Chapter- 1

Development
Introduction:-
The word development literally means to grow from one stage to another stage.
Like a human being grows from child to adult even a society grows from an
undeveloped society where health, sanitation, food and standard of living are a
concern to a society where these are of higher standard and the Government
takes care of all basic needs.

Society normally grows from aspirations of people from where they are and
where they would like to be in the future. Therefore development means the
growth of an individual or its society from its current position to a better position
in the near future.

Development Promises different People different Goals :

Development means different things to different people. This is because

aspirations and the needs are different for different people. The meaning of
development is subjective in nature, it implies that two individuals staying in
same house or studying in same class may also have different meaning to
development.

We can also say that development for one person may not be development for
another. It can be disturbance, conflicting and may have a negative effect on
other people.

For example:- The word development will mean completion of studies and regular
job to a child going to a government school but to a public school student it will
mean establishing himself in a profession or a business.

Development may also be conflicting for two individuals. For example:-

Construction of Narmada dam was development to farmers and industries in
Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh but destruction to Adivasis staying in the area.
These people lost their land, houses and their livelihood which was the forest as
it was all submerged under water.

Discuss the development goals of people in Table 1.1 on page 4 of the text book.

Income and Other Goals

The basic reason for people to work is to generate Income. It is also the most
important reason to work for men & women as it sustains the quality of life for
the family & the standard of living. Therefore income is the most important goal
for an individual.

As we look at matters closely we also observe that people demand freedom,

safety and security, non-discrimination, along with income for development
needs.

For E.g.- an Engineer or a businessman will not readily work in a remote place or
disputed region like Afghanistan even if they are likely to generate much higher
income then they presently do. This is because they will remain away from the
family, their security will be at stake and their freedom will be restricted.

A student would not like to settle in places where his freedom is restricted. Nor
would a person like to work in a place where he is discriminated irrespective of
the money he is making.

In most of the cases quality of life depends on Non Monetary things which cannot
always be measured. The above things play a very important role in our lives and
the quality of standard of living.

Therefore we can conclude that for better development & and standard of living
people don’t look at just income as a goal but a mix of goals like safety, security,
freedom and non-discrimination also are considered as complete package for
growth.
 National Development
Once we understand the importance of mix of goals we shall now discuss the
parameters for measuring development.

When we have to measure and compare certain things we consider those

parameters where a large population is covered. Should income be the only
parameter or should other parameters be considered.

There are two agencies which measure development of all the countries and
then classify them. They are the World Bank and United Nations Development
Program (UNDP). These agencies use three parameters for measuring
development Income, Health and Education. These three parameters are
further divided as follows :

1) National Income
2) Per Capita Income
3) Infant Mortality Rate
4) Life Expecting at Birth
5) Literacy Rate
6) Net Attendance Ratio

The parameters of various countries or states can be compared and the ones
with better parameters are considered more developed.

1) National Income:

It is defined as the value of all final goods and services produced in a country
during a year. Higher the national income better developed is the country.

2) Per Capita Income (P.C.I.):

Per Capita Income is also called the Average Income. It means the national
income of a country divided by the population of that country. It is a better
parameter for measuring development. Countries with P.C.I. higher than Rs.
8,20,000/- are called developed countries and the ones with lesser than Rs.
65,000/- are called under developed or poor countries. Countries with PCI in-
between the two are called developing countries. India is a developing
country with a PCI of Rs 1,23,500/- in as per World Bank report in 2017.

3) Literacy rate:

It is the proportion of literate population in the 7 and above 7 age group.

Higher the rate of literacy better is the development of the population.

4) Infant Mortality Ratio (I.M.R.):

The number of children that die before the age of one year as a proportion of
thousand of live children born in that particular year. Lower the rate of infant
mortality better developed is the country

5) Net attendance ratio

The total number of children in age group 6 to 10 attending school as a

percentage of the total number of children in the same age group. Higher the
ratio better is the development. Different age groups are considered for
measuring attendance ratio at different level of education.

6) Life Expectancy at Birth

It is defined as an average expected length of life of a person at the time of

birth. Higher the life expectancy better developed is a country.

Per Capita Income as measure for Development:

In order to understand per capita income or average income as a measure for
development let us take a hypothetical example.

