Wednesday, March 23, 2011

It's official- Vidarbha is most neglected-TIMES OF INDIA


It's official- Vidarbha is most neglected-TIMES OF INDIA


NAGPUR: Deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar has been claiming that no discrimination was being meted out to Vidarbha. The statistics released by his own government once again prove him wrong. It is now official that Vidarbha was being neglected in almost all fields.

On most parameters, the region is behind rest of Maharashtra barring a few backward districts like Dhule, Nandurbar and Jalna. Out of five most backward districts as far as human development index (HDI) is concerned, three- Gadchiroli, Yavatmal and Washim- are in Vidarbha. The infant mortality rate in all 11 districts of the region including Nagpur is above the state average. The per capita district domestic product of all districts except Nagpur is far below state average.

The ranking of the districts presents only a part of the picture. The HDI of Mumbai and Mumbai suburban districts is 1.00 while Gadchiroli languishes at the bottom with HDI of 0.21. This means that Mumbai is five times better off than Gadchiroli so far as literacy rate, mean years of schooling, infant mortality rate and per capita district domestic product are concerned.

The literacy rate in Vidarbha districts is somewhat better than that of some districts in Marathwada but all Vidarbha districts have very high infant mortality rates. The per capita income (PCI) has not been considered for calculating HDI. However, it is the real indicator of poverty. If this parameter is considered, Washim is poorest district in the state with PCI of Rs 36,087 while Gadchiroli is the third poorest at Rs 36,286. The PCI of Mumbai and Mumbai suburban districts is Rs 1,25,506 while that of Pune is Rs 1,11,637. The PCI of Nagpur district is Rs 81,225.

Division-wise Amravati is poorest with PCI of Rs 46,340 against Rs 1,09,824 of Thane division and Rs 79,788 of Pune.

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