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scrutiny.
    True, the evidence is unequivocal that Kerala has the best all-around education and health indicators among the major Indian states. Its literacy rates for both males and females and life expectancy are higher and the rates of infant mortality, maternal mortality, and malnutrition are lower than for all other larger states in India. The superior education and health outcomes in Kerala are not in question.
    But the evidence that there is a clearly identifiable Kerala model to which these superior outcomes can be attributed is absent. Authors Richard Franke and Barbara Chasin (1999) offer a definition, but beyond the redistribution of land, it is descriptive of the Kerala experience rather than a set of policies that other states could potentially emulate. 8 As we noted earlier, land redistribution as an instrument of poverty alleviation was well known to Indian planners and was tried all over India but its implementation failed due to political opposition. 9
    Amartya Sen is also said to have talked about a “Kerala model” but George Mathew (2001) has contradicted this: “Dr. Amartya Sen during his recent visit to Kerala repudiated the argument that there is what is called a Kerala model, and disclaimed that he had ever used the term. At best, what has happened is Kerala’s experience of development.” 10
    There are four observations to be made about Kerala’s developmental approach and outcomes.
    First, if redistribution has been at the heart of its achievements, as it is widely believed, we should find a relatively low level of and a significantly declining trend in inequality in the state. Yet, according to the 2004–2005 NSSO expenditure survey, Kerala exhibits the highest degree of inequality among the fifteen largest Indian states. It is possible that Kerala had greater success in redistributing land than other states, but that has certainly not translated into a more egalitarian distribution of expenditures than in the rest of the country. Likewise, inequality fails to show a declining trend. Rural and urban inequalities in Kerala did fall between 1983 and 1993–1994 but they rose back in 2004–2005 to levels well above those in 1983. The significant decline in poverty between 1983 and 2004–2005 could not be explained by the trend in inequality.
    Second, Kerala began with a huge advantage in literacy over the rest of the country at independence. Since then, it is hard to find anything spectacular or unique in outcomes in Kerala. This is shown in Figure 5.4 , which plots the evolution of literacy rates in Kerala, Maharashtra Gujarat, and India. Maharashtra began with a 20 percentage-point disadvantage vis-à-vis Kerala in 1951. By 2011, the disadvantage had been reduced to 11 percentage points. Gujarat began with a 25 percentage-point gap but narrowed it to 15 percentage points. Similar narrowing of the gap can be observed with respect to the India-wide average.
    The historical advantage of Kerala can also be observed in the indicators of health. Here we do not have ready access to the data from 1951but we do have the series on life expectancy and infant mortality rates beginning in the early 1970s.
    In Figure 5.5 , we show the life expectancy at birth from 1970–1975 to 2001–2005 at five-year intervals in three high-achiever states: Kerala, Maharashtra, and Tamil Nadu. Maharashtra begins with an eight-year disadvantage and Tamil Nadu with a twelve-year disadvantage vis-à-vis Kerala. But the gap narrows to approximately seven years in each case by 2001–2005. A similar story unfolds in the infant mortality rate. The gap of more than forty-five deaths per 1,000 live births vis-à-vis Kerala in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu in 1971 is reduced to less than twenty in 2009 in each case.
    Third, advocates of the Kerala model argue that the state’s achievements with respect to poverty, education, and health are to be distinguished from those of other