Dukhi (Unhappy) India drops further on World Happiness Index

India is among the world’s least happy nations, and became even less happy in the last year. India ranked at 122 out of 155 countries in the World Happiness Report 2017, four notches below its previous rank of 118.  
 India was behind the majority of South Asian nations, apart from war-ravaged Afghanistan, that stood at 141. Among the eight South Asia  nations, Pakistan was at 80th position, Nepal stood at 99, Bhutan at 97, Bangladesh at 110 while Sri Lanka was at 120. However, Maldives did not figure in the World Happiness Report.

After ranking fourth for the last two years, Norway emerged at the top, displacing three-time topper Denmark for the first time. Denmark dropped to second place, followed by Iceland, Switzerland, Finland, the Netherlands.

The bottom five countries on the list where people are the unhappiest are Burundi (154), Tanzania (153), Syria (152), Rwanda (151) and the Central African Republic (155).

Studying happiness may seem frivolous, but serious academics have long been calling for more testing about people’s emotional well-being, The entire top ten were wealthier developed nations. Yet money is not the only ingredient in the recipe for happiness, the report said.

In fact, among the wealthier countries the differences in happiness levels had a lot to do with “differences in mental health, physical health and personal relationships: the biggest single source of misery is mental illness. Income differences matter more in poorer countries, but even their mental illness is a major source of misery,”  the report said.

The happiness rankings are based on six factors: GDP per capita, healthy years of life expectancy, social support (as measured by having someone to count on in times of trouble), trust (as measured by a perceived absence of corruption in government and business), perceived freedom to make life decisions, and generosity (as measured by recent donations). 

The United States meanwhile slipped to the number 14 spot due to less social support and greater corruption; those very factors play into why Nordic countries fare better on this scale of smiles. China, making  major economic strides in recent years, but its people are not happier than 25 years ago, it found.