Social Infrastructure, Employment and Human Development in 2015-16

In India, the proportion of economically active population (15-59 years) has increased from 57.7 per cent to 63.3 per cent during 1991 to 2013. To reap the benefits of this ‘demographic dividend’ in the years ahead, it is imperative to investment in social infrastructure.

Trends in Social Sector Expenditure

• As a proportion of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), expenditure on education has been around 3 per cent during 2008-09 to 2014-15. Similarly, expenditure on health as a proportion of GDP has remained stagnant at less than 2 per cent during the same period. During 2013-14, out of the total expenditure on social services, 11.6 per cent was spent on education, while 4.6 per cent was spent on health.
• At the state level, in 2013-14, Tamil Nadu had the highest share in the expenditure on education of about 12 per cent, followed by Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat. However, in terms of per student expenditure, Sikkim and Goa spent more than Rs.2,000, while Tamil Nadu spent about Rs.726.

Education Sector Challenges

• There are four main challenges in India’s education sector as follows:
  • Increasing enrolments
  • improving the quality of education
  • reducing the gender parity in education
  • improving the professional qualities of teachers.
• As per the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2014, there is a decline in the percentage of enrolment in government schools in rural areas, from 72.9 per cent in 2007 to 63.1 per cent in 2014. This decline is partly due to increased private schools. Some shift to private schools might be due to the poor quality of education in government schools.
• There is a sharp decline in the number of children in standard V who can read a textbook of standard II in both government and private schools. It declined from 56.7 per cent in 2007 to 42.2 per cent in 2014. The decline in educational outcomes in private schools warrants equal attention since there is an increase in the share of private providers of schooling and education across India.
• Another issue is professional qualification and training received by the teachers. According to a recent survey, only 79 per cent of teachers are professionally qualified. For the higher secondary level, the percentage of qualified teachers is around 69 per cent.
• There is an improvement in girls education, with parity having been achieved between girls and boys at all levels of education, except higher education in the case of total and Scheduled Caste (SC) students.
• The government launched a ‘Digital Gender Atlas for Advancing Girl’s Education in India’ in March 2015 to help identify low-performing geographic pockets for girls, particularly from marginalized groups.

Trends in Employment

• Employment growth in the organized sector was increased by 2.0 per cent in 2012 over 2011, as against a growth of 1.0 per cent in 2011 over 2010. The annual growth rate for the private sector was 4.5 per cent in 2012 against a growth of 5.6 per cent in 2011; whereas the public sector registered a marginal growth of 0.4 per cent in 2012 against a decline of 1.8 per cent in 2011.
• As per the survey conducted during the period January 2014 to July 2014, the Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) is 52.5 for all persons, 54.7 for rural areas, and 47.2 for urban areas.
• The LFPR for women is significantly lower than that for males in both rural and urban areas. The Worker Population Ratio (WPR) also reflects a similar pattern. The main reason for low labour participation in India is largely because of lower female LFPR.
• Further the main reasons for low women LFPR include:
  • Rapid increase in female participation in education and their preference to white collar jobs
  • Rising male incomes
• The conventional employment and unemployment surveys have not been able to capture the various types of unpaid work that women engage in both within and outside households in rural and urban areas in India.
• To address the issue of low female LFPR and WPR, the government has launched various legislation based schemes with emphasis on female participation.
  • For example, in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), there is a stipulation of one-third participation by women.
  • Similarly, the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM) aims at organizing all rural poor households and nurturing and supporting them till they come out of abject poverty, by organizing one woman member from each household into affinity-based women Self-Help Groups (SHG) and their federations at village and higher levels by 2024-25. The mission has covered 1.7 lakh villages and mobilized around 24.61 lakh SHGs, of which 8.3 lakh are new.
• A notable aspect of the employment situation in India is the large share of informal employment and growth in informal employment in the organized sector. The share of informal employment in the organized sector increased from 48 per cent to 54.6 per cent in 2004-5 to 2011-12. Its share in total employment remained above 90 per cent throughout this period.

Child Labour

• Nothing special has been launched in year 2015 for prevention of Child Labour. An amendment to the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 which prohibits the employment of children below 14 years in certain occupations, is pending in Rajya Sabha since 2012. In 2015, the NDA Government has decided to move Official Amendments to the Amendment Bill. The new bill would comprise:
  • complete prohibition on employment of children below 14 years
  • linking the age of prohibition with the age under RTE Act, 2009
  • making the punishment for employer for contravention of the provisions of the Act more stringent.
• The ongoing programmes include NCLP (National Child Labour Project) under which children rescued/withdrawn from work in the age group of 9-14 years are enrolled in NCLP special training centers, where they are provided bridge education, vocational training, midday meal, stipend, health care, etc., before being mainstreamed into formal education system.
• Children in the age group of 5-8 years are directly linked to the formal education system through close coordination with the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan (SSA).

