Sonbhadra district of Uttar Pradesh has topped in the ranking of aspirational districts by government think-tank Niti Aayog for July. Darrang (Assam) and Mamit (Mizoram) have been placed at second and third positions, respectively, Niti Aayog said in a tweet. Naupada (Odisha) has been ranked fourth and Gaya (Bihar) is at the fifth place.
The delta rankings took into account incremental progress made by more than 112 aspirational districts across six developmental areas during February-June this year. Health and nutrition, education, agriculture and water resources, financial inclusion, skill development and basic infrastructure were the development areas that were taken into consideration for the ranking.
The aspirational districts programme, launched in January 2018, aims to transform districts that have shown relatively lesser progress in key social areas and have emerged as pockets of under-development.