Physical Quality of Life Index (P.Q.L.I) was developed by famous economist Morris David Morris in 1979 for 23 developed and developing countries.The PQLI is a measure to calculate the quality of life.

1. Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI)
Physical Quality of Life Index (P.Q.L.I) was developed by famous
economist Morris David Morris in 1979 for 23 developed and developing
countries.The PQLI is a measure to calculate the quality of life.
Morris David used the following three indicators to prepare a
composite index known as Physical Quality of Life Index:
1. Life Expectancy Rate (L.E.I)
2. Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)
3. Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)
★ Life Expectancy Rate (L.E.I)
Life expectancy means average number of year a person is
expected to live. As per census of 2022, it is 70.19 years in India.
★ Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)
It refers to the number of infants dying within one year of their
birth out of every 1000 births. As per census report of 2022, it is 27 per
1000. Higher infant mortality is harmful for economic development.
★ Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)
Any person above the age of 7 year who can read and write in any
one language with an ability to understand it is considered as literate.
As per census 2022, it is 77.7% in India.
For each of the above indicator, the performance of individual country
is rated on a scale of 1 to 100 where 1 represents the worst performance

2. and 100 represent the best performance. P.Q.L.I is then constructed by
averaging these three indicators giving equal weight to each of them.
➔ Morris has given following formula to obtain P.Q.L.I
P.Q.L.I = L.E.I+ I.M.I+ B.L.I/3
➔ Example: Suppose, the L.E.I. for India is rated as 70.19, the I.M.I is
rated as 27 and B.L.I. is rated as 77.7, then the P.Q.L.I will be ?
➔ Answer: 58.29 [(70.19+27+77.7)/3
❖ Advantage of P.Q.L.I
• P.Q.L.I helps to government to understand the overall welfare in
the economy and how well its welfare policies are being implemented.
This helps the government to take corrective action.
• The method followed to measure P.Q.L.I is standard for all the
countries. Therefore, it can be used to make comparison between
countries and this helps the relatively underdeveloped countries to take
corrective measure.
• The three indicator i.e. life expectancy rate, infant mortality rate and
literacy rate very well represent the welfare of the people of the
country. A country wherein all the three indicators are good can be said
to be a developed economy.
• The P.Q.L.I considers the distribution of welfare in the country. A
country cannot have a high average of literacy rate, life expectancy and
low infant mortality rate unless a large part of the population is covered
by the benefits of economic development.
❖ Limitations of P.Q.L.I.

3. • P.Q.L.I ignores many factors which influence the quality of life such as
employment, housing, justice, social security as well as human rights.
• P.Q.L.I is a simple average of literacy rate, infant mortality rate and life
expectancy rate i.e. all the factors have been giving equal weightage.
However, it is difficult to understand the rationale behind giving equal
importance to all factors.
• P.Q.L.I. does not explain the structural change in the economy of a
country. Moreover, it does not at all consider economic or monetary
concept. Hence, it is a poor measure of economic development as well
as economic growth.
Inspite of these drawbacks, P.Q.L.I. is considered as an
improvement over traditional measure of economic welfare. However,
recently developed Human Development Index (HDI) is a better and
more refined version of PQLI.
Quality of Life Index 2022 - India Ranks at 48th Position.
https:/
/www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp