West Bengal has witnessed a continuous decline in economic performance, the paper, authored by Sanjeev Sanyal, member, EAC-PM, and Aakanksha Arora, joint director of EAC-PM, said.
The paper ‘Relative Economic Performance of Indian States: 1960-61 to 2023-24′ noted that overall maritime states had outperformed other states with the exception of West Bengal.
The data used in the analysis includes current prices and spans the period from 1960-61 to 2023-24, providing insights into how individual states have performed in response to changes in national and state-specific policies.
According to the paper, southern states have significantly outpaced others after economic liberalisation in 1991, with the five states, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, collectively accounting for aound 30% of India’s GDP in 2023-24.
“Before 1991, southern states did not show exceptional performance. However, since the economic liberalisation of 1991, southern states have emerged as the leading performers,” it said, adding the per capita income of all southern states became higher than the national average after 1991.On West Bengal, the paper said the state has experienced a continuous decline in its relative economic performance over several decades. From having the third-largest share of national GDP at 10.5% in 1960-61, West Bengal now accounts for only 5.6% in 2023-24. “West Bengal’s per capita income was above the national average in 1960-61 at 127.5%, but its growth failed to keep pace with national trends. As a result, its relative per capita income declined to 83.7% in 2023-24, falling below that of even traditionally laggard states like Rajasthan and Odisha,” the paper added.
Although Bihar’s relative position has stabilised in the last two decades, it remains significantly behind other states and requires much faster growth to catch up, the paper noted.
Conversely, Odisha, traditionally a laggard, has shown a marked improvement in recent years.
Elaborating on the performance of northern states, the paper said Delhi and Haryana have outperformed other states.
“Delhi has one of the highest per capita incomes throughout the study period,” it said.