NITI Aayog Health Index 2021

About NITI Aayog Health Index

• As a part of cooperative & competitive federalism, NITI Aayog and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) work to continuously nudge states/UTs towards improvements in health outcomes.
• In 2017 the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) in collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) and the World Bank initiated an annual Health Index for tracking Overall Performance and Incremental Performance on health across all states and Union Territories (UTs).
• The objective of the NITI Aayog Health Index is to track progress on health outcomes and health systems performance, develop healthy competition and encourage cross-learning among states and UTs. Health Index Scores and rankings for states and UTs are generated to assess incremental performance (year-to-year progress) and overall performance (current performance).
• The exercise is expected to help drive state/UT's efforts toward the achievement of health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) including those related to Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and other health outcomes.

• Health Index is a weighted composite score incorporating 24 indicators covering key aspects of health performance. The domains covered in the report are Health Outcomes, Governance and Information, and Key Inputs and Processes.
• These Health Index Reports aims to nudge the States/UTs towards building robust health systems and improving service delivery. The importance of this annual tool is reemphasized by MOHFW’s s decision to link this Health Index to incentives under National Health Mission. This Report has tried to shift the focus from budget spending, inputs, and outputs to outcomes.
• A robust, acceptable mechanism is used for measuring the performance- indicators are agreed upon, data is collected online through a portal maintained by NITI, which is then validated through an independent validation agency selected through a transparent bidding process, and the validated data sheets are shared with the states for verification, after which data is finalized and used for analysis and report writing.
• The Health Index is a useful tool to measure and compare the overall performance and incremental Performance across states/UTs over time and is an important instrument in understanding the variations in performance across various parameters including health outcomes, governance, data integrity, and key inputs and processes.
• It has strengthened the culture of use of data at the state/UT level to monitor performance and is contributing to the agenda of improving the availability, quality, and timeliness of data in most states/UT.

Good Governance Index 2021

• Good Governance Index, GGI 2021 Framework covered ten sectors and 58 indicators.
• The sectors of GGI 2020-21 are 1) Agriculture and Allied Sectors, 2) Commerce & Industries, 3) Human Resource Development, 4) Public Health, 5.) Public Infrastructure & Utilities, 6) Economic Governance, 7) Social Welfare & Development, 8) Judicial & Public Security, 9) Environment, and 10) Citizen-Centric Governance.
• The GGI 2020-21 categorises States and UTs into four categories, i.e., (i) Other States – Group A; (ii) Other States – Group B; (iii) North-East and Hill States; and (iv) Union Territories.
• Gujarat, Maharashtra and Goa top the composite rank score covering 10 sectors.
• Good Governance Index 2021 says that Gujarat registered a 12.3 per cent increase and Goa registered 24.7 per cent increase over GGI 2019 indicators. Gujarat has performed strongly in 5 of the 10 sectors including economic governance, human resource development, public infrastructure and utilities, social welfare and development, judiciary and public safety. Maharashtra has performed strongly in agriculture and allied sector, human resource development, public infrastructure and utilities, social welfare and development.
• Goa has performed strongly in agriculture and allied sector, commerce and industry, public infrastructure and utilities, economic governance, social welfare and development and environment.

• GGI 2021 says that Uttar Pradesh has shown an incremental growth of 8.9 % over GGI 2019 performance. Among the sectors, UP has secured the top position in Commerce & Industry sector and has also shown an increase in Social Welfare & Development and Judiciary & Public Safety. Uttar Pradesh has also performed in citizen-centric governance including public grievance redressal.
• GGI 2021 says that Jharkhand has shown an incremental growth of 12.6 per cent over GGI 2019 performance. Jharkhand has performed strongly in 7 sectors of the 10 sectors. Rajasthan has shown an incremental growth of 1.7 per cent over the GGI 2019 performance. Rajasthan has topped the Other States (Group B) category in Judiciary and Public Safety, Environment & Citizen Centric Governance.
• GGI 2021 says that in the North-East and Hill States category, Mizoram and Jammu and Kashmir have registered an overall increase of 10.4% and 3.7% respectively over GGI 2019. Mizoram has performed strongly in commerce and industry, human resource development, public health and economic governance. Jammu & Kashmir has performed strongly in Commerce & Industry sector and has improved its scores in Agriculture & Allied Sector, Public Infrastructure and Utilities and Judiciary and Public Safety sectors.
• GGI 2021 says that in the Union Territories category, Delhi tops the composite rank registering a 14 percent increase over the GGI 2019 indicators. Delhi has performed strongly in Agriculture & Allied Sectors, Commerce & Industry, Public Infrastructure and Utilities and Social Welfare & Development.
• The GGI 2021 says that 20 States have improved their composite GGI scores over the GGI 2019 index scores. The sector-wise scores attained by the States and UT’s indicates that strong performance in one or the other sector. Analysis of scoring also suggests that there is a very marginal difference among the States in their composite governance scores. This indicates that overall governance in the States of India is moving in the positive direction.

In addition to the existing quantitative Indicators, additional process and input-based indicators are made part of the GGI 20202-21 framework. The aim of including additional dimensions is to make GGI a more holistic tool of measuring governance. A roadmap of the inclusion of qualitative aspects, an approach for the inclusion of new indicators and making the required data available for index computation is included in the report of GGI 2020-21.