Human development is increasingly viewed as the ultimate goal of development. It has multiple dimensions such as life expectancy at birth, education, standard of living, healthcare, inequalities, etc. and these can be improved and achieved with the rapid economic growth. The Human development is best measured by the United Nations Human Development Index and the World’s Banks Human Capital Index. While, the economic growth is measured by the Gross Domestic Product or gross national product. However, there exists a strong correlation between Economic Growth and Human Development as Economic Growth provides the necessary resources to permit sustained improvements in Human Development.

• India today is among the largest economies of the world. However, according to the United Nations Human Development Index report 2018, India ranks 130 out of 189 countries. The HDI 2018 highlighted some improvements such as increased life expectancy at birth, increased enrollment in schools, etc. However, India’s gross national income per capita also increased by a staggering 266.6 per cent between 1990 and 2017.
• According to the World Bank’s Global Human Capital Index 2019, India ranks 115th out of 157 nations. The report also held that a child born in India is likely to be only 44% productive when (s)he grows up, if (s)he receives education and adequate healthcare. So, This clearly states that the Indian economy has failed to provide a trickle-down effect.

Reasons for the lack of Human development

Unequal Distribution of Wealth and Non-inclusive growth: In the last five years, only 1% of the wealthiest in India increased their share in wealth of around 60% and the richest 10% in India own more than four times more wealth than the remaining 90%.

• This results in an uneven distribution of wealth across the various sections of the society and it marks the prevalence of high inequality in the Indian socio-economic paradigm which led Non-inclusive growth and low human development.

Jobless growth: With increasing economic growth, the rate of growth of employment has declined.

• According to NSSO, unemployment is India is highest in 45 years.
• With rising population and, consequently, the labour force, India will soon experience demographic disaster rather than a demographic dividend.
• Also, according to ASSOCHAM, there is no deficiency of the adequate number of jobs, but the majority of the labour force doesn’t have adequate skills required by the market.

Dismal condition of Education and Health:

• On comparison with similarly placed emerging economies, India spends way too low in the education and health sector.
• India spends 3% of GDP on education and 1.5% of GDP on health.

Education status in India:

• Independent India retained the largely colonial superstructure of primary, secondary, and tertiary education, which emphasis on rote learning and obsession with marks in the exams.
• Consequently access, quality, and outcomes all are far lower than what anyone would have desired.
• Dropouts are only one outcome of bad quality. Poor learning outcomes, low employability of graduates, low productivity, and consequent low wages constitute another set of outcomes.
• All these outcomes are reflected in the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2018, which concluded that the quality of education is far from satisfactory.

Health status in India

• Even after many government schemes, both the infant mortality rate and the maternal mortality rate remains high.
• There is a high prevalence of malnutrition in Indian children, reflected in a high percentage of Child stunting, wasting and underweight.
• The neglect of women’s health, in particular, is striking.
• Apart from it, India features the highest deaths in the world due to air pollution.
• Also, there is a disconnect between the rate of technological growth and ability to distribute the gains from it by adequately focusing on skilling (via knowledge, education) and health, which is critical for greater resilience and sustained productivity.
• Though the government has initiated many schemes for enhancing human capital i.e. Skill India, Digital India, Startup India, Ayushman Bharat. However, the results are not yet promising.

Road ahead

• The government needs to increase public expenditure on health and education as envisaged by National health policy 2017 (2.5% of GDP) and Draft education policy 2019 (6% of GDP).
• Apart from holistic reforms in education, Right to Education must be accompanied by Right to Learning.
• Promotion of Primary health centre under Ayushman Bharat, which focuses on preventive healthcare is a step in the right direction.
• The government should also focus on promoting labour-intensive sectors such as gems and jewellery, textiles and garments and leather goods.
• Skill framework in India needs to integrate with industries, so as to increase the employability of the Indian labour force.
• The government should make efforts to curb digital divide, as it creates and reproduces socio-economic backwardness.

Human development and economic growth share a cause and effect to each other relationship. Therefore, without investing in Human capital and addressing current economic slowdown, the goal to becoming a $5 trillion economy, will remain a pipe dream for India.