MP may get happiness index after LS polls

Bhopal: In the run-up to the state assembly elections, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders, including chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, have cited the state government’s achievement of creating the country’s first ‘happiness department’.

Officials in the department earlier said an index will be in place before the November 28 elections to measure the popular happiness quotient under the BJP’s unbroken 15-year rule in the state. Now, officials in the department familiar with the matter say the gauge may not be ready even before the Lok Sabha elections in 2019; it is likely to be compiled only by August.

It was two years ago that the Chouhan government formed the country’s first ‘happiness department’, or the Rajya Anand Sansthan, a move emulated by Andhra Pradesh in 2017.

The department initiated its work in August 2016 with three main initiatives - Alpviram (to bring inner happiness through self realisation), Anand Utsav (festival of happiness) and appointment of happiness volunteers and Anand sahyogis (trainers for the Alpviram programme).

People at large are still not clear about what happiness department is really doing, according to department officials.

“People want to see tangible success but we are working on bringing happiness by changing the life of people...,” said Iqbal Singh Bais, additional chief secretary (ACS) and in-charge of the happiness department.

To measure how happy the people of Madhya Pradesh are with the development programmes and welfare measures

undertaken by the Bharatiya Janata Party regime, the government signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, on May 16, 2017 to prepare the happiness Index for the state.

This February, then department head Manohar Dubey said the process would be completed in the next six months and the index would be released by the end of this year.

After two years, the department has finalised a questionnaire to evaluate popular happiness and decided to conduct a survey in 10 districts.

“It is a time-consuming process. MP has different regions and therefore, the questionnaire has to be region-specific,” department director Indrapal Singh said.

The Opposition alleges the government wanted to create a perception that MP was a utopia by creating the happiness department, to gain an advantage in state assembly elections.

“In the fourth poorest state that MP is, as per Global MultiDimensional Poverty Index 2018, farmers are committing suicide due to farm distress and youth due to joblessness. There are problems galore. That’s why they are afraid of releasing any happiness index,” said JP Dhanopia, spokesperson for the Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee.

Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Rajneesh Agrawal said, “The department is first of its kind and when something happens for the first time, implementation faces many challenges. ”

Happiness department officials claim it has motivated people to feel relaxed by helping them to access government benefits and improving the surroundings they live in through a cleanliness campaign.