Uttar Pradesh - Background
Garlanded by the Ganga and Yamuna. The two pious rivers of Indian mythology, Uttar Pradesh is surrounded by Bihar in the East, Madhya Pradesh in the South, Rajasthan, Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana in the west and Uttaranchal in the north and Nepal touch the northern borders of Uttar Pradesh, it assumes strategic importance for Indian defence. Its area of 2,36,286 sq kms. lies between latitude 24 deg to 31 deg and longitude 77 deg to 84 deg East. Area wise it is the fourth largest State of India. In sheer magnitude it is half of the area of France, three times of Portugal, four times of Ireland, seven times of Switzerland, ten times of Belgium and a little bigger than England.
The British East India Company came into contact with the Awadh rulers during the reign of IIIrd Nawab of Awadh. There is no doubt that the history of Uttar Pradesh has run concurrently with the history of the country during and after the British rule, but it is also well-known that the contribution of the people of the State in National Freedom Movement had been significant.
Life in Uttar Pradesh is short and uncertain. Females expect to live less than 55 years and the under-five mortality rate is as high as 141 per thousand. In these respects Uttar Pradesh resembles Sub-Saharan Africa for with 53 years of life expectancy and 160 under five mortality rate. Further, the demographic transition of U.P. has been slow. Among all the major Indian states, Uttar Pradesh has the highest birth rate and the highest fertility rate.
Among all major Indian states, Uttar Prdesh has the highest under five mortality rate, the second highest crude death rate and the third lowest life expectancy figure. The number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live birth in the state estimated to be 931 in the mid 1980s. If a girl is born in Kerala she can expect to live 20 years longer than if she is born in Uttar Pradesh. The probability that she will die before the age of one is more than six times as high in Uttar Pradesh than in Kerala. According to the recent National Family Health survey, Uttar Pradesh comes second to Bihar among the major Indian states in terms of the incidence of under nutrition among children below the age of five. This corroborate as well as explain to a large extent the lower possibility of child survival in Uttar Pradesh.
Uttar Pradesh is often seen as a case study of development in a region of India that currently lag behind other parts of the country in terms of a number of important aspects of well being and social progress. Their region consists of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. There are important differences between these four states. But the cause of social backwardness in these four different States, never the less, appear to have much in common and recent comparative research have pointed to many similarities in the social, cultural and even political makeup of these states which have contributed to their backwardness.
The total population of the state was 8.8 crores in 1971. It increased to 11.1 crores in 1981 and then reported to be 13.9 crores in 1991. The increase, in population in these two decades was almost identical at 25 per cent. As against this, the national population shows a declining trend from 25 per cent in 1971-81 to 23.8 per cent in 1981-91. Since 1971-81 the decadal variation of U.P. population in percentage forms has remained higher than that of the national.
It is also the fourth largest state in geographical area covering 9.0 per cent of the country’s geographical area, encompassing 2,94,411 square kilometres and comprising of 83 districts, 901 development blocks and 112,804 inhabited villages. The density of population in the state is 473 person per square kilometres as against 274 for the country.
Poverty estimation in India is based on (a) the concept of poverty time which is the prescribed minimum calorie intake neccessary for a normal human being to survive and (b) size and distribution of population by expenditure obtained from the household consumption surveys conducted by national sample survey.Evidently, the incidence of poverty in the state has fallen from about 57 percent in 1973-74 to 42 percent in 1987-88. The fall in the incidence of poverty is slightly more in the rural areas. However, the numbers of population below the poverty line have increased by 31 take between 1977-78 and 1987-88. This increase is more in the urban area than in the rural area i.e. there has been urbanisation in the root of poverty in Uttar Pradesh during the last two decades. Further, there has been increase in the intensity of poverty in the state over all these years.
Almost all social indicators of the state show that the state stands on 13th or 14th position among the sixteen major States. Bihar and in some cases Orissa, are the only two states which lag behind U.P. in terms of social development indicators like medical facilities, teacher-pupil ratio in primary schools, birth rate, death rate, infant mortality rate, literacy, per capita income, electrification of villages, per capita power consumption etc.
Distinguishing feature of Uttar Pradesh's economy is its regional imbalances. In terms of economic indicators like agricultural productivity, infrastructural facilities, industrial growth, the Uttar Pradesh's economy can be categorise into five regions; Western, Eastern, Central, Ruhelkhand and Hill. The Western Uttar Pradesh is agriculturally prosperous. It is relatirely industrialised and has seen greater degree of urbanisation. At the other end is Bundelkhand. Low agricultural growth, less number of industrial units, lesser gross value of industrial products marks tout his region as the least developed in the state.
The level of urbanisation has also been lower than most other states. The numbers of urban centres with more than one lakh population have grown slowly over last thirty years. The growth of urban centres with population less than five thousand have, on the other hand, have grown more significantly and these centres have grown in larger numbers in the western part of the state.
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