performer in Social Progress Index; Jharkhand worst

The indexing was part of the Social Progress Index (SPI) for States and Districts made by the Institute for Competitiveness and Social Progress Imperative that was submitted to the Economic Advisory Council- Prime Minister and released on Tuesday.

The Social Progress Index is a tool that can serve as a holistic measure of a country's social progress at the national and sub-national levels. The index assesses states and districts based on 12 components across three critical dimensions of social progress - Basic Human Needs, Foundations of well-being, and Opportunity.

The performance of Puducherry, which was placed in the "Very High Social Progress" category in the report, was attributed to its performance across components like Personal Freedom and Choice, Shelter, and Water and Sanitation.

Lakshadweep and Goa closely followed Puducherry in the "Very High Social Progress" category with scores of 65.89 and 65.53, respectively.

Jharkhand and Bihar scored the lowest, 43.95 and 44.47, respectively.

For Basic Human Needs, Goa, Puducherry, Lakshadweep, and Chandigarh are the top four states with the best performance in Water and Sanitation and Shelter as compared to the other states and union territories.

In addition, Goa also got the highest component score for Water and Sanitation, followed by Kerala, scoring the highest across the Nutrition and Basic Medical Care components. For Shelter and Personal Safety, Chandigarh and Nagaland have emerged as the front-runners, respectively.

Further, Mizoram, Himachal Pradesh, Ladakh, and Goa have emerged as the best-performing states for the Foundations of Wellbeing.

Within the dimension for the Access to Basic Knowledge component, Punjab has the highest component score of 62.92, while Delhi has topped the list for Access to Information and Communication with a score of 71.30.

For Health and Wellness, Rajasthan has the highest component score of 73.74. For Environmental Quality, the top three states belong to the northeast region, namely, Mizoram, Nagaland, and Meghalaya.

Lastly, Tamil Nadu has achieved the highest component score of 72.00 for the Opportunity dimension. Within this dimension, Andaman and Nicobar Islands have the highest component score for Personal Rights, while Sikkim has topped the list for Inclusiveness. (ANI)