B R Lachotra
Our country has produced many great statisticians but contributions made by the Late Prof P.C Mahalanobis in the field of statistics and development planning in various capacities is exemplary. He is gauged as a star in the Indian statistical universe who had not merely established the base for the Indian statistical system but also put in place the necessary apparatus and suggested strategic steps for planning, policy formulation and guided the World with his remarkable vision for statistics.
Professor Mahalanobis was born on June 29, 1893 in Kolkata. After completing ‘Tripos in Natural Sciences’ in 1915 from King’s College, Cambridge, he began teaching physics at the Presidency College where he analyzed examination results using the statistical method. He enjoyed this work so much that he left physics and fell into love with facts, figures, graphs and charts. He continued to teach physics at the College for the next thirty years but during this time he brought revolutionary changes which influenced the future development of statistics in India. He introduced the D2 statistic, known today as the ‘Mahalanobis distance’.
The other important contribution made by late Prof. Mahalanobis, apart from his scientific papers, were setting up the Indian Statistical Institute. The Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) was established on December 17, 1931. His sustained efforts and missionary approach made the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) really an institution of academic excellence of international repute.
He was also instrumental in setting up “Central Statistical Unit in 1951” for coordinating with various Central Ministries in statistical matters besides providing technical inputs to “National Sample Survey (NSS) in 1950 which later became National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) in 1970 with its mandate to capture data by conducting socio-economic surveys in various fields. Besides, he was also instrumental in setting up and developing the ministry’s agriculture statistics wing. His most important contributions are related to large scale sample surveys.
Due to his visionary and pragmatic approach, Professor Mahalanobis got tremendous patronage from Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. He remained one of the important members of the Planning Commission of India during 1953-68. Basically he is considered the architect of the Second Five Year Plan document in 1954. He visualized that development models of advanced countries were not suitable for India and, therefore, he conceptualized a two-sector development model for India which envisaged rapid industrialization to address the unemployment problem in the country.
Mahalanobis received many honours and awards for his remarkable contributions to the development of statistics. He was President of the Indian Science Congress in 1950 and President of the International Statistical Institute in 1957. In 1968 the Government of India awarded him the Padma Vibhushan:- for his contribution to science and services to the country.
According to him, “Statistics must have a clearly defined purpose,” one aspect of which is Scientific Advance and the other Human welfare & Nation Development. He died on 28th June 1972.
In recognition of the visionary and pioneering contributions made by him in the fields of economic planning and statistical development in the post-independent era, the Government of India, in 2007, decided to designate 29th June every year, coinciding with his birth anniversary, as the Statistics Day to be celebrated at the national and state levels. Thus organizing the Statistics Day in his memory is a befitting tribute to Prof. Mahalanobis.
The United Nations Statistical Commission put-forth the following broad objectives for the statistics day:
v To promote people’s awareness of Statistics and their value, and encourage their support for Statistics and for providing data;
v To bring together users and producers of Statistics;
v To promote the use of Statistics;
v To develop professionalism;
v To promote introspection, identification of data gaps and addressing challenges in pursuit of human welfare.
The theme of the current year’s Statistics Day is ” Labour & Employment statistics” There is a growing perception that quality of Statistics on “Labour & Employment” has deteriorated over the years. Labour & Employment sector play vital role for fostering inclusive growth and ensuring well being of the society besides, optimum utilization of labour dividend, natural resources, human resources. The reliable information on Labour & Employment also provides inputs for taking various labour & employment related initiatives for the welfare of the working class, unemployed youths besides, providing an effective channel of communication between the government and social partners for identifying grey areas that need changes in policies and legislations. Previously estimates of labour market parameters were available only through surveys conducted by NSSO with 5 years interval. They were useful for planners for making long term plans , unfortunately, they failed to capture the changes in employment and un-employment in the intervening period. Ministry of labour & employment now entrusted the task of conducting of such surveys on annual basis to the Labour Bureau. The labour Bureau has also entrusted the task of conducting quick quarterly enterprise level surveys so as to have some idea about change in the employment & unemployment scenario in much shorter interval. The results could be very useful inputs not only for farmimg our employment policy but also policies on gender equity.
An expert group under the chairmanship of Prof. Parlha Dass Gupta, Prof. Emeritus of Economics, University of Cambridge was constituted by Govt. of India with the mandate of developing a framework for “Green Account” for India identifying the data gaps and preparing road map for implementation of the framework.
The expert group has indicated in the report that the system of national account currently in use for estimation of national income, suffers from narrowness as vast quantities of information relevant for economic evaluation do not figure in them. The report focus on growth of wealth rather Gross Domestic Product (GDP) nor believe in adhoc indicators of human well being advanced by United Nations (HDI).
So there is increasing realization that focus on out come and impact is the only way to ensure that scarce resources are used effectively and efficiently for socio-Economic Development of the economy for which sound statistics base is inevitable as right statistics means right development.
The celebration of the Statistics Day will sensitize our statistical fraternity and other stakeholders about the importance & role of statistics in addressing global challenges besides inspiring them for addressing data gaps so that right inputs could be provided to planners, policy makers for ensuring sustainable & inclusive growth.
(The author is Director, Economics & Statistics, J&K)
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