In a first, the government has come up with a Panchayat Advancement Index (PAI) by ranking over 2.16 lakh panchayats based on their performance and progress towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Among the leading 699 panchayats, most are from Gujarat and Telangana, followed by Tripura.
PAI is prepared by the Ministry of Panchayati Raj after assessing panchayats based on their performance on various indicators covering nine SDG themes, including poverty-free and enhanced livelihood. The ranking will be in five categories—Achiever (90-100), Front Runner (75-90), Performer (60-75), Aspirant (40-60) and Beginner (below 40)—based on their score on a scale of 0-100.
Of the 2.16 lakh panchayats, 699 have been ranked as Front Runner, 77,298 as Performer, 1,32,392 as Aspirant, and 5,896 as Beginner. Of the 699 panchayats which have been ranked as Front Runner, 346 are from Gujarat, followed by Telangana (270) and Tripura (42).
The nine SDG themes are: Poverty-Free and Enhanced Livelihoods in Panchayat; Healthy Panchayat; Child-Friendly Panchayat; Water Sufficient Panchayat; Clean and Green Panchayat; Panchayat with Self-Sufficient Infrastructure; Socially Just and Socially Secured Panchayat; Panchayat with Good Governance; and Women-Friendly Panchayat.
An official at the Ministry of Panchayati Raj said, “PAI is an instrument to measure the performance and progress of each of the 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats (GP) in the country on SDGs. Each GP can assess its level of development through the PAI and also compare its performance with other GPs in the block, district or state. It is a powerful tool for evidence-based planning at the panchayat-level through identified development indicators across nine themes of localisation of sustainable development goals (LSDGs).”
Sanyukta Samaddar, former NITI Aayog advisor (SDGs) and architect of SDG India Index, termed it the “most-awaited step in India’s SDG localisation journey”. She said, “The PAI is a logical fruition to India’s first sub-national measure of SDGs which was launched by Niti Aayog way back in 2018 – the SDG India Index- our very own SDG Score Card for all our 36 states and Union territories, which has since then become a powerful policy tool to trigger action.”
“After similar SDG Index Ranking developed for districts and Indian cities, the SDG progress ranking of our panchayats is the most-awaited step in India’s SDG localisation journey which will lead to fast tracking of SDG targets across the chosen nine priority sectors at the grassroots level of gram panchayats,” said Samaddar, who currently serves as the Principal Secretary (Civil Defence), Uttar Pradesh.
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The Panchayati Raj Ministry official said, “Over 2.55 lakh gram panchayats have entered data in the portal. Out of these, data of over 2.16 lakh gram panchayats from 29 states/UTs have been received after due validation. Only those panchayats have been included in the preparation of PAI whose data has been duly validated by the state/UT concerned.”
“The PAI data of 11,712 gram panchayats/traditional local bodies from five states/UTs (Meghalaya, Nagaland, Goa, Puducherry and West Bengal) had not been duly validated,” the official said, adding: “PAI uses 435 unique local Indicators (331 mandatory and 104 optional) consisting of 566 unique data points across nine themes of LSDGs… Local Indicators Framework (LIFs) are visualised as the backbone of monitoring the attainment of SDGs…,” the official said.
