Underlying the policies and investments that the Tamil Nadu state government has pursued are:Īn inclusive vision traced out by widely popular Tamil cultural figures turned political leaders, such as former chief ministers (the top executive post at the state level) M. How did Tamil Nadu do this? The state’s development path illuminates some key points regarding how governments can effectively promote inclusive development. In other words, the state has achieved high growth rates and economic transformation in combination with significant progress on social outcomes, which has been key for enabling broad swathes of the state’s population to share in its growth. At the same time, it ranks second on the Human Development Index among India’s 13 largest states. Located at the southernmost tip of the subcontinent with a population of more than 70 million, it is India’s most urbanised state and one of its most industrialised, with a strong manufacturing base and a large services sector. Today, Tamil Nadu is India’s second-largest economy despite being only its sixth most populous state, and among India’s 12 largest states, Tamil Nadu has the third-highest GDP per capita. 39.4%), and its urban poverty rate was less than half of Uttar Pradesh’s (12.8% vs. And in 2009-10, Tamil Nadu’s rural poverty rate dropped to nearly half that of Uttar Pradesh (21.2% vs. By 2005, Tamil Nadu’s per capita income outpaced Uttar Pradesh’s by 128 percent-a gap more than twice as big as it was in the early 1960s. In fact, in 1960, the rural poverty rate in Tamil Nadu checked in at just below 70%, much higher than Uttar Pradesh’s rate of 48%.ĭecades later, we see a much different situation. The two states were even closer together when it came to poverty: from the early 1970s (and probably before) to the late 1980s, Tamil Nadu’s poverty rate was equal to or higher than that of Uttar Pradesh. This gap, however, narrowed to 39% by the early 1980s. For instance, at that time, Tamil Nadu had a per capita income 51% higher than that of Uttar Pradesh-5,053 as compared to 3,338 Indian rupees. In 1960-61, these two states were not so different across a number of measures related to development, albeit with Tamil Nadu achieving a generally higher performance. A comparison of Tamil Nadu, a southern state, and Uttar Pradesh, a northern state, is indicative of broader regional trends. Although the culinary and linguistic differences between North and South India are widely known outside the country, less well understood abroad are the differences in how the two groupings of Indian states have fared on development.
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