NCERT MOST IMPORTANT QUESTIONS CLASS – 12 | GEOGRAPHY INDIA- PEOPLE AND ECONOMY IMPORTANT QUESTIONS | CHAPTER- 13 | HUMAN DEVELOPMENT | EDUGROWN |

In This Post we are  providing  CHAPTER 13 HUMAN DEVELOPMENT NCERT MOST IMPORTANT QUESTIONS for Class 12 GEOGRAPHY INDIA- PEOPLE AND ECONOMY which will be beneficial for students. These solutions are updated according to 2021-22 syllabus. These MCQS  can be really helpful in the preparation of Board exams and will provide you with a brief knowledge of the chapter

NCERT MOST IMPORTANT QUESTIONS ON HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Question 1.
Describe the trend of fertility and mortality rates in India since 1951.
Answer:
Fertility and Mortality rates
(1) Death rate. The crude death rate (number of deaths per thousand of population in a particular year) in India has declined rapidly from 27.1 in 1951 to 7.48 per thousand in 2011.

(2) Decline in infant mortality rate (number of deaths of children under one year of age per thousand live births) has decreased from 148 to 47.5 per thousand.

(3) Child (0-4 years) mortality rate declined from 51.9 per thousand to 22.5. It means risk of death has declined at each stage of life. Certainly it is a definite improvement in health.

(4) The birth rates have also declined but at a slower rate. It came down from 40.8 per thousand to 26.1

(5) Simultaneously, total fertility rate also registered decline from 6 children per woman of child¬bearing age to 2.9.

Question 2.
Examine the causes of comparatively low literacy rates in the country.
Answer:
In India, the literacy rate, according to 2011 census, is 74.04 per cent. The male literacy rate is 82.14 per cent while female literacy rate is 65.46 per cent. Thus there is a gap of 16.68 per cent in male and female literacy rate. Several social and economic factors are responsible for low literacy rate in India.

• General poverty of people.
• Low status of women.
• High ratio of drop-outs from schools.
• Low female literacy rate.
• Farm based economy.
• Prejudices against female education.
• Fast growing population.

But due to changing socio-economic conditions, the literacy rate is steadily increasing.

Question 3.
Identify the area of high and low literacy in the country.
Answer:
There are wide regional disparities in literacy rate. It varies from 63.82 per cent in Bihar to 93.91 per cent in Kerala (2011).
(1) Kerala maintains its top position closely followed by Lakshadweep (92.28 per cent) and Mizoram (91.58 per cent).

(2) Bihar ranks last in literacy among the states and union territories of India.

(3) Total 22 states and union territories are above the national average while 13 are below it.

(4) Literacy is very high (above 72 per cent) in 17 states and 7 union territories viz., Kerala, Mizoram, Lakshadweep, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh, Maharastra, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Nagaland, Manipur, Uttarakhand, Gujarat, Dadar & Nagar Haveli, West Bengal, Punjab, Haryana, Karnataka, Meghalaya, Goa, Delhi, Chandigarh, Puducherry, Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Daman and Diu.

Reasons :
(i) These are most urbanised states union territories
(ii) some of them are highly influenced by social and religious organisations.
(iii) Highest level of literacy in Kerala may be attributed to the states’ long tradition of education due to enlightened administration and high proportion of non-agricultural workers.

Question 4.
Why Human Development is necessary? Explain.
Answer:
According to Paul Streeten, human development is necessary on account of the following reasons :
1. The ultimate purpose of the entire exercise of development is to improve the human conditions and enlarge people’s choices.

2. Human development is a means to higher productivity. A well-nourished, healthy, educated, skilled, alert labour force is the most productive asset. Therefore, investments on these sectors are justified on grounds of productivity too.

3. It helps in reducing the rate of growth of population.

4. Human development is friendly to the physical environment also. Deforestation, desertification and soil erosion declines when poverty declines.

5. Improved living conditions and reduced poverty contributes to a healthy civil society, enhanced democracy and greater social stability.

6. Human development also helps in reducing civil disturbances in the society and in increasing political stability.

Question 5.
Distinguish between Economic development and Human development.
Answer:
The basic difference between the concepts of economic development and the human development is :
(i) The first focuses exclusively on the increase in income, while the second embraces the widening of all aspects of human life—economic, social, cultural or political.

(ii) Economic development is essential but in a different perspective. The basic tenet behind this is that it is the use of income and not income itself that is decisive in expanding human choices. Since the real wealth of nations is their people, the goal of development should be the enrichment of human life.

Question 6.
Write a note on indicators of Human development used in India.
Answer:
Indicators of Human Development. The quality of life and the level of human well-being are difficult to measure quantitatively. However, in search of a comprehensive measure that could capture the various dimensions of human development, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has developed composite index, now known as the Human Development Index (HDI).

It includes
(i) longevity of life
(ii) knowledge base, and
(iii) a decent material standard of living. Initially, life expectancy was chosen as an index of longevity, adult literacy as an index of knowledge and per capita Gross National Product adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) as an index of decent life. Therefore, a methodolgy was evolved to construct a composite index rather than several indices.

