India ranks 115 in World Bank human capital index

Indians born today are likely to be just 44% productive as workers, way below their Asian peers, the World Bank said Thursday in a human capital index report.

Poor investment in human capital puts a threat on productivity of the India’s future workforce, the World Bank said revealing that India’s human capital productivity will be half of what Singapore citizens will achieve. Overall, India was ranked 115 among 157 countries. That’s much below its Asian peers, including China ranked 46, Indonesia (87), Malaysia (55). Singapore was ranked number one in the world followed by Japan, Hong Kong and Finland.

A child born in India today will be only 44% as productive when she grows up as she could be if she enjoyed complete education and full health, according to the report. Only 96% of the Indians born today will have the probability to survive to age five indicative of how India is still struggling to control infant mortality in a big way. The report, which took into account the human capital investments and outcomes, almost reiterated that Indian children are not learning enough in schools. Factoring in what children actually learn, expected years of school is only 5.8 years, effectively putting to question the impact of the Right to Education Act, 2009, that promises eight years of compulsory education to all Indians. Talking about the health parameters, it said only 62 out of 100 children are not stunted, putting 38% of kids at the risk of cognitive and physical limitations that can last a lifetime. The government, however, expressed reservation over the report questioning its utility.

“There are major methodological weaknesses, besides substantial data gaps. For instance, for the schooling parameter, though quantity is assessed using enrolment rates reported by UNESCO, quality is gauged using harmonized test scores from major international student achievement testing programs,” the union government said in a statement.

“For India, the data for quality of education pertains to 2009 assessment by PISA, which was conducted for only two states, namely Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. The methodology for harmonization is hugely suspect, the data quite dated and, consequently, the results quite non-comparable,” the government added.

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