Why south India outperforms the north
Data shows that southern Indian states continue to outperform the rest of the country in health, education and economic opportunities. But what are the consequences of this phenomenon? Nilakantan R, a data scientist, finds out.
Consider a child born in India.
Firstly, this child is far less likely to be born in southern India than in northern India, given the former's lower rates of population growth.
But let's assume she is. In which case, she is far less likely to die in the first year of her life given the lower infant mortality rates in south India compared with the rest of the country.
She is more likely to get vaccinated, less likely to lose her mother during childbirth, more likely to have access to child services and receive better early childhood nutrition.
She is also more likely to celebrate her fifth birthday, find a hospital or a doctor in case she falls sick and eventually live a slightly longer life.
She will go to school and stay in school longer - she will more likely go to college as well. She is less likely to be involved in agriculture for economic sustenance and more likely to find work that pays her more.
She will also go on to be a mother to fewer children, who in turn will be healthier and more educated than her. And she'll also have greater political representation and more impact on elections as a voter.
At the time of India's independence in 1947, the four southern states - Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh which constituted about a quarter of India's population - were mostly in the middle or bottom in terms of development. (A fifth state of Telangana was formed in 2014 - three years after the last census - by bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh.)
But the southern states started to diverge positively compared with the rest of India in the 1980s - a trend which has accelerated ever since.
There is no one answer to why this happened though.
Each of the southern states has its own particular story, but in essence, the progress was achieved by the innovative policies of individual states.
Some of those worked. Some failed. And many were fiscally profligate. But the states, many believe, have acted as laboratories of democracy, as they were intended to.
A prime example of this is the mid-day meal scheme - feeding students a free lunch at government schools - which began in Tamil Nadu.
The scheme ended up increasing school admissions in Tamil Nadu - the state today boasts of the highest school enrolment gains in the country.
In neighbouring Kerala, scholars such as Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen have attributed advances in health and education to a combination of political mobilisation and to the state's syncretic culture. Others such as Prerna Singh, a political scientist, have cited subnationalism - the strong regional identity of the state - as another possible reason.
But the southern states' success has also led to a special problem.
The four states have a smaller population than their northern counterparts, having seen lower population growth for a generation now.
While their prosperity leads them to being taxed more - on a per-capita basis because they are less populous - they are given a relatively smaller share in the central transfer of taxes where the amount allocated is dependent on the population. Thus, they see themselves as being punished for their success.
Many believe that this has been made worse by recent tax reforms.
In the past, all states would raise revenues through indirect taxes which gave them the financial freedom to make their own policies - such as the mid-day meal scheme in Tamil Nadu. But with the introduction of the Goods and Services Tax (GST), designed to unify the country into a single market, the states say they have little leeway to raise their own finances and are increasingly dependent on federal transfers.