• Gujarat topped the composite ranking in the Good Governance Index (GGI), followed by Maharashtra and Goa.

• Union Home Minister Amit Shah released the GGI 2021, prepared by the department of administration reforms and public grievances (DARPG), on Good Governance Day (December 25).

• December 25 is observed as the good governance day to commemorate the birth anniversary of former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

What is the need for Good Governance Index?

• The government constituted a Group of Secretaries (GoS) on governance who recommended developing an Index to gauge the performance of the states. Following their recommendation, the department of administration reforms and public grievances (DARPG), launched the Good Governance Index (GGI) Framework and published the first Good Governance Index in 2019. 

• As envisaged to be a bi-annual exercise, the process for preparation of GGI 2020-21 was initiated soon after the release of 2019 Index.

• GGI is a comprehensive and implementable framework to assess the state of governance across the states and UTs which enables ranking of states/districts. The objective of GGI is to create a tool which can be used uniformly across the states to assess impact of various interventions taken up by the central and state governments including UTs. 

• Based on the GGI Framework, the Index provides a comparative picture among the states while developing a competitive spirit for improvement.

How was GGI prepared?

The GGI 2020-21 ranks states and UTs in ten different sectors. The score and ranks for GGI 2020-21 are computed based on 58 indicators and ten sectors.

1) Agriculture and Allied Sector

2) Commerce and Industry

3) Human Resource Development

4) Public Health

5) Public infrastructure & Utilities

6) Economic Governance

7) Social Welfare & Development

8) Judiciary and Public Safety

9) Environment

10) Citizen Centric Governance.

To account for the variations in size and diversity of the states, they have been categorised into four groups: 

1) Other States – Group A (10) 

2) Other States – Group B (8)

3) North-East and Hill States (11)

4) Union Territories (7). 

GGI 2020-21 retained Jammu & Kashmir as a state in the category of North-East and Hill States for this edition of GGI. Also, Dadar & Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu are shown separately under the category of UTs.

Top ranking states/UTs in various sectors

1) Agriculture & Allied Sector:

• Andhra Pradesh

• Madhya Pradesh

• Mizoram

• D&N Haveli

2) Commerce and Industry:

• Telangana

• Uttar Pradesh

• J&K

• Daman & Diu

3) Human Resource Development:

• Punjab

• Odisha

• Himachal Pradesh

• Chandigarh

4) Public Health:

• Kerala

• West Bengal

• Mizoram

• A&N Island

5) Public Infrastructure and Utilities:

• Goa

• Bihar

• Himachal Pradesh

• A&N Island

6) Economic Governance:

• Gujarat

• Odisha

• Tripura

• Delhi

7) Social Welfare and Development:

• Telangana

• Chhattisgarh

• Sikkim

• D&N Haveli

8) Judiciary and Public Safety:

• Tamil Nadu

• Rajasthan

• Nagaland

• Chandigarh

9) Environment:

• Kerala

• Rajasthan

• Manipur

• Daman & Diu

10) Citizen Centric Governance:

• Haryana

• Rajasthan

• Uttarakhand

• Delhi.

Key points of the Index:

• Gujarat topped the composite ranking in the 58 indicator index followed by Maharashtra and Goa.

• In the Union Territories category, Delhi tops the composite rank registering a 14 per cent increase over the GGI 2019 indicators. Delhi has performed strongly in agriculture and allied sectors, commerce and industry, public infrastructure and utilities and social welfare and development.

• Himachal Pradesh has topped the NE & Hill States category composite ranking.

• As many as 20 states have improved their composite GGI scores in 2021, according to the index.

• While Gujarat registered a 12.3 per cent increase, Goa registered a 24.7 per cent increase over GGI 2019 indicators.

• Uttar Pradesh has registered an 8.9 per cent improvement in the GGI indicators in the period 2019 to 2021 which Jammu & Kashmir registered an improvement of 3.7 per cent in the same period.

• Jharkhand showed incremental growth of 12.6 per cent over GGI 2019 performance. It has performed strongly in seven of the 10 sectors.

• Rajasthan's incremental growth of 1.7 per cent was over the GGI 2019 performance. It has topped the other states (Group B) category in judiciary and public safety, environment and citizen centric governance.

• In the North-East and Hill States category, Mizoram, and Jammu and Kashmir have registered an overall increase of 10.4 per cent and 3.7 per cent respectively over GGI 2019.

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