Recently an appraisal report of the ‘Aspirational Districts Programme’ has been published by the United Nation Development Programme India.  The appraisal is published based on the district administration’s performance to execute the programme properly, and achieved desired goals. A set of predetermined indicators was provided by UNDP. These indicators helped the district administration to focus on specific targets and sectors instead of broad government schemes or new initiatives. The UNDP report said, "A very successful model of local area development" that "should serve as a best practice for several other countries where regional disparities in development status persist for many reasons”. This report was handed over by UNDP India resident representative Shoko Noda to NITI Aayog, vice-chairman Dr Rajiv Kumar, and CEO Amit Kant. They made recommendation for improvement after analyzing the progress of ADP. The progress was analyzed based on five sectors of ADP. These are health and nutrition, education, agriculture and water resources, basic infrastructure and skill development and financial inclusion. According to the report, across the sectors of health and nutrition, 9.6% more home deliveries are attended by a skilled birth attendant and 5.8% more pregnant women with severe anaemia were treated. In terms of financial inclusion, registration of 1,580 more accounts per hundred thousand populations under the Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana. The ‘Malaria Mukt Bastar Abhiyaan’ in Bijapur and Dantewada, which has reduced malaria incidences in these districts by 71% and 54% respectively, was recommended as one of the ‘best practices’ found in ADs, as per the report. The report stated that, "The competitive and dynamic culture fostered by it has successfully pushed several low performing districts (as per baseline rankings) to improve their standing in the past three years. Simdega (Jharkhand), Chandauli (Uttar Pradesh), Sonbhadra (Uttar Pradesh) and Rajgarh (Madhya Pradesh) were found to have progressed the most since the beginning of the programme." Source: The Hindustan Times BM