India is a rising superpower and we are on our way to become the second largest economy in the world overtaking US by the year 2050.
India today influences world behaviors and every country wants to keep good terms with the country because of its immense potential. India makes its presence known in almost all the lists that come out from time to time, be it a list of billionaires, countries which made it to Mars, influential personalities etc. and we as Indians should and do take pride in them. But there is another part of India that we seem to continuously ignore in the midst of all the achievements. India, still in many spheres, is far behind many other countries and until we sort out those weaknesses, our development to some extent goes in vain.
Though this is a non-exhausting list, here we have put before you 10 embarrassing lists in which India tops.
This by no means is to criticize the country, but a synopsis of where we have much to do still.
1. Highest ozone pollution deaths
According to the report of the State of Global Air released in February 2017, India accounts for the highest number of pre-mature deaths because of Ozone pollution and in the year 2015, around 2.54 lakh people died due to ozone exposure. The report pointed that the number of deaths in India is 13 times higher than that of Bangladesh and 21 times higher than India’s arch-rival Pakistan.
2. Most selfie deaths
Though selfies have taken the entire world by storm, it appears India is paying the highest cost for this 21st century craze in a bid to get more likes on the social networking platforms. A study published by US-based Carnegie Mellon University and India’s Indraprastha Institute of Information Technology, Delhi, during November 2016 stated that since March 2014, of the 127 confirmed deaths identified caused by selfies, 76 persons belonged to India. Pakistan is in the second position with 9 deaths.
3. Highest number of Internet shutdowns
According to a report by US think-tank Brookings Institution, there were a total 22 Internet shutdowns during the year 2015-16, costing India more than 6,000 crores. The number of shutdowns to tackle emergency situations was as many as the war-torn country Iraq. India and Iraq were followed by Syria (areas not controlled by ISIS), Pakistan, Turkey and Brazil.
4. Highest number of poor population
According to World Bank, 30% of India’s population lives under the poverty line and earns less than Rs. 125 per day. With 224 million people living under the poverty line, it is 2.5 times more than the second position hold by Nigeria that has 84 million people living under the poverty line of USD 1.90 a day.
5. Highest number of road accidents
Blame it one the bad roads or the reckless driving by the Indians, but India has the highest number of road accidents in the world. The fact was also acknowledged by Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on several occasions. According to this report by BBC, 400 people die in India every day in road accidents. In the year 2015, 146,133 people died in road accidents in India while in the year 2014, the figure was 139,671.
6. Highest bribery rate in the Asia Pacific
According to a survey conducted by Transparency International, 69% of the participants in India in the survey accepted to have paid ‘tea money’ to avail public services in the past year at least once. Conducted in the 16 countries of the Asia Pacific region, India is followed by Vietnam with the bribery rate of 65%. The lowest rate was recorded among Japanese with only 0.2% who accepted that they had to pay bribes.
7. Highest number of modern slaves
India is home to 18.35 million people who are forced into modern forms of slavery, which include forced labour, prostitution, begging etc. of the total 45.8 million people worldwide. According to Global Slavery Index released in the year 2016 by Walk Free Foundation, India has six times more people living in trapped slavery than China, which stands at second with 3.39 million people. Pakistan comes third with 2.13 million and Bangladesh fourth with 1.53 million people living as slaves.
8. Highest number of hungry people
Though India has made much improvements in bringing down the number of hungry population from 210.1 million during the year 1990-92 to 194.6 million by the year 2014-16, it still is the country with the highest number of people sleeping hungry. China in the meantime has shown remarkable progress and has been able to bring its hungry population down from 289 million during the year 1990-92 to 133.8 million by the end of 2014-15. Globally, the hungry population has diminished from 1 billion during 1990-92 to 795 million in 2014-15.
9. Largest offline population
According to World Development report of 2016, India has the largest offline population in the world with 1,063 million populations who does not have access to Internet. China comes second with 755 million people. Ironically, India is the second largest exporter of information and communication technology goods in the world. With government’s digital India initiative, it would be interesting to see how much progress we make in the coming years.
10. Slowest Internet in the Asia Pacific
The year 2016 brought some speed in India and we witnessed the country making a leap from the 114th to the 105th in Internet speed ranking in the world, improving the average speed from 3.5 mbps to 4.1 mbps. But still, India ranks the last in the Asia-Pacific in terms of Internet speed. The list is topped by South Korea with a speed of 26.3 mbps.
