Why Is Bihar A Backward State?

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Why 'Bihar' or 'Bihari' word is used for abusing someone like "Ye Bihari Se Sakal Chal Hatt" or if someone commits a mistake then " Ye Pakka Bihar Se Hoga". What is the reason why Bihar is a backward state and why people from Bihar are facing discrimination in other states? Today I am going to tell a few factors why Bihar is backward.

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In India, we have 28 states and 8 Union territory. Bihar is one of the slowest growing states as compared to others. The per capita income of Bihar is only 43000 rupees which is way to low compare to others. Per capita income is calculated by divided Ares's Total Income by its Total Population.

Literacy Rate: Education, Employability, earning, and development are directly proportionate to each other. The population of Bihar was 10.41  crores as per the 2011 census and estimated to be 12.9 crores by 2020 and the literacy rate is only 63.82 ( 73.39% for males and 53.33% for females). As compared to other states literacy rate is very less. As we know that education is an essential factor for growth and due to the miss-match in population and literacy rate development of skills and technology is very less which has affected the growth of Bihar. 

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Lack of Major Industry: Bihar has no major industries due to a lack of infrastructure and government support. Bihar is importing goods from other states like West Bengal, MP, UP, etc.. but not exporting anything. Bihar used to have Sugar mills and Fertilizer industry but due to weak ecosystem company went into loose and got shutdown. The biggest loss cropped up when Jharkhand got created from Bihar into 2000, all-natural resources(Coal, Iron ore, Bauxite, Uranium, Limestone, etc...), corporates, mineral-rich companies, Bokaro steel city, TataNagar, Jamshedpur everything went to Jharkhand. Till present Bihar does not have proper roads and electricity so people think of opening anything. 

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Freight Equalisation Policy 1952-1993: As per this policy factory could be set up anywhere in India and the transportation of minerals required would be subsidized by the central government. It means they were getting minerals at the same price they used to get in the mineral-rich state. Under this policy, factories got open in other states instead of Bihar, and this increased unemployment, and because of that earning of Bihar was less compare to national earning which affected the growth of Bihar.

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Caste Politics:  Name itself reflecting everything. To some extent cast politics is good it helped low cast and poor people to earn equality in society but from independence till now we have forgotten development politics completely and we are electing leaders based on caste and our benefit. During 70 years 40 times the government got changed 23 Chief ministers came into power but no one talked about development politics and along with leaders citizens are equally responsible too. When liberalization initiated in 1991 other states were trying to get foreign investment, international funding and they were taking benefits of liberalization. On one side other states were developing whereas Bihar was busy in its cast politics and did not develop. 

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Geographical Factors: As it is the landlocked state it does not have benefits like states in coastal regions. States in coastal regions are Gujrat, Mumbai, Karnataka, Kerala, etc... they have good international business through the sea which helps these states to grow. But if we see in case of Bihar, it is a landlocked state it shares an international border to the north with Nepal and that is not that beneficial. Because of these reasons, It does not get global access, and transportation cost increases. As we know that Bihar has fertile soil(Alluvial soil) and Ganges river (which divides Bihar into the south and north Bihar) we can use it to grow double of grains than what we are cultivating at present but due to lack of the government support and insufficient equipment, farmers are unable to do it.     

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Natural Calamity: Bihar suffers from floods and drought every year. If we see the current situation it is a very tough time for Bihar. It is suffering from floods and COVID-19 too. Bihar does not have a proper water drainage system and because of that floods harm a lot. When a flood hits it destroys everything like crops, houses, etc... and as we know that the major portion of the population depends on agriculture and that's why they do not have a choice other than going to other states for livelihood. People going to other states for a livelihood because they are helpless and this is helping that state to develop instead of Bihar.

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Population Wise: Bihar is a third most populous state as per the 2011 census with 10.4 crores People living here and in 2020 it is going to overtake Maharastra and become a second-most populous state. Bihar is having a high fertility rate and a low literacy rate. The backward place with a low literacy rate in Bihar is having a high fertility rate compared to a place which is having a good literacy rate like towns. Because of the high population and lack of government support literacy rate is not increasing and employment is not increasing which is indirectly affecting the growth of Bihar. Despite being Nalanda University(oldest university), most numbers of IAS officers, etc... average literacy rate is very low.

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Mindset: Civil services or any government job is everything for Bihari people or you can say it has become a culture. If someone tries to do business people discourage them instead of encouraging. They believe that if you get a government you will get everything like free electricity, flat, dowery and bribe as well. Actually, dowery is fixed based on your job if you are an IAS Officer you will get 1-3 corer if you are IPS  you will get 1-2 crore even a government peon will get a fixed amount. There is a dowery calculator if you enter your job, age, caste, color complex, etc... it will calculate fixed dowery amount.

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Bihar is full of the youth population and they have a good quality of thinking and are hard workers too but still, our state is backward. We can see Anil Agrawal(The Founder and Chairman of Vedanta Group), Samprada Singh(The Founder and Chairman of  Alkem Laboratories.LTD), Ravindra Kishore Sinha(The Founder of SIS Security), Subrata Roy(The Founder and Chairman of The Sahara India), many more.  Imagine if these people were behind the government jobs then they couldn't reached here. It is necessary to change the attitude and mindset of Biharis. There was a time Bihar was ahead of many states but now they are developed twice than Bihar. So instead of focusing only on the government job people here should think and move towards doing business and generating the jobs that will increase employability as well as develop the state.

At last, I want to say we talk about foreign countries that Indians are not getting respect facing discrimination than what about this "Ye Bihari Se Sakal Chal Hatt" or "Ek Bihari Saw Bimari"? Even we are doing the same with our neighbor state people. Our root itself is not strong then how can we expect from others. A place that is less developed needs more and fast development and Bihar is a place that requires maximum growth because it affects the growth of our country as well. Let's change and support each other and help our INDIA to grow.