Challenge For Uttar Pradesh

Both economically and socially, Uttar Pradesh (UP), India’s largest state, has become the nation’s greatest backwater. At over 170 million people, more than 16 percent of India’s population resides in UP, though it accounts for only 6 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP). UP’s economic growth rate has been below the national average since 1960. In fact, from 1960-80, the economic growth rates of both UP and Tamil Nadu were not very different.  Since 1981 – when India’s average growth rate climbed to roughly 6 percent per year – Tamil Nadu has transformed itself and reached the national average while, at 4.5 percent per year. UP has remained resolutely behind. Agriculture still accounts for over 40 percent of UP’s economic output, as opposed to less than 17 percent of India’s GDP today. UP’s literacy rate is 7 percent below the national average and a girl in UP is likely to live 20 years less than a girl in Kerala. Of the other North Indian states, Rajasthan has already begun to turn itself around and Bihar is also showing signs of arresting its downward trend, while UP’s decline continues unabated.

If one were to read India’s history or quickly survey national politics since 1947, UP’s enormous lag would come as a big surprise. All but four Prime Ministers of India have come from UP. Right or wrong, India’s civilizational history has also been North-centric: UP has the Taj Mahal, the holy city of Varanasi, and the confluence of Ganga and Jamuna rivers in Allahabad.  These sites are of great national and international importance.  

In the 1950s and 60s, Bangalore was a sleepy town while UP’s capital, Lucknow, was bustling with self-belief and glory. Today, Bangalore is written about throughout the world while Lucknow is a relic of the past. Kanpur, a city far ahead of Bangalore in industrialization until the 1960s, has plunged into the depths of economic despair with the closing of its textile mills. The town of Noida constitutes the only recent success story of national magnitude from UP. However, the performance of Noida may have more to do with its proximity to Delhi and less with UP’s policy vision.

What accounts for such a miserable record? The long-term sources of UP’s decline remain unclear, but the more recent causes are clearly identifiable. For roughly two decades until 2007, no government in UP lasted throughout its term and there was no policy stability.