The pursuit of happiness

NEW DELHI: The recently released World Happiness Report 2023, published by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, has placed India at the bottom with a ranking of 126. Nations in the global north, Nordic countries, and Israel are on top of the list.

The list draws on global survey data from people in more than 150 countries, ranked on the basis of their average life evaluations over the past three years.

The five questions are centred on national happiness, trust and benevolence, state effectiveness, altruistic behaviour affecting one’s own happiness and the overall happiness of society, as well as how social media enables us to measure happiness and distress.

Despite jumping 10 places from 136 to 126, India ranks behind neighbours like Nepal, China, Pakistan and Bangladesh with regard to the perception of citizens on their happiness. India’s ranking is confounding when you consider it has emerged as the world’s fastest growing economy, and even the government has claimed that there are improvements in our Ease of Living index.

Nations in the midst of a full-blown war have been ranked relatively higher than India, a case in point being Russia ranked 70, and Ukraine ranked 92. Even Pakistan and Sri Lanka, two nations which have been beset by economic turmoil have fared better than India — ranked 108 and 112. The bulk of the global south has been placed within the ambit of unhappy nations, including those in Africa, while Afghanistan was ranked the unhappiest.

So how do we interpret such reports, which many have downplayed as laden with Western bias. For starters, factors that contribute to a general sense of well-being in any geography include aspects such as income equity, the presence of social security, support systems, and a healthy life expectancy.

What does not work in favour of many emerging economies is the presence of corruption, wealth disparity, unemployment, corruption, high crime rates, inadequate public infrastructure and pricey healthcare, and this one’s a major — distrust in one’s government and local administration.

Obviously, living up to the parameters of a progress report such as this might be daunting, as it tends to discount many ground realities facing citizens and governments. Even within States in India, the quantum of development varies between geographies. Here in Tamil Nadu, one of the most industrious States in the country, which has now transformed into a healthcare hub, there are endemic issues pertaining to the delivery of affordable public health services in rural regions.

Even Chennai, like so many of its urban counterparts, faces challenges pertaining to basic amenities like garbage disposal, availability of open spaces for recreation, last mile connectivity, as well as sewage and water supply issues. Yes, we could be upset about a hundred things that are not going so well. But it seems counter-intuitive to discount the thousands of things that are working well for a city, and a nation like ours.

It makes more sense to arrive at a consensus on how to set things on course correction. Madhya Pradesh happened to be the first State to constitute a Happiness Ministry, while Andhra Pradesh is now in the final stages of introducing a Happiness Commission. It might be wishful thinking, but even India could perhaps emulate its neighbour Bhutan, and lend equal weightage to the idea of gross national happiness, as it does to the GDP.