Education Order in Punjab: A District Level Study

This paper attempts to evaluate the status of education in the current districts of Punjab and compare this with the status of education attainment in 1998. The tool used for assessment and comparison is the Education Index (EI) for the districts of Punjab. The Education Index is a composite index which is calculated using enrollment at different education levels and literacy rates. The main data sources used are the Population Census 1998, Punjab Development Statistics 1998 and the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) 2008. Using data from these sources, robustness in the results is verified by comparing different weighting simulations of the EI. The EI results are found using the UNDP methodology and the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) method. Both methodologies of calculation lead us to ascertain the robustness of the EI calculation using the data. This testing allows an important conclusion to emerge that the different weighting schemes does not largely affect the ranking of districts. Further, by comparing the results for both years, considerable development in education status is observed; however, an unexpected result also appears. The relative pattern of education status across Punjab has hardly altered in the last ten years even with the considerable progress that has been witnessed. This shows that an unchanging relative ranking of districts seems to exist unless significant endorsement of education takes place within the lowest ranked districts.