States like Bihar, UP, MP making India backward: NITI CEO Amitabh Kant

India fell under the "medium human development category" and its HDI, at 0.624, was behind Sri Lanka and the Maldives in South Asia

NITI Aayog Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Amitabh Kant on Tuesday said India was backward because of the eastern states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, especially on social indicators. 

While speaking at the first Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan Memorial Lecture at Jamia Millia Islamia University, Kant said, "We have improved on ease of doing business, we have remained backwards on human development index."

India is indexed at 133 out of 188 countries in the  Human Development Index (HDI) 2016 released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). India was placed behind countries like Gabon (109),