Spatial dimension of development continues to be a neglected area in economic analysis. As a consequence, the traditional models of development fail to explain the growing imbalance in space as also the widening gaps in levels of socio-economic development between the city and its periphery. The objective of the present paper is to analyse if indeed the distance of a village from the nearest town has a systematic impact on its socio-economic characteristics.The distributional pattern of the indicators of economic well-being, health, education, etc, shows that their values do not necessarily decline along smooth gradients, as we move from the city/town to its periphery.