1 2 3 4 5 Total P.C. Income

Country A 900 1150 750 1200 1000 5000 1000

Country B 200 250 150 300 4100 5000 1000

 1) If we look at the above Example we observe that total income and average
i.e. P.C.I. are the same in both the countries.
2) We yet find a huge disparity of income in both the countries where P.C.I
is actually hiding the real status of both the countries.
3) It is clear that in a country A there is less disparity of income and in country
B there is a major disparity of income.
4) In country A people earn a reasonable income which is close to the
average income but in country B there is a huge disparity of income.
5) In country B first four citizens are very poor and the last citizen is super
rich. His income averages out the income of country B, thus hiding the
poverty of the other four citizens.
6) The concentration of the wealth is centered in few hands in country B
while it is evenly spread in country A. Therefore country A is more
developed than country B even when Per Capita Income is the same.
7) Therefore we can say that per capita income is not the best parameter for
measuring development. This is why we consider other parameters like life
expectancy, infant mortality rate, literacy rate and net attendance ratio as
measure for development.

Comparison of States
State P.C. I. I.M.R. Lit. Rate N.A. Ratio
Haryana 1,62,034 33 82 61
Kerala 1,40,190 10 94 83
Bihar 31,454 38 62 43

From the above comparison it is clear that Haryana has a much higher P.C.I.
then the other two states. Therefore by the P.C.I. records Haryana should be
more developed than the other two states.

It is also observed that parameters of Health and Education are better of

Kerala even though it does not have the highest P.C.I. The I.M.R. is only 10
which implies that very less children are dying before the age of one in Kerala
and almost everyone can read and write in Kerala.

It even reflects that more that 80 percent children attend school in Kerala
while in Haryana 40 percent and in Bihar almost 60 percent children are out of
school. This reflects a very adverse image of the state, making them less
developed.

Therefore we can say that there is even distribution of Income in Kerala as

everyone can afford healthcare and education making it a better place to live
with higher standard of living.

This is why we can also conclude that P.C.I. alone cannot be the measure for
development as other parameters are equally important.

United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and

World Bank.

1) UNDP measures development on HDI Index and World Bank measures

development on Per Capita Income.
2) Per capita income focuses on just the availability of goods and services but
human development focuses on quality of human life.
3) Human Development Index takes into consideration Health and Education
parameters along with Income but World Bank takes into account only per
capita income or just money.
4) Both these institutions give money to Governments for development
purpose. World Bank gives Loans to almost every country while UNDP
gives Aid to underdeveloped and developing countries.
5) HDI is a better way of measuring development than World Bank as it
takes into account all factors of development. The purpose of both these
institutions are also different.
 Public Facilities
They are those facilities which are offered by the government to its citizens free
of cost or at a very marginal cost.

These facilities are useful not only to the poor but also the rich people because
money in pocket cannot buy all the goods and services that you need to live.

Facilities like better quality of Roads , Pollution free Environment, supply of

Water and Electricity, Security by Police cannot be made possible by just being
rich. They are made possible by improving the Public Facilities.

Therefore public facilities improve the life of a society and also the standard of
living of its citizens. This is why we observe that cities are more developed than
small towns and villages. It is because public facilities are better developed in
cities and the standard of living is generally better.

Example of Public Facilities are Water Supply , Electric Supply, Sanitation, Roads,
Park, Provision of Safety and Security by Police , Transportation etc.

Sustainable Development
Sustainable development can be defined as a development that meets the needs
of the present generation without compromising the ability of the future
generations to meet their own needs.

To understand this we need to understand that environment and economy are

interdependent. With lot of advances and development in economies around the
world, major stress has been put on natural resources. With growing economies
across the world use of natural resources has increase tremendously and a huge
burden is put on the existing natural recourses which are both renewable and
non-renewable. It has also increase the rate of pollution which is becoming a
major environment hazard.
Due to extreme pressure on the environment two natural recourses Fossil Fuel or
Crude Oil and Water are facing huge pressure. They are depleting at a very fast
pace, we probably don’t have crude oil to last for more than 50 years and
underground water tables are also reducing drastically leading to environment
crises.

Body Mass Index (B.M.I.)

This system is used to find out the nutritional level of an individual. Economists
and Scientists use this to calculate whether a person is undernourished or not.

The system of measuring B.M.I is very simple. Take the weight of the individual in
K.G. then take the height in Meters. Once we have both this data, divide the
weight by square of height to get the Body Mass index.

If the answer is below 18 the person is undernourished and if the answer is above
25 then the person is obese or over weight.

Example:-Sir Weight = 85 Kg

Height = 5.10 inches (Convert in meters)

In Inches 5 X 12 = 60 +10 = 70 inches

In C.M. 70 X 2.5 = 175 / 100 = 1.75 m

Square of Height in meters 1.75 X 1.75 = 3.0625

B.M.I. = Weight / (Height)2

= 85 / 3.0625

= 27.76