The study revisits the properties of Group Differential (GD) measures and extends it to include monotonicity and policy sensitivity axioms. Imposing level sensitivity, which indicates that a given gap is worse off at higher (lower) level of attainment (failure), the study concurs that a simple...

There was a boom in the development of sustainable development indicators (SDIs) after notion of sustainability became popular through Bruntland Commission's report. Since then numerous efforts have been made worldwide in constructing SDIs at global, national and local scales, but in India not a...

We impose a value judgment that a decrease in failure should be accompanied by a decrease in gap (difference or ratio) between sub-groups. In other words, the same gap at lower levels of failure is to be considered worse off. This, in line with transfer sensitivity axiom of poverty indices, is...

Using Minkowski distance function we propose a class of Human Development Index measures. Special cases of this turn out to be the popularly used linear average method as also a newly proposed displaced ideal method. Two measures of penalty are suggested. One captures the non-uniform attainment...

There is a growing consensus that universalisation of modern energy services is central to reducing major elements of poverty and hunger, increasing literacy and education, and improving health care, employment opportunities, and lives of women and children. In India, more than 700 million...

In a recent work Nathan and Reddy (2011a) have proposed a Multi-view Black-box (MVBB) framework for development of sustainable development indicators (SDIs) for an urban setup. The framework is flexible to be applied to any domain or sector of urban system. In this paper the proposed MVBB...

The selection of optimum number of indicators is the key to any Sustainable Development Indicator (SDI) research. Indicators, too less in number may be inadequate to convey the message and; too many may dilute the purpose. To arrive at a limited number of indicators from a larger set of potential...

Gender Development Index and Gender Empowerment Measure are two gender-based indicators provided by the United Nations Development Program. Population share of the genders enter the formulation of these indicators in such a way that it favours the better performing gender. This can lead to...

The popularly known Human Development Index (HDI) is obtained through linear averaging (LA) of indices in three dimensions - health, education and standard of living. LA method assumes perfect substitutability among the indices. We question its appropriateness and propose an alternative measure,...

Provision of modern energy services for cooking (gaseous fuels) and lighting (electricity) is an essential component of any policy aiming to address health, education or welfare issues; yet it gets little attention from policy-makers. Secure, adequate, low-cost energy of quality and convenience...