Quality Of Life For Elderly Index:
The Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM) released the Quality of Life for Elderly Index.
- The share of elders, as a percentage of the total population in the country, is expected to increase from around 7.5% in 2001 to almost 12.5% by 2026, and surpass 19.5% by 2050.
- EAC-PM is a non-constitutional, non-statutory, independent body constituted to give advice on economic and related issues to the Government of India, specifically to the Prime Minister.
- The Index has been created by the Institute for Competitiveness at the request of EAC-PM and it sheds light on an issue often not mentioned- problems faced by the elderly.
- Institute for Competitiveness, India is an international initiative centered in India, dedicated to enlarging and purposeful disseminating of the body of research and knowledge on competition and strategy.
- It identifies the regional patterns of ageing across Indian States and assesses the overall ageing situation in India.
- Ageing is a continuous, irreversible, universal process, which starts from conception till the death of an individual.
- However, the age at which one’s productive contribution declines and one tends to be economically dependent can probably be treated as the onset of the aged stage of life.
- National Elderly Policy defines people in the 60+ age group as elderly.
- It will promote healthy competition among States through fair rankings and highlights the pillars and indicators they can improve.
Major Findings:
State-wise Rankings:
- Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh are top-scoring regions in Aged and Relatively Aged States, respectively.
- The Aged States refer to States with an elderly population of more than 5 million, whereas Relatively Aged States refer to States with an Elderly population of less than 5 million.
- Chandigarh and Mizoram are top-scoring regions in Union Territory and North-East States category.
Pillar-wise Performance:
- The Health System pillar observes the highest national average, 66.97 at an all-India level, followed by 62.34 in Social Well-being.
- Financial Well-being observes a score of 44.7, which is lowered by the low performance of 21 States across the Education Attainment & Employment pillar, which showcases scope for improvement.
- States have performed particularly worse in the Income Security pillar because over half of the States have a score below the national average in Income Security, which is the lowest across all pillars.
