Nagaland has emerged as the 10th poorest state in India with 25.23% of its population classified as “multidimensionally poor”, as per the Niti Aayog’s first Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) report released on November 24, 2021.
The national MPI measure has been constructed by utilising twelve key components which cover areas such as health and nutrition, education and standard of living.
According to the report, 17.16% of the population in Nagaland is deprived of nutrition while 1.38% of the population is deprived in the child and adolescent mortality.
Further, according to the study, 18.34% of the population in the State are deprived under the maternal health indicator, while 11.28% of the population is deprived under the years of schooling indicator.
Under the school attendance indicator, 3.67% of the population is deprived while 23.97% of the state’s population is deprived under the cooking fuel indicator.
Likewise, 8.71% of the state’s population is deprived under the indicator sanitation and 6.90% of the state’s population is deprived under the drinking water indicator.
Under the electricity indicator, 2.50% of the population is deprived, while 23.98% of the population is deprived under the housing indicator.
Meanwhile, 16.67% of population in the state is deprived under assets indicator while and 15.82% population are deprived under bank account indicator.
The report has also stated that in the uncensored headcount category, 24.5% of the population in Nagaland is deprived of nutrition, 69.3% of population is deprived of cooking fuel, 71.01% of housing, 33.9% of assets, 3.3% of electricity, 2.1% in child and adolescent mortality, 13.6% of years of school, 21.2% of drinking water, 28.7% of bank accounts, 4.8% of school attendance and 23.3% of sanitation.
As per the percentage of population who are multidimensionally poor in each district, Mon is the poorest district, where 45.56% of the population is poor, followed by Tuensang (38.62%), Kiphire (37.33%), Longleng (33.88%), Phek (27.2%), Peren (24.6%) and Zunheboto (23.71%).
With only 8.14% of the population identified as multidimensionally poor, Mokokchung is the least poor district of Nagaland. Other least poor districts include Kohima (11.18%), Wokha (15.35%), Dimapur (17.33%).
This baseline report of India’s first ever national MPI measure is based on the reference period of
2015-16 of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS).
MPI has been used by the United Nations Development Programme in its flagship Human Development Report since 2010 and is the most widely employed non-monetary poverty index in the world (Godinot & Walker, 2020).