Kerala retains top spot in Niti Aayog’s SDG Index, Bihar at the bottom

Niti Aayog on Thursday released the third edition of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) India Index 2020-21, which evaluates progress of states and union territories on social, economic and environmental parameters. In the latest release, Kerala has retained the top spot with a score of 75 while Bihar has been adjudged the worst performer with a score of 52.

As per the report, both Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu took the second spot with a score of 74 while Bihar, Jharkhand and Assam were the worst-performing states in this year’s India index with scores of 52, 56 and 57 respectively. Chandigarh too maintained its top spot among the UTs with a score of 79. Mizoram, Haryana, and Uttarakhand are the top gainers in 2020-21 in terms of improvement in score from 2019, with an increase of 12, 10 and 8 points, respectively.

“Our effort of monitoring SDGs through the SDG India Index and Dashboard continues to be widely noticed and applauded around the world. It remains a rare data-driven initiative to rank our states and union territories by computing a composite index on the SDGs,” NITI Aayog Vice Chairperson Dr Rajiv Kumar said after launching the report titled, SDG India Index and Dashboard 2020-21: Partnerships in the Decade of Action..

First launched in December 2018, the index has become the primary tool for monitoring progress on the SDGs in the country and has simultaneously fostered competition among the states and union territories by ranking them on the global goals.

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The index, developed in collaboration with the United Nations in India, measures the progress at the national and sub-national level in the country’s journey towards meeting the global goals and targets and has been successful as an advocacy tool to propagate the messages of sustainability, resilience, and partnerships, as well.