New Delhi: Niti Aayog’s ‘ranking for 101 aspirational districts’ has ranked Haryana’s Mewat as the most backward district in India followed by Asifabad (Telangana), Singrauli (MP), Kiphire (Nagaland) and Shrawasti (UP). Aayog’s ranking was based on 49 indicators across five sectors including health and nutrition (30% weightage), education (30%), agriculture and water resources (20%), financial inclusion and skill development (10%), and basic infrastructure (10%).
Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said, “People will know which districts are performing well and which are lagging behind.” Kant said that India can’t develop without the progress of backward districts. Rejecting apprehensions about the availability of funds, he said that money is not the problem and governance failure can also be related to this backwardness.
Apart from these districts, a few more, around 10 from Odisha, four from West Bengal and one from Kerala will be added to the list. In the current list of backward districts, 35 worst Naxal-affected districts are also included. As part of its “naming and shaming” strategy, Aayog will rank these districts every month from May 2018 based on their “incremental progress” to be monitored on a real-time basis, to help them gauge their progress.