India's rank in terms of Human Development Index (HDI) stood unchanged at 127 during 2002, with per capita income coming down but literacy rate improving slightly, the United Nations Development Programme said in its report on Thursday.
"Despite India showed improvement on two major parameters -- life expectancy at birth and adult literacy rate -- the country's ranking could not improve as other nations saw a much healthy growth in the social sector parameters," UNDP Assistant Resident Representative Surekha Subarwal said.
UNDP measures HDI in terms of life expectancy at birth, adult literacy rate, gross enrolment ratio for primary, secondary and tertiary schools, and per capita income in purchasing power parity (PPP).
The index was static mainly due to the decline in GDP per capita PPP to $2,670 in 2002 from $2,840 dollar in 2001, on account of the decade's worst drought in 2002 that resulted in lower GDP growth.
The life expectancy ratio improved to 63.7 in 2002 from 63.3 in 2001, while adult literacy rate went up to 61.3 from 58 in the previous year.
Enrolment ratio in schools, however came down marginally to 55 during 2002 from 56 in 2001.
The report covering 177 countries was released by Information and Broadcasting and Culture Minister S Jaipal Reddy in New Delhi.
