Status of child development in India
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Status of child development in India Phalasha Nagpal1 Accepted: 13 September 2020 © Institute for Social and Economic Change 2020
Abstract Child development is critical to human development and a prerequisite to a country’s longterm socio-economic progress. Its gains are particularly more pronounced for a country like India, which is among the youngest countries in the world and largely relies on its labour force as a key growth input. As per the Child Development Index (CDI), India ranked 100th out of 141 countries in 2005–2010. However, these rankings mask considerable disparities and inequalities in child development existing within India. This paper computes the CDI values for and ranks major Indian states to facilitate a state-wise comparative analysis using the Save the Children, U.K. methodology employing secondary data from National Family Health Survey and Unified-District Information on School Education for 2005–2006 and 2015–2016. We observe considerable variations in the performance of different states across the three domains of health, education and nutrition. Between the two review periods, the most substantial progress has been achieved in improving health outcomes in terms of a reduction in under-five mortality. Meanwhile, non-net enrolment rates and the proportion of underweight children have improved at a relatively modest rate. The study shows that nutritional outcomes tend to be the most critical factor impeding childhood development in India. Overall, the CDI values have declined from 2005–2006 to 2015–2016 for all states (except in the cases of Sikkim and Uttar Pradesh) indicating that on average, child well-being in India has improved. In conclusion, there is a need for evidence-based state-specific interventions to enhance child development in India. Keywords Child development · Education · Nutrition · Health · Child mortality · Child development index
Introduction Child development is a critical component of human development. Healthy and diseasefree children mature to constitute productive human capital that contributes to the economic development of a country. In a corollary to that, poor child development outcomes adversely impact the achievement of fundamental development goals- both social and economic. * Phalasha Nagpal [email protected] 1
Oxford Policy Management, 4/6 first floor, Siri Fort Institutional Area, New Delhi 110049, India
13
Vol.:(0123456789)
Journal of Social and Economic Development
Premise for the study The need to go beyond human development and exclusively examine child development is premised on several factors. First, the human development approach focuses on adult outcomes, which do not always move in the same direction as child development outcomes and do not always change in the same proportion (Save the Children 2012). This means that the relative changes in human development index do not necessarily reflect commensurate changes in child development. Second, children belong to the vulnerable sections of the population; therefore, their rights o
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