Question 7.
‘Development is freedom. Discuss.
Or
Explain the Western Euro-Centric view of development.
Answer:
According to Euro-centric Western view, development is freedom. It is believed that “Development is freedom” which is often associated with modernisation, leisure, comfort and affluence.

The present day symbols of develpment are :

• Computerisation
• Industrialisation
• Efficient transport
• Communication network
• Larger education development
• Advanced medical facilities
• Safety and security of individual.

Every individual, community and government measures its performance or levels of development in relation to the availability and access to some of these things. But, this may be partial and one-sided view of development. It is often called the western or euro¬centric view of development. For a postcolonial country like India, colonisation, marginalisation, social discrimination and regional disparity, etc. show the other face of development.
So, it is said, ‘Development and Environmental degradation are two faces of the same coin.

Question 8.
Which factors determine the nature of human development ?
Answer:
Low scores in the HDI is a matter of serious concern but, some reservations have been expressed about the approach as well as indicators selected to calculate the index values and ranking of the states/ countries.
(1) Lack of sensitivity to the historical factors like colonisation, imperialism and neo-imperialism

(2) Socio-cultural factors like human rights violation, social discrimination on the basis of race, religion, gender and caste.

(3) Social problems like crimes terrorism and war

(4) Political factors like nature of the state, forms of the government (democracy or dictatorship) level of empowerment are some factors that are very crucial in determining the nature of human development. These aspects have special significance in case of India and many other developing countries.

Question 9.
Describe the indicators of a healthy life. Describe the progress made in India in these.
Answer:
Indicators of a Healthy Life. Life free from illness and ailment and living a reasonably long life span are indicative of a healthy life.

• Availability of pre and post natal health care
• facilities in order to reduce infant mortality and
• post delivery deaths among mothers
• old age health care
• adequate nutrition and
• safety of individual are some important measures of a healthy and reasonably long life progress in India.

1. Death Rate. India has done reasonably well in some of the health indicators like decline in death rate from 25.1 per thousand in 1951 to 8.1 per thousand in 1999.

2. Decline in Infant Mortality Rate. Infant mortality from 148 per thousand to 70 during the same period.

3. Life expectancy. Similarly, it also succeeded in increasing life expectancy at birth from 37.1 years to 62.3 years for males and 36.2 to 65.3 years for females from 1951 to 1999. Though, these are great achievements, a lot needs to be done.

4. Birth rate. Similarly, it has also done reasonably well in bringing down birth rate from 40.8 to 26.1 during the same years, but it still is much higher than many developed countries.

Question 10.
Explain the relation between Environ¬ment, Resources and Development. State the views of different writers.
Or
“The prime task before any development activity in India is to maintain parity between population and resources.” Justify the statement.
Or
“Development is a substantive concept once it is achieved it will address all the socio¬cultural and environmental ills of the society.” Analyse the statement.
Answer:
Population, Environment and Development. Development in general and human development in particular is a complex concept used in social sciences. It is complex because for ages it was thought that development is a substantive concept and once it is achieved it will address all the socio-cultural and environmental ills of the society.

Though, development has brought in significant improvement in the quality of’ life in more than one way but increasing regional disparities, social inequalities, discriminations, deprivations, displacement of people, abuse of human rights and undermining human values and environmental degradation have also increased.

Population and Resources. At the other extreme of this approach lie the views expressed by the Neo-Malthusians, environmentalists and radical ecologists. They believe that for a happy and peaceful social life proper balance between population and resources is a necessary condition. According to these thinkers, the gap between the resources and population has widened after eighteenth century.

There have been marginal expansion in the resources of the world in the last three hundred years but there has been phenomenal growth in the human population. Development has only contributed in increasing the multiple uses of the limited resources of the world while there has been enormous increase in the demand for these resources. Therefore, the prime task before any development activity is to maintain parity between population and resources.

It is not the availability of resources that is as important as their social distribution. Resources everywhere are unevenly distributed. Rich countries and people have access to large resource baskets while the poor find their resources shrinking. Moreover, unending pursuit for the control of more and more resources by the powerful and use of the same for exhibiting ones prowess is the prime cause of conflicts as well as the apparent contradictions between population resource and development.

Indian culture and civilisation have been very sensitive to the issues of population, resource and development for a long time. It would not be incorrect to say that the ancient scriptures were essentially concerned about the balance and harmony among the elements of nature.

Mahatma Gandhi in the recent times advocated the reinforcement of the harmony and balance between the two. He was quite apprehensive about the on-going development particularly the way industrialisation has institutionalised the loss of morality, spirituality, self-reliance, non-violence and mutual co-operation and environment.

In his opinion, austerity for individual, trusteeship of social wealth and non-violence are the key to attain higher goals in the life of an individual as well as that of a nation. His views were also re-echoed in the Club of Rome Report “Limits to Growth” (1972), Schumacher’s book “Small is Beautiful” (1974), Brundtland Commission’s Report “Our Common Future” (1987) and finally in the “Agenda-21 Report of the Rio Conference” (1993).