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Introduction
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1.1 Background
Indices have been used over many decades to measure human well-being
for various purposes. The three basic functions of indices are to simplify,
quantify and communicate (HMSO, 1994) the required information. They aid to
summarize the complexities of our dynamic systems into simple and meaningful
information, which is more focused and condensed in nature (Godfrey & Todd,
2001). Thus, they act as tools to point out important issues or conditions which
demand urgent attention and hence, enable policy makers to take necessary
interventions in order to achieve desired outcomes.
The indices were initially used mainly to assess economic growth. The
Gini index (1912) brought forth the issue of income inequality as a development
concern for the first time; the gross domestic product (GDP), however, remained
the key indicator of economic growth and development. For the first time in
1990, with the release of Human Development report, UNDP introduced the
new approach to measure advanced human well-being i.e. Human Development
Index (HDI). The index not only was based on economic development but also
gave emphasis on the social well being of human. Later, with growing
environmental concerns, several indices focusing on environmental
sustainability were developed (Jacobs &Šlaus, 2010). Ecological Footprint 1997,
Living Planet Index 1998, Environment Sustainability Index 2002, Environment
Vulnerability Index 2005, and Environment Performance Index 2006 are some
of major ones among others (Wackernagel& Rees, 1997, South Pacific Applied
Geoscience Commission, 2005, and Esty & Porter, 2005). However, limited
efforts have been made to develop composite Sustainable Development Indices
(SDIs) which take into account all related aspects of sustainability holistically,
covering the three dimensions – social, economic, and environment.
Sustainable development (SD) is a multi-dimensional concept which
emphasises on integration and striking balance between economic, social and
environmental aspects in a region, to ensure inter- and intra-generational equity
(Pope et al., 2004). The concept is evolved over a period of time and continues
to be a subject of study. With the release of Brundtland Commission‘s Report
(Brundtland, 1987), many countries started to define their SD objectives and
 [Introduction

priorities to adjust their growth patterns towards sustainable pathways. The

Commission also laid emphasis on multidimensional aspects of SD. Pearce et al.
(1989) reinstate that sustainability can only be assured with alleviation of
poverty and deprivation, conservation and enhancement of the resources base,
broadening of the concept of development, with inclusion of social and cultural
development, with economic growth and unification of economics and ecology
in decision making at all levels.
With the same vision towards attainment of sustainability worldwide, in
2000, United Nations announced the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)
to give directions to improve quality of life across the world (Kumar et al, 2016).
These eight goals focussed on major developmental issues to improve quality of
life worldwide, which include eradication of extreme poverty and hunger,
achieving universal primary education, promotion of gender equality, reducing
child mortality, improving maternal health, combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and
other diseases, ensuring environmental sustainability and developing a global
partnership for development. The scope of these goals has been enhanced to
include sustainability concerns in the developmental processes, which has led to
the announcement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) recently in
2016. The countries are expected to follow-up and review the progress made
towards achieving the SDGs during the next 15 years i.e. from 2016-2030. These
17 SDGs are – no poverty, no hunger, good health and wellbeing, quality
education, gender equality, clean water and sanitation, affordable and clean
energy, decent work and economic growth, industry, innovation and
infrastructure, reduced inequalities, sustainable cities and communities,
responsible consumption and production, climate action, life below water, life
on land, peace, justice and strong institutions, and partnerships for the goals
(UNDP, 2015). The countries are expected to follow-up and review the progress
in implementing the SDGs during next 15 years upto 2030.
One of the major issues to address sustainability concerns is to have
indices, which can measure the performance of a region on various dimensions
of sustainable development. The efforts to develop these indices got initiated
with the adoption of Agenda 21 (UN, 1992) at the Earth Summit in 1992. This
specifically asked national governments, international governmental and non-
governmental organizations to contribute in the development of SDIs relevant at
different level – national, regional and global. The Johannesburg Plan of
Implementation (UN, 2002), and the United Nation Commission on Sustainable
Development (UNCSD) at its 11th and 13th sessions further emphasized the
development and reporting of these indices (UN, 2006). Since then, several

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organizations such as UNCSD, UN-Habitat, World Bank, Institute for Financial

