NCERT Book Class 12 Geography Human Development

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Sixty years ago, Rekha was born in a family of small farmer in Uttaranchal. She helped her mother in household chores. While her brothers went to school, she did not receive any education. She was dependent on her in laws after she was widowed immediately after marriage. She could not be economically independent and faced neglect. Her brother helped her to migrate to Delhi.

For the first time, she travelled by bus and train and was exposed to a large city like Delhi. After a while, the same city which attracted her with its buildings, roads, avenues and facilities and amenities disillusioned her.

With greater familiarity of the city, she could comprehend the paradoxes. The jhuggi and slum clusters, traffic jams, congestion, crimes, poverty, small children begging on traffic lights, people sleeping on footpaths, polluted water and air revealed another face of development. She used to think whether development and under-development coexist? Whether development help some segments of population more than the other? Does development create haves and have nots?

Let us examine these paradoxes and try to understand the phenomena. Of all the paradoxes of our times mentioned in the story, development is the most significant one. Development of a few regions, individuals brought about in a short span of time leads to poverty and malnutrition for many along with large scale ecological degradation. Is development class biased?

Apparently, it is believed that “Development is freedom” which is often associated with modernisation, leisure, comfort and affluence. In the present context, computerisation, industrialisation, efficient transport and communication network, large education system, advanced and modern medical facilities, safety and security of individuals, etc. are considered as the symbols of development. Every individual, community and government measures its performance or levels of development in relation to the availability and access to some of these things. But, this may be partial and one-sided view of development. It is often called the western or euro-centric view of development.

Thus, for India, development is a mixed bag of opportunities as well as neglect and deprivations. There are a few areas like the metropolitan centres and other developed enclaves that have all the modern facilities available to a small section of its population. At the other extreme of it, there are large rural areas and the slums in the urban areas that do not have basic amenities like potable water, education and health infrastructure available to majority of this population. The situation is more alarming if one looks at the distribution of the development opportunities among different sections of our society. It is a wellestablished fact that majority of the scheduled

castes, scheduled tribes, landless agricultural labourers, poor farmers and slums dwellers, etc. are the most marginalised lot. A large segment of female population is the worst sufferers among all. It is also equally true that the relative as well as absolute conditions of the majority of these marginalised sections have worsened with the development happening over the years. Consequently, vast majority of people are compelled to live under abject poverty and subhuman conditions.

EXERCISES

1. Choose the right answers of the following from the given options.

     (i) Which one of the following is India’s rank in terms of Human Development Index among the countries of the world in 2005?

              (a) 126                           (c) 128 

              (b) 127                           (d) 129

     (ii) Which one of the following states of India has the highest rank in the Human Development Index?

              (a) Tamil Nadu               (c) Kerala

              (b) Punjab                     (d) Haryana

     (iii) Which one of the following states of India has the lowest female literacy?

              (a) Jamu and Kashmir            (c) Jharkhand

              (b) Arunachal Pradesh            (d) Bihar

     (iv) Which one of the following states of India has the lowest female child sex ratio 0-6 years?

              (a) Gujarat                     (c) Punjab

              (b) Haryana                    (d) Himachal Pradesh

     (v) Which one of the following Union Territories of India has the highest literacy rate?

              (a) Lakshadweep           (c) Daman and Diu

              (b) Chandigarh              (d) Andaman and Nicobar Islands

2. Answer the following questions in about 30 words.

     (i) Define Human Development.

     (ii) Give two reasons for low levels of Human Development in most of the Northern States of India.

     (iii) Give two reasons for declining child sex ratio in India.

3. Answer the following questions in about 150 words.

     (i) Discuss the spatial patterns of female literacy in India in 2001 and bring out the reasons responsible for it.

     (ii) Which factors have caused spatial variations in the levels of Human Development among the 15 major states in India?

Please refer to attached file for NCERT Class 12 Geography Human Development