Development of village, micro and small enterprises in India has a special significance with regard to bridging up the disparities between urban and rural sectors of the economy on the one hand and the more industrialized and the less industrialized states on the other. It would also channelize...

Rank-ordering of individuals or objects on multiple criteria has many important practical applications. A reasonably representative composite rank ordering of multi-attribute objects/individuals or multi-dimensional points is often obtained by the Principal Component Analysis, although much...

This paper demonstrates that if we intend to optimally rank order n objects (candidates) each of which has m attributes or rank scores awarded by m evaluators, then the ordinal ranking of objects by the conventional principal component based factor scores turns out to be suboptimal. Three...

Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index obtained by a weighted aggregation of other three indices, each measuring one aspect, namely life expectancy, education and real per capita income. Intra-country equality in income distribution, however, is very important with regard to quality...

Subjugation of women in certain spheres of life is very common in the patriarchal societies and it has a long history. In India, women have little social or economic independence. They are treated inequitably at home as much as at the workplace outside. Perhaps, it is so for the Indian society...

Indebtedness has been acknowledged as one of the most infamous stumbling blocks in the way of rural prosperity. It is cancerous, self-perpetuating, malignant and maleficent. It abates agricultural production, abashes social psyche, aggravates inequalities in the distribution of socioeconomic...

Social sector with the objective to satisfy the welfare needs of the people and to correct the imbalances in the economy claims a sizeable proportion of the public expenditure and has emerged as a significant sector. This paper in this regard is a state level analysis on the growth of public...

The demographic canvas of the North Eastern Region of India (NER) is perhaps the most colourful and enchanting in the whole nation. We do not find in any other part of the country such a variety – anthropologically, socially, linguistically, culturally, economically, politically and...