Skill Development

• In India, there is a perception that vocational education and skill development are meant for people who have failed to join mainstream education. This perception is strengthened by the significantly lower wages paid to employees with vocational training vis-à-vis those with formal education.
• According to the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC), there is a severe quality gap and lack of availability of trainers in the vocational education and training sector. Government has to invest in bridging the skill gap in the vocational education and training sector to improve the employability of people.
• The establishment of the National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF) will facilitate increased adoption of skill development programmes, with availability of pathways for progression between higher education and skill development.
• The other initiatives include:
  • setting up of Sector Skill Councils (SSCs)
  • definition of Occupation Standards and funding initiatives such as the Standard Training and Assessment Reward (STAR) scheme
  • Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY)
  • Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana (DDU-GKY)
  • These schemes are likely to create a widespread positive impact on the skill ecosystem in India.

Health Sector

Findings from NSSO 71^st round:

• The private sector continues to play a significant role in the provision of outpatient and hospitalized care.
• Over 60 per cent of all institutional deliveries are in the public sector and the Out of Pocket expenditures for childbirth in the public sector is about one-tenth that in the private sector.
• As regards non-hospitalised care, only 28.3 per cent of care is being provided by public sector.

Other health indicators:

• Under five,  mortality  has  declined from 126 in 1990 to 49 in 2013, much faster than global rate of decline during the same period.
• The immunization coverage has improved substantially since NFHS-1, when only 36 percent of children were fully vaccinated and 30 percent had not been vaccinated at all. The full immunization coverage improved to 44 per cent as per NFHS-3.As per NFHS-4, the percentage of children fully immunized in the age group (12-23 months) is above 80 per cent in Sikkim and West Bengal.
• Targeting coverage of all those children by 2020 who are either unvaccinated, or are partially vaccinated against seven vaccine-preventable diseases which include diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, polio, tuberculosis, measles and hepatitis B, Mission Indradhanush was launched in December 2014.
• Under the Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK), support is being provided to States/UTs for child health screening and early intervention services through early detection and early management of common health conditions.
• The Government of India has initiated an integrated National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancers, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases and Stroke (NPCDCS) jointly by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and Ministry of AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy) on pilot basis in six districts.

Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Index

• The UHC index has been developed by the World Bank to measure the progress made in health sectors in select countries of the World.
• India ranks 143 among 190 countries in terms of per capita expenditure on health. It has 157th position according to per capita government spending on health.

Housing Amenities, Sanitation, Hygiene and Health

• The disparity across states in terms of access to household amenities like tap water and latrine facilities is sharp. While access and coverage of latrine facilities is as high as 95 per cent in Kerala, 91 per cent in Mizoram and 89 percent in Manipur, less than 25 per cent of households have access to latrine facilities within the household premises in Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Odisha.
• The progress in sanitation has witnessed a spurt since the launch of the Swachh Bharat Mission. More than 122 lakh toilets have already been constructed in rural areas so far under the mission. Sanitation coverage, which stood at 40.60 per cent as per NSSO data, has risen to around 48.8 per cent as on 31 December 2015.
• In order to improve availability of drinking water in rural areas, the National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) initiated a new project supported by the World Bank, the ‘Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project–Low Income States’ with a total cost of R 6000 crore. The project aims to provide safe, 24 x 7 piped drinking water supply to 7.8 million rural population in four low-income States–Assam, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand–that have the lowest piped water supply and sanitation facilities.

Poverty Trends

• Poverty estimates based on the Tendulkar Committee methodology using household consumption expenditure survey data collected by the NSSO in its 68th round (2011-12) shows that the incidence of poverty declined from 37.2 per cent in 2004-05 to 21.9 per cent in 2011-12 for the country as a whole, with a sharper decline in the number of rural poor.

Human Development: International Comparisons

• As per the Human Development Report (HDR) 2015, India ranks 130 out of 188 countries. In comparison with BRICS nations, India has the lowest rank with Russia at 50, Brazil at 75, China at 90 and South Africa at 116.
• India’s HDI of 0.609 (in 2014) is also below the average of countries in the medium human development group (0.630) but marginally higher than the HDI average of South Asian countries (0.607).
• As compared to other BRICS nations, India reports the least mean years of schooling, and its Life Expectancy at Birth (LEB) is lower than that of Brazil, China and Russia, but higher than that of South Africa.
• Along with HDI, HDR 2015 also gives the Gender Development Index (GDI) for all the 188 countries. The HDI value for females in India is 0.525 in 2014, which remains unchanged in comparison to that in 2013. Except Pakistan, all the other four South Asian countries have reported higher HDI values for females in comparison to India.