Concept of Economic development:

Till the 1960s, the term economic development and economic

growthwere used synonymously. However, the term economic
development is nolonger considered as economic growth.Economic
development is taken to mean growth plus progressive changesin certain
crucial variables which determines the well being of the people.Economic
development is much more than growth. It typically refers
toi mpr ovement s i n l i t er acy r at es, l i f e expect ancy, and pov
er t y r at es. Whereas, the term economic growth refers to the
increase /growth of
aspecific measure such as real national income, gross domestic product,op
er capita
income. There are vari ous i ndi cat ors of economi c devel opment
whi ch are asfollows:

Literacy rates,

Poverty,

Life expectancy,

Natural resources,

Infrastructure, etc.
Literacy and economic development:
A s i m p l e d e f i n i t i o n o f t h e l i t e r a t e p e r s o n i s o n
e w h o c a n w i t h under st andi ng bot h r ead and wr i t e a si
mpl e st at ement r el evant t oeveryday life.
Growth of literacy
: During the British period, progress of education wasrather tardy. Between
1881-82and 1946-47, the numbers of school grewfrom 82,916 to 134,866
and the number of students grew from 2,061,451to 10,525,943. Total
enrollment at the primary level has increased from19, 200, 000 i n
1950-51 t o 109, 800, 000 i n 2001-02. The number of hi ghschools
in 2000-01 was higher than the primary schools at the time
of independence. The provision of universal and compulsory education for
all children in theage group of 6-14 was a cheri shed nat i onal i deal
and had been gi venoverriding priority by incorporation as a
directive policy in article 45 of thecommission, but it is still to be
achieved more than half of the century

The growth performance of the tenth five year plan is as follows:
Target2002-07Actual 2002-07
Growth rate 8.00 7.80Growth inagriculture4.00 3.42Growth inindustry8.9
8.74Domesticsavings23.31 26.62Averageinflation5.00 5.02
Growth performance of several five year plans:
S . N . 5 y e a r plan T a r g e t A c
t u a l 1 F i r s t
2 . 1 3 . 6 1
2 S e c o n d 4
. 5 4 . 2 7 3 T
h i r d 5 . 6
2 . 8 4 4 F o u
r t h 5 . 7 3 .
3 0 5 F i f t
h 4 . 4 4 . 8
0 6 S i x t h
5 . 2 5 . 6 6
7 S e v e n t h 5
. 0 6 . 0 1 8 E i
g h t h 5 . 6 6
. 6 8 9 N i n t
h 6 . 5 5 . 3
5 1 0 T e n t h
8 . 0 7 . 8
11
th
five year plan(2007-2012):
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The major objective of the eleventh five year plan is to reduce
poverty.Other objectives are as follows:

Growth rate of 10% p.a.

Agriculture growth at 4%per year.

Growth of industrial sector to 10% and manufacturing sector to 12%p.a.

Double per capita income by 2016-17.

Reduce educated unemployment rate to below 5%.

Reduce dropout rate of school children to 20% from 52% now.

Literacy rate to be increased to 80%clean drinking water to all
by2009.

Electricity connection to all by 2009.

A telephone in every village by November 2007.

Broad band connectivity to all villages by 2011-2012.

Achieve WHO standard air quality in major cities by 2011-12.
India-vision 2020:
Planning commission has released India vision -2020 on January 23,
2003which presents pre-assessment of the progress of Indian economy for
theIndian economy for the next two decades. This document is
prepared byMr. Shyam Prasad gupta, a member of planning commission.
The salientpoint s of the document are:

Expected annual growth rate to be 9%.

Full elimination of unemployment, illiteracy, & poverty.

Per capita income to get doubled by 2020.

1.35 billion Population of the country to have better living conditionsby
2020.
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Wi t h 2 % a n n u a l e mp l o y me n t g e n e r a t i o n r a t e , 2 0 c r o r e
n e wemployment opportunities to be created by 2020.

Cent percent registration of the children (age group 6-14) in schools.

Environment situation to be remain as unbalanced as present.

Un o r g a n i s e d s e c t o r t o c r e a t e mo r e a d d i t i o n a l e mp l o y
me n t opportunities.

Urban population percentage to get increased from existing 25.5%to 40%.

Water problem in metropolitan cities to continue as such.
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