K.S. James, director of the International Institute of Population Studies at Mumbai, an autonomous institution under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, has been suspended, ostensibly to allow for an investigation of recruitment practices in the institution (The Hindu, July 30). A media report (The Wire, July 28) states that the development follows the publication of the fifth National Family Health Survey report (NFHS-5), produced by the institute.
As the institute has produced the report periodically for over two decades, and the director himself is a trained demographer, we would expect that the data are as robust as can be. It has been speculated that the government is peeved by some of its findings, and hence the move. There have been instances in the past when the axe came down on some periodic publications of India’s national data agencies. Thus, the Consumer Expenditure Survey for 2017-18 conducted by the National Sample Survey Office was shelved. The official reason given was that it was methodologically flawed. As with the NFHS, these periodic surveys had been undertaken for decades. It is difficult to imagine that the last one suddenly adopted a questionable method.
Past record
In the case of the Consumer Expenditure Survey, it has been suggested based on leaked information, that the final report was suppressed as it showed a decline in aggregate consumption. At the time, leading commentators argued that this would be an anomaly in a growing economy, implying that there was good reason to have withheld the publication of the report. The argument is flawed, though, for a decline in total consumption can occur even in a growing economy when the income distribution shifts towards the rich.
Then, there was the Periodic Labour Force Survey for 2017-18, which was ready for release in early 2019 but was published only after the parliamentary elections held that May. It is believed that the government delayed the release as the report showed unemployment to be at a 45-year high in 2017-18. The recorded rise in unemployment is not surprising as growth of production in the non-agricultural private sector slowed considerably following the demonetisation.
Two contravening findings
The media report referenced above has pointed to two findings in NFHS-5 that may have caused discomfiture to the government. The first is that the level of anaemia has risen across all sections of the population, quite alarmingly among children. The levels recorded are indeed disturbing, with over half of India’s women in the age group 15-49 years reportedly anaemic. This does not sit well with the idea of an economy poised to be the third largest in the world in a matter of years, which the government takes credit for.
But is the finding itself implausible? The survey for NFHS-5 was conducted over 2019-21. There was a marked increase in food-price inflation during this period, with the monthly inflation rate for food surging from -1.3% in January 2019 to a staggering 12.1% in December of that year. While it may have declined since, it stayed high by historical standards for the next 24 months. Anaemia is partly related to food intake. It is possible that the higher price of food during the period of the survey contributed to its rise. In addition to the higher inflation, income had contracted during 2020-21 due to COVID-19.
A second finding reported in NFHS-5 shows that India has some way to go before it can be declared ‘open defecation free’ with any confidence. While NFHS-5 shows a substantial rise in the percentage of households using an “improved sanitation facility” since 2015-16, the figure falls short of 100% by about a fifth. Again, is this implausible? The figures for open defecation reported for 2005-06, 2015-16 and 2019-21 are 55%, 39% and 19%, respectively.
Compared to the reduction during the first period that achieved in the second one is actually quite impressive. Indeed, given the magnitude of the backlog in 2015-16 and that ending open defecation requires behavioural change among the population, it is not obvious that a superior outcome could have been achieved, whatever may have been the government’s aspiration. Perhaps it is to flag that the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan has not failed after all, that when reporting the percentage of households using an improved sanitation facility the NFHS-5 report adds the caveat: “This indicator does not denote access to toilet facility.” Such an entry is absent in earlier reports.
Impact of suppression
It would be unfortunate if the suspension of the head of the institution responsible for the NFHS-5 report is related to publishing them. Surveillance of the nation’s data agencies would have damaging consequences. First, it introduces an incentive to not reveal outcomes that are likely to be frowned upon by the government of the day. This can jeopardise public policy interventions. Imagine there is an ongoing epidemic. If deaths are deliberately under-reported it could cause complacency in the population, encouraging a risky behaviour that spreads contagion.
Then there is the feature that elections are the means by which the nation chooses the political party they entrust with governance. For the exercise to be credible, citizens must have access to accurate and timely data. Now, national data agencies left to function without fear or favour become vital to a democracy.
Pulapre Balakrishnan is an economist. M. Parameswaran contributed to the piece.
