Assessing Nighttime Light as a Proxy for Income Index with Gendered Insights in North East India

  • Unique Paper ID: 189416
  • Volume: 12
  • Issue: 7
  • PageNo: 6009-6018
  • Abstract:
  • North East India has eight states. It has a varied situation regarding income growth, changes in different sectors, and ongoing inequality. Over recent decades, the region has experienced varied economic trajectories, with some states like Sikkim and Mizoram witnessing rapid income growth, while others, such as Assam and Manipur, still lag behind the national average. Nighttime light (NTL) data are commonly used as proxies for economic activity and income, especially in areas where traditional statistics are limited or unreliable. In Northeast India, with its hilly terrain and reliance on agriculture, the connection between NTL and income index is often weak or negative at detailed spatial levels. Studies consistently indicate that women in Northeast India earn less and have lower labor force participation than men, with the wage gap remaining significant. In this paper, an effort has been made to quantify how Nighttime light can serve as a proxy for the income index for both men and women.

Copyright & License

Copyright © 2026 Authors retain the copyright of this article. This article is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

BibTeX

@article{189416,
        author = {Dr. Subhajit Majumder and Souvik Mukherjee},
        title = {Assessing Nighttime Light as a Proxy for Income Index with Gendered Insights in North East India},
        journal = {International Journal of Innovative Research in Technology},
        year = {2025},
        volume = {12},
        number = {7},
        pages = {6009-6018},
        issn = {2349-6002},
        url = {https://ijirt.org/article?manuscript=189416},
        abstract = {North East India has eight states. It has a varied situation regarding income growth, changes in different sectors, and ongoing inequality. Over recent decades, the region has experienced varied economic trajectories, with some states like Sikkim and Mizoram witnessing rapid income growth, while others, such as Assam and Manipur, still lag behind the national average. Nighttime light (NTL) data are commonly used as proxies for economic activity and income, especially in areas where traditional statistics are limited or unreliable. In Northeast India, with its hilly terrain and reliance on agriculture, the connection between NTL and income index is often weak or negative at detailed spatial levels. Studies consistently indicate that women in Northeast India earn less and have lower labor force participation than men, with the wage gap remaining significant. In this paper, an effort has been made to quantify how Nighttime light can serve as a proxy for the income index for both men and women.},
        keywords = {Nighttime Light Data (NTL) , Income Proxy , Gender Disparities , North East India, Regional Economic Inequality, JEL Classifications : C43, J16 , O12 , O13 , O18},
        month = {December},
        }

Cite This Article

Majumder, D. S., & Mukherjee, S. (2025). Assessing Nighttime Light as a Proxy for Income Index with Gendered Insights in North East India. International Journal of Innovative Research in Technology (IJIRT), 12(7), 6009–6018.

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