Spatial Disparities in Socio-economic Development among North-western Indian States

Abstract

ABSTRACT Regional disparity in the socio-economic development is a universal phenomenon which can be found in developed and developing countries of the world including India. The present paper addresses the issue of regional disparity based on 16 indicators of socio-economic development at district level in north-western region of India. The study has been done with reference to three reference years at an interval of 20 years, that is, 1971, 1991 and 2011. The study is entirely based on secondary sources of data collected from various government data providing agencies. In order to examine the spatial variations in socio-economic development, Z-score and composite standard score have been computed and interpreted. Co-efficient of variation (C.V.) has also been computed to measure the disparities at the variable level and overall development. During 1970s, the high level of development was concentrated in few pockets. North-west India has witnessed visible improvement in the levels of socio-economic development. The study shows that the low level of development remained concentrated in the districts of Rajasthan along with the central-western districts of Jammu & Kashmir. Despite declining regional disparities in socio-economic development, some of the districts are still multi-sectoral backward in the study region