India?s literacy rates grow by 9.21% points

Literacy rates revealed in the latest census data for India is cause to rejoice as it has registered an increase of 9.21 percentage points over the last decade.

Literacy rate has gone up from 64.83 per cent in 2001 to 74.04 per cent in 2011, showing an increase of 9.21 percentage points, as per provisional population figures released on Thursday.

The overall percentage growth in literacy rate 2001-2011 is 38.82, while for males it is 31.98 per cent and for females is 49.10 per cent.

A significant milestone reached in Census 2011 is that a decline of 31,196,847 among illiterates is noted.

Out of total decrease in number of illiterates, the female 17,122,197 outnumber males 14,074,650.

Ten States and Union Territories, namely, Kerala, Lakshadweep, Mizoram, Tripura, Goa, Daman & Diu, Puducherry, Chandigarh, NCT of Delhi and Andaman & Nicobar Islands have achieved literacy rate of above 85 per cent, the target set by the Planning Commission to be achieved by 2011-2012.

The gap of 21.59 percentage points recorded between male and female literacy rates in 2001 Census has reduced to 16.68 percentage points in 2011.

Planning Commission has set up target of reducing this gap to 10 percentage points by the year 2011-2012.

The States/Union Territories which have achieved male-female gap in literacy rate of 10 percentage points or less are Chandigarh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Tripura, Meghalaya, Lakshadweep, Kerala and Andaman & Nicobar Islands.

Kerala topped the list in literacy rates with 93.91 per cent age, followed by Lakshwadeep with 92.28 per cent.

Bihar fared the worst in this respect with 63.82 per cent literacy rate, followed by Arunachal Pradesh with 66.95 per cent.

District-wise, Serchhip and Aizwal districts of Mizoram topped the list with literacy rates of 98.76 per cent and 98.50 per cent respectively.

Alirajpur (Madhya Pradesh) and Bijapur (Chhattisgarh) are placed the lowest with literacy rates of 37.22 per cent and 41.58 per cent respectively.