India has dropped to rank 128-a fall of two places — among 177 countries in this year’s report on the Human Development Index despite a marginal gain in HDI value. The UNDP’s Human Development Report released today states that climate change may actually reverse the trend of a steady linear progress in health, education and poverty reduction seen in the last few decades, especially in India with a “large human development deficit”.

The HDI is the measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living and well-being for countries worldwide. India’s value this year, based on 2005 data, is 0.619 — in 2006, India ranked 126 out of 177 countries with a value of 0.611 which was based on 2004 data.

Despite the gain in HDI value, the ranking fell because other countries have done better. India’s gains have come from updated GDP per capita and the more recent gross enrolment data — both are higher in 2005. Gross Enrolment Ratio for primary, secondary and tertiary education has gone up from 62% to 63.8%.

This year’s report calls for huge investments from rich coun-tries to cut emissions within the next decade not just in their countries but to finance low carbon growth in developing countries.

“While India is a high-growth economy, the benefits have been unequally shared and there is a large human development backlog. Around 28 per cent of the population, some 320 million people live below the poverty line and three quarters of the poor in rural areas¿ superimposing incremental climate change risks on this large human development deficit would compromise the ambition of inclusive growth set out in India’s Eleventh Five Year Plan,” warns the report.

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