States like UP, Bihar, MP keeping India backward, says NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant

NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant on Tuesday said that eastern states like Bihar, UP, Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan were keeping India backward while the western and southern region were growing faster.

Speaking at the first Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan Memorial Lecture at Jamia Millia Islamia University, Kant said, "Eastern part of India particularly states like Bihar, UP, Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan is keeping India backward especially on social indicators.”

During his lecture on 'Challenges of Transforming India', Kant said that India improved on several indicators, including the ease of doing business, but remained backward on human development index.

“While we have improved on ease of doing business, we have remained backward on human development index. We are still 131 out of 188 countries in HDI," the NITI Ayog CEO said.

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He said that India’s was lagging behind in the areas of education and health and asserted that it will difficult to achieve the consistent growth unless we improve on these aspects.

 "Education and health are critical and these are areas in which India is lagging behind. Our learning outcomes are poor - a class 5 student is not able to do class 2 substraction. Class 5 student is not able to read his mother tongue. Infant mortality rates are very high. Unless we improve on these aspects, it will be difficult to grow in a consistent way,” he added.