Management and Research, New Economic Foundation, United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP), Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development (OECD) came up with indicator sets to measure and assess one or
more aspects of sustainable development. The countries are also now expected
to develop their own national level indices to adequately measure progress made
towards sustainability pathways (UN, 2016).
Sustainability concerns are found to be different at different levels. There
are studies which have been undertaken to assess sustainability at levels varying
from global, national, and regional to urban settings (Moffatt, 1996; Hanley et
al., 1998). Out of the 500 SDIs reported world-wide, 70 have found their
application at global levels, ~ 100 at national levels, ~70 at state or provincial
level, and ~300 at local or metropolitan levels (Parris and Kates, 2003). Global
indices are the ones which are employed to keep track of the concerns which are
relevant at the planet level, and require global coordination among countries.
They are generally used to track global common issues; some of these may be
applicable even at national level for countries but may not be equally relevant to
every country. These indices also act as a common and consistent set of metrics
employed to not only assess global progress towards a goal but also relative
performance of the countries. Agencies at the global level are involved to
develop these indices in consultations with partnering countries and also
provide technical support for data collection and reporting at the country level
(Parris and Kates, 2003). National level indices are a common set of indicators
which are required to adjudge the relative performance based on commonly
applicable issues across different states/provinces in a country. These indices
may not be a sub-set of the global set of indices as there could be national
priority issues, which may not be so important at the global level. Even within a
country, there could be large variation across different regions (especially in a
bigger country like India) and indices at the national level may eclipse a very
prominent issue in a particular region in the country. Hence, the regional and
urban level indices are required which are specific to issues relevant to a
particular region or a city. Further, in order to attain global sustainability, it is
essential to attain sustainability at regional level. Regional level sustainability
has great potential to feed into national level sustainability. It is essential for a
region to carryout self assessment in order to assess their pace and direction,
while moving on the SD pathways. In summary, while it is important to have
broad indices at a macro level (Global/National) to follow a broad direction of
growth and assess relative performance of sub-units, micro level

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(regional/urban) indices are essential to detail out local sustainability concerns

and provide corrective measures. Improvements at the regional/urban levels are
cumulatively expected to enhance sustainability at the macro level also.
In developing countries, developmental issues take the front seat, while
sustainability concerns often remain at lower priority. However, neglecting
sustainability concerns lead to losses, first in terms of environmental
degradation and then leading to negative socio-economic impacts. Quite often,
unplanned rapid economic growth and industrialization leads to deterioration of
natural resources like air, water and land, which further impact human health,
agriculture and other important aspects of human society in an adverse manner.
Conclusively, measuring sustainability is essential in developing country‘s
context, and for a country like India with huge population base, socio-economic
diversity, steep trajectory of growth, and rich natural resources, the importance
of sustainability assessments becomes even more important both at national and
regional levels. In India, there is currently a research gap on development of a
composite SDI at different levels. At the national level, an SDI is required to
highlight and prioritise local issues at the regional level for which the
involvement of local stakeholders is essential (Pinfield, 1996; Rydin et al., 2003;
Mickwitz et al., 2006). Stakeholder involvement process not only makes the
assessment robust but also ensures capacity building. Further, regional SDI
values enhance public awareness on the relevant issues in the context of regional
sustainability.
India is progressing on the path of rapid economic growth. Therefore, it
is essential for India to develop SDI at national and regional levels. This will
help in refining and strengthening the SD pathways and will ensure higher
quality of life, maintaining equity at inter- and intra-generational level along
with long-term sustainability of natural resources. Thus, the present study aims
to develop a national level SDI, which can track and compare the performance of
various states/UTs of India on various dimensions of SD. Further, the SDI can
be used to highlight the scope for improvement and thus take appropriate
actions in the pursuit of SD. The present study, in addition, aims to develop
regional level SDI, which may be used for tracking the progress made by a region
towards attaining sustainability with greater emphasis on local issues, which
may not be so relevant at the national level. The study also showcases the
importance of stakeholder participation in development of regional level SDI to
incorporate relative importance of different issues/ themes in the index.

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1.2 Need and justification of study

Post independence, achieving socio-economic stability was the most
important challenge for India. In the pursuit of it, the shift has been made from
a dominant agrarian economy to manufacturing of products and provision of
services. While population in India grew by 3.5 times in last 60 years, the index
of industrial production has grown by 50 times. India has shown unprecedented
economic growth in the last two decades. While managing a population base of
more than 1.2 billion people, India has maintained a healthy economic growth
rate (~7%), leading to improve per capita incomes and quality of life (PC, 2013).
However, this development has come at some cost – the stocks of natural
resources diminished and environment quality has deteriorated. In this context,
it becomes an important proposition to assess the sustainability of the current
development model to ensure inter- and intra-generational equity.
The HDI for India has gone up from 0.345 (1980) to 0.624 (2015) in last
35 years (UNDP, 2016); however, India still lags behind at a rank of 131 out of
188 countries. India ranked 110 out of 149 countries on Global Sustainable
Development Goal Index & Dashboard on its performance across 17 SDGs
launched by Sustainable Development Solution Networks (SDSN) and the
Bertelsmann Stiftung (Sachs et al., 2016). The low rankings of India on these
indices raises key questions over the current developmental polices and their
implications over long-term sustainability. It is in this context, a comprehensive
sustainability assessment is essential to track the progress and to identify areas
for improvement.
India is on the verge of choosing its developmental path and has an
opportunity to leapfrog while looking out for a model of SD ensuring socio-
economic growth and environmental preservation, simultaneously. This model
can ensure avoidance of irreversible environmental damages and expensive
environmental restoration processes at a later stage. Moreover, degraded
environmental resources will gradually put pressures on the socio-economic
dimensions also. Deteriorated environmental quality leads to impacts over
human health, productivity, and well-being. It also impacts certain economic
activities (e.g. tourism, industries dependent on water) which are dependent on
good environmental quality.There are research studies which claim that on
account of deteriorated environmental quality, India is losing its GDP almost at
the same rate at which its economy is growing (Mani et al., 2013). This means
that even to grow socio-economically, environmental conservation and
protection is essential which calls for sustainable development. Therefore, it is
now important to develop the SDIs and measure sustainability rather than mere

