According to the report by Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), violence had impacted the economy of India to the tune of $341.7 billion in 2014. The country has been ranked at a lowly 143 out of 162 nations in this year’s Global Peace Index (GPI). This is equivalent to 4.7 per cent of India’s GDP, or $273 per person. South Asia moved up one notch in the regional ranking after staying at the bottom in 2014, but that’s mostly because conditions worsened at a faster pace in Middle East and North Africa.

In South Asia only Bhutan, Nepal and Bangladesh have registering some improvement in their rankings. India ranked 5th out of seven countries in South Asia. Moreover, in the past eight years since GPI was first introduced, India deteriorated by 6 per cent largely due to “deteriorations in indicators measuring deaths from external conflict, political terror and perceptions of criminality“.

Globally the impact of violence on the economy reached a whopping USD 14.3 trillion, or 13.4 per cent of global GDP, in 2014.

Iceland led the pack of the Global Peace Index, followed by Denmark and Austria at second and third positions, respectively. Others in the top 10 include New Zealand, Switzerland, Finland, Canada, Japan, Australia, and Czech Republic.

Countries such as Iraq, Syria, Nigeria, South Sudan and Central African Republic brought up the bottom of the list, turning less peaceful.