Will India achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by the 2015 deadline? It certainly does not look so, says a report of an UN study, With only five years left for the target year, the report says that the South Asia is not expected to eradicate poverty in half by 2015. According to Millennium Development Goals Report 2010, India is expected to reduce its poverty rate from 51 percent in 1990 to 24 percent in 2015 adding that "other South Asian countries have not made sufficient efforts to cut poverty in half by 2015."

The prevalence of hunger actually increased between 2000-2002 and 2005-2007 from 20 to 21 percent, the report adds. When it comes to nutrition, South Asia fares badly. The region is home to 46 percent of the world's undernourished children - the highest in the world, said the report. It has marginally fallen by six percent from the 51 percent recorded in 1990.

The region, in fact, had uniformly low scores on the eight point indicators considered for the report.

South Asia is also next to sub-Saharan Africa in vulnerable employment with 77 percent of people employed as either own-account or unpaid family workers, said the UN report. Women continue to work in the vulnerable sector. There is clear disparity on job front for women, the report adds. “Only 9 percent of managerial positions are held by women – the lowest percentage among all regions.”

However, the report has praised progress made on primary education sector. “The South Asian region reached 90 percent enrolment in 2008, up from 79 percent in 1999 and likely to meet target of universal primary education by 2015,” said the report.

South Asia is a laggard in meeting maternal health and sanitation conditions as per the report. Giving birth is risky in southern Asia where less than half the women deliver without skilled care. The open defecation is an affront to human dignity, said the report. Again here South Asia tops the chart with highest rate of open defecation in the world, the report noted.

In September 2010, the United Nations is holding a plenary session of the General Assembly to discuss the world’s progress on the Millennium Development Goals. 

Read the report