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economic growth. Presently, India does not own an index that can clearly
measure the progress made by a region or the whole country towards SD.
Development is generally measured in terms of socio-economic well-being;
environment, the third leg of sustainable development is not given its due
consideration that it deserves. There is now a clear need of developing and
reporting an SDI along with development indices. The assessment of trends of
SDI will help in taking proactive actions to ensure a good balance between the
three legs of sustainability.
The present study aims to fill the identified research gap through
development of national and regional level SDIs for India in order to assess the
progress made towards sustainability goals over a period. These indices will be
helpful in addressing national and regional level sustainability issues and
provide a baseline for the policy makers to take informed decisions for ensuring
growth without hampering environmental quality in a region. The study also
aims to develop a framework of sustainability assessment to assess the present
and to plan for future timeframes.

1.3 Scope and objectives

Scope
The scope of this study is to develop composite SDIs for measuring
progress made towards adopting sustainability pathways at national and
regional levels in India. The study domain for national level work is India and
Goa the regional level assessment.
The scope of the study at the national level is to assess the performance
of various states/UTs using a SDI based on the three dimensions of
sustainability i.e. social, economic and environmental well-being. The index has
been used to compare and adjudge the forerunners and laggards states/UTs in
India on a sustainability scale across a common timeframe (year 2010).
Considering the data limitations, the datasets (indicators) have been kept as
small as possible, however, covering all the major issues of macro-concern to
India. The selected aspects have a general relevance to all states and UTs;
however, the magnitude of concern may vary.
The scope of the study at the regional level is to develop a regional level
SDI, which can track the progress made by a region in moving towards
sustainability pathways. The regional level SDI has been developed using a
consultative approach, wherein the perceptions of various stakeholders in the
region are taken into account. The scope of work also includes the assessment of

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relative importance of various themes considered for evaluation of the regional

level SDI. The SDI has been validated using past years‘ data and future
projections have been made, considering the projected sectoral growth patterns
in the region. Alternative growth scenarios are scoped to be evaluated in this
study to come up with a most sustainable model of growth for the region.

Objectives
Following are the objectives of the study:
1. To develop a composite national level SDI for India
2. To compare performance of different states/UTs using the developed SDI
3. To study the linkages between the economic, social and environmental
indicators and their relative impact on the composite SDI at national level
4. To develop and validate SDI at a regional level for the state of Goa as a case
study
5. To project regional-level SDI for future years under baseline and alternative
scenarios.

1.4 Organisation of thesis

The overall organization of the thesis is outlined in this section. The
thesis contains five chapters. Chapter 1 is the introductory chapter describing
the need, relevance, scope and objective of the present study. Chapter 2 presents
the ―Review of relevant literature‖ which critically reviews the past research in
the field, and also highlights the research gap and identifies the need and scope
for the present study. Chapter 3 presents the materials and methods used for
analysis, and present the top-down and bottom-up methodologies. Chapter 4
presents the results and discussion of analysis carried out based on
sustainability indices for national and regional level in India. Chapter 5 presents
the conclusions and summarizes the overall findings. Detailed contribution of
this research has also been discussed. Based on the research findings, several
future research directions are suggested. Finally, the limitations of this research
are also highlighted.

1.5 Operational definitions

1. Sustainability – In the context of the present study, sustainability can be
defined as development of a particular area (country/state or region) on
social, economic and environment fronts while keeping a balance between
them, for inter-generational and intra generational equity of resources.

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2. National Level SDI – In context of the present research, the National Level
SDI is an index, which can compare and assess the sustainability status of
all states and UTs of India on the three dimensions of sustainable
development - social, economic and environment.
3. Regional Level SDI - The regional level SDI in context of the present study
can be defined as a tool for measuring trends or progress of a region (i.e.
state or Union Territory as boundary) on the three dimensions of
sustainability i.e. social, economic and environment over a period.

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