Congress MP from Assam Gaurav Gogoi on Wednesday alleged that chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma misled people on the state’s poor performance in Niti Aayog’s sustainable development goal (SDG) report of 2020-21.
“The CM claimed Assam had progressed from being in the aspirant category in 2018 to the performer category in 2020. In fact, Assam’s progress from 2019 to 2020 was of barely 2 points (55 to 57), making it the slowest overall progress among all states. Assam’s overall rank in the recent survey dropped from 23rd to 26th,” Gogoi said in Guwahati, and indicated that there were “clear cut contradictions” between what the Niti Aayog report said and the CM’s claims.
“In the field of health, Assam has the lowest score of 59 among all states. It also dropped by 3 ranks from 25th to 28th place. Percentage of adolescents aged 10–19 years who are anaemic is 36.9, higher than India’s score. Assam also has the highest maternal mortality rate among all states with a score of 215, almost double of India’s score,” he added.
Gogoi pointed out that in the education category, Assam has ranked 24th out of 28 states and its score has actually dipped this year from 44 to 43. Assam’s dropout rates in classes 9 and 10 are the second highest among all states. It also has one of the lowest pupil teacher ratios of 11 among all states and almost half of India’s score of 21.
{{/usCountry}}Gogoi pointed out that in the education category, Assam has ranked 24th out of 28 states and its score has actually dipped this year from 44 to 43. Assam’s dropout rates in classes 9 and 10 are the second highest among all states. It also has one of the lowest pupil teacher ratios of 11 among all states and almost half of India’s score of 21.
{{/usCountry}}“The CM tried to justify Assam’s poor performance saying the data was based on the National Family Health Survey 4 (NFHS4) and not the recent NFHS survey 5. The justification does not hold because there’s no significant difference between NFHS 4 and the Phase 1 factsheet of NFHS 5,” said the MP.
“Overall, Assam figures in the bottom rankings of all the essential categories of economy, healthcare, education and gender equality and there hasn’t been any significant growth since 2018. The BJP government should be honest about its shortcomings instead of misleading the people,” added Gogoi.
Leaders from BJP and the CM’s office didn’t respond to calls for reactions on Gogoi’s assertions.