Punjab fares much better than other provinces in human development

PESHAWAR: Punjab leads other provinces of Pakistan on the human development index (HDI), revealed a United Nations Development Programme report on Sunday.

The report, titled ‘Pakistan National Human Development Report 2017: Unleashing the Potential of a Young Pakistan’, revealed that Punjab fares better than other provinces on the HDI (a composite index measuring average achievement in three basic dimensions of human development—a long and healthy life, knowledge and a decent standard of living).

Among the provinces, Punjab and Azad Jammu and Kashmir come under high medium human development, while Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa fall under medium human development.

On the other hand, very low human development was noted in Federally Administered Tribal Areas and Balochistan, while Gilgit Baltistan fell under low medium human development.

Lahore was the highest ranked city of Pakistan on the HDI with 0.877, followed by Islamabad and then Rawalpindi. Four out of six cities of Punjab feature on the list of high human development including Rawalpindi (0.871), Sialkot (0.834) and Jhelum *0.829).

Moreover, only one city from Sindh, Karachi, makes it to the high human development list with 0.854.

The high medium human development rankings include 18 cities from Punjab, four cities from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and one city from Sindh (Hyderabad).

Eleven cities each from Punjab and KP make it to the list of medium human development, which also includes four cities from Sindh and one from Balochistan (Quetta).

Very low human development includes 14 cities from Balochistan, two from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (Tor Ghar and Kohistan)and one from Sindh (Tharparkar). 

Pakistan itself ranks in the medium human development category of the global rankings.

'KP excels other provinces over next three years'

Meanwhile, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter said the UNDP report exposed propaganda by the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).

The report is an analysis of first 18 months of the incumbent government, the PTI KP chapter said in a statement, which it said was even less than first two years of the government.

"The stats of five years cannot encompass first two years," the statement said, adding that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has surpassed rest of the provinces in performance and human development over the next three years.

Over the next three years, 4 KP districts progressed in terms of human development, compared to 3 districts in Punjab, 2 in Balochistan and 1 in Sindh, it said.

The PTI KP chapter said that under the tenure of Pakistan Peoples Party-led government in Sindh, 6 out of 10 Sindh districts fell prey to worst governance in the province.

The PML-N, which came to power in Punjab six times, has been perplexed over the performance of PTI's first-ever government in KP, the statement added.