After the release of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) India Index 2023-24 by Niti Aayog in July, it would be imprudent for the Centre to persist in blaming Kerala for fiscal mismanagement, like it did in the Supreme Court in April this year. Kerala has once again emerged as the top scorer in the country with 79 marks, the distilled score of the state's performance across 16 SDGs. In other words, if India looks good globally in terms of comprehensive development goals, Kerala is one of the major reasons.

The SDG framework is part of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development that was adopted by 193 members of the United Nations General Assembly in 2015. The objective is to raise living standards of every individual to a certain global standard set by the United Nations.

Given that Kerala has achieved most of the goals set by the Centre, the moot question is whether Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, when she presents the first budget of the third Modi dispensation on July 23, will be sensitive to Kerala's needs. The Kerala government has sought a special package of Rs 24,000 crore to tide over what it says is a central squeeze on Kerala's entitlements in the form of funds and grants during the last four years.

In addition to being the overall topper, Kerala also has the highest score in three SDGs: Zero hunger (Goal 2), quality education (Goal 4), and affordable and clean energy (Goal 7). What's more, Kerala is in the 'frontrunner', or high scoring, category for all SDG goals except two -- responsible consumption and production (Goal 12) and life below water (Goal 14).
Any state that scores between 65 and 100 marks is bracketed in the 'frontrunner' category.

Therefore, even when Kerala is not the top scorer in the achievement of certain goals, there are components within these individual goals in which Kerala has achieved a level of success that even the top achiever of that particular goal would struggle to better any time soon.

Zero poor Kerala
Take for instance Goal 1, 'No Poverty'. Kerala ranks seventh with 81 marks. Tamil Nadu, with 92, tops the achievement list. Now take the most crucial component within this goal, 'Head Count ratio as per the Multidimensional Poverty Index' (MPI)  or the percentage of people suffering multidimensional poverty.

For Kerala, the percentage is 0.55%, the best in the country by a distance. Even the global target is 1.2%. For Tamil Nadu, the leader in this category, it is 2.20%. For Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh it is 33.76%, 22.93% and 20.63%.

The MPI, which has replaced the Human Poverty Index, is calculated on the basis of various indicators within three dimensions -- health, education and standard of living. If child mortality and nutrition are indicators of health, years of schooling and school attendance signifies the level of education. Living standards are measured by various factors like cooking fuel, sanitation, drinking water availability, assets, electricity and housing.

Better than the best
Take another example, Goal 3 (Good Health and Well Being). Kerala is sixth with 80 marks -- Gujarat is the top scorer with 90 marks. But in most of the components that make up this goal -- maternal mortality, under-five mortality, HIV incidence and health worker density -- Kerala has the healthiest numbers, far better than top scorer Gujarat.

Kerala's score in this goal has gone down mostly because of high rates of road accidents and suicides (at 28 suicides per one lakh population, Kerala is the fourth worst state behind Sikkim, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Puducherry).
Or take Goal 9, 'Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure'. Though ranked three, it has the highest percentage of inhabited villages with 3G/4G mobile internet coverage.

Goal 10 (Reduced Inequalities), where Kerala is ranked 11, offers a better example of Kerala's distinction in matters of social progress. In this, the crucial component is Gini coefficient, which is a measure of income inequality. The value of the Gini coefficient ranges from 0 (perfect equality) to 1 (perfect inequality). Even if ranked 11, Kerala has the country's lowest Gini coefficient of 0.1, a figure closest to perfect equality.
Still, if the rank is relatively low it is because of the higher number of crimes against SC and ST in Kerala.

For Goal 11, Sustainable Cities and Communities, Kerala is ranked 12. Even then it has the highest number of individual household toilets and also the most efficient door-to-door waste collection.

Women and child concerns
Nonetheless, there are innumerable areas where there is a slide in progress. Though Kerala is the top scorer in 'Zero Hunger', the percentage of pregnant women with anaemia has increased from 22.60% in 2022-23 to 31.40%.

Under 'Gender Equality' a noticeable drop has been detected. The number of women in managerial positions in listed companies (per 1,000 persons) has dropped to 167 from 241.
Under 'Good Health and Well-Being', where Kerala is ranked 6, two alarming trends have been noticed. One, the percentage of children immunised has fallen from 92% to 85.4%. Two, the suicide rate (per lakh population) has spiked; from 24.30 to 28.50.

Under 'Quality Education', where Kerala is ranked first, there is an embarrassing development. The percentage of Class 8 students achieving minimum proficiency level in language and maths has fallen, from 86.8% to 77%.

Gathering waste, waning innovation
Under 'Responsible Consumption and Production', in which Kerala is ranked 27 and is one of the two goals (Life Below Water is the other) where Kerala is not in the 'frontrunner' category, there are two developments of concern.

One, the percentage of hazardous waste recycled/utilized to total hazardous waste generated has shown a steep fall; what was nearly 33% in 2022-23 plummeted to just 3%, an indication that recycling has virtually stopped in Kerala.
Two, the percentage of biomedical waste treated to the biomedical waste created has also shown a big fall, from 58.67% to 47%.

Though Kerala boasts of an evolved startup ecosystem, the innovation spirit seems to have dwindled in Kerala. Under 'Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure', Kerala's innovation score as per the India Innovation Index has shrunk to 13.67 from 30.58.

What is SDG India Index
The SDG India Index 2023-24 evaluates the progress of all states and Union Territories on 113 indicators aligned with the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation’s (MoSPI) National Indicator Framework (NIF). It calculates scores for the 16 SDGs for each state and UT. The SDG Index scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating greater progress toward the targets.