On 20th of March 2023, like every year, the world celebrated “International Happiness Day”. Happiness is a fundamental human goal , the United Nations affirms, while calling for a holistic, pragmatic, and poised approach to pursue economic growth. In common parlance, The International Day of Happiness is deemed to be a day reserved for celebrating and enhancing people’s happiness, but it begs to answer the questions – what does it mean for a modern state? Is there a relationship between people’s happiness and the functioning of a country? How does the state materialise it in practice?
The World Happiness Report is published annually and The World Happiness Report 2023 ranked India 126 out of 136 countries on its happiness index. The World Happiness Report measures happiness on six parameters, namely :GDP per capita, Social Support, Healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity and corruption. The Report has faced a lot of flak domestically for the abysmal ranking accorded to India, and to the prudent mind, the criticism may well be warranted. The research desk of the State Bank of India in its weekly report in April 2023 decided to censure the World Happiness Rankings, and rightly so. As asserted by the SBI Report “Ecowrap”, the biggest lacuna in the happiness survey is the one fits all approach. Happiness foremost is an extremely subjective emotion, and while it can now be reduced to a scientific concept and measured via structured determinants, it still cannot be devoid of its subjectivity. The biggest example of the same is the juxtaposed difference in the way the Bhutanese, considered to be the pioneers of happy-nomics, measure happiness for their goals and the way the Happiness Index in the World Happiness Report does it.
The SBI Report highlights this intrinsic lacunae of the WHR, and goes ahead to measure India’s happiness according to a different set of parameters. According to the SBI, India stands on the 48th position in their Happiness Index; which unfortunately may not be as promising as it sounds. One, India is 48, but among 61 countries as per the SBI rankings, which still puts India at a similar percentile, much like the World Happiness Report. Two, the SBI Report fails to capture the objective of these happiness rankings. This ranking, much like the World Happiness Report, is not solely a measure of the ‘emotional happiness’ of a country, the objective is to make “national happiness an operational objective for governments”.
It is at this stage where detractors of the happiness movement bring forth the subjective nature of the concept and thus, the issues in quantifying it as an absolute determinant of public policy. For this purpose, scholars over a period of time have realised that a country’s development cannot be measured only on the basis of its GDP. It has been accepted that a more holistic approach has to be undertaken, and that’s where “happiness” or more precisely “Subjective Well-Being (SWB)”, comprising of life evaluations, positive effects and negative effects, comes into the picture.
Countries are being conscious to take steps to formulate policy and laws from the happiness perspective, so as to promote a more holistic model of development. India’s rankings in the World Happiness Index, from its very inception, have been unenviable to say the least, which seriously undermines India’s global positioning as a fast growing economic powerhouse with a stable and democratic government. Moreover, with an entire chapter in its written constitution endowing far-reaching fundamental rights to its citizens and an activist judiciary guaranteeing the rights to the people, the rankings lead to a paradoxical situation; as the entire objective of these rights is the enhancement of the social, political and economic well-being of the citizenry.
India’s constitutional structure is based on the welfare model, with the goal of the Government being the upliftment of the citizenry. It is also true that ideologies aside, the Government has taken up a plethora of measures for the progress of the country, be it infrastructural, socio-economic, legal etc. Hence, India is no novice to the happiness agenda. However, the welfare policies of the Government have somewhere fallen short of realising their actual potential. Whether it is our National Food Security Act or the different Housing schemes floated by the Central Government and the State Governments or MNREGA, the list being endless, the authorities have time and again implemented a wide range of welfare policies with the objective of increasing people’s happiness. And yet we rank 126 as per the perceived Happiness index.
Pragmatically now what is required is not to introduce the happiness agenda into the Indian polity, for the Indian constitution is very much a consequence of this agenda, but to create a framework so as to measure the efficacy of policy vis-a-vis happiness. It has become pertinent to bring public policy and happiness together, to achieve beyond the set traditional contours of any welfare action. It is time that we build upon a policy of happiness; for it will definitely go a long way in serving as a fulcrum for all consequent policy initiatives. India needs to bridge the gap between the ideal and the reality, for the New India, is an economically thriving and more importantly, not an unhappy nation.