Planning Commission replacement likely in December
New Delhi, Nov 30: Work has moved into top gear for finalizing the name and structure for the new institution that will replace the 64-year old Planning Commission and the same may be unveiled this December.
"The Prime Minister has convened a meeting of the chief ministers on December 7 to seek their view points on the structure of the institution which would ultimately replace the Planning Commission," an official source said.
The commission has received many suggestions regarding the name and role of the new body. Some of the suggested names are Sustainable Development Commission, National Development Agency, Social Economic Development Commission or Bharat Pragati Lakshya. Besides, there have been reports about the new body being named as Niti Aayog or Policy Commission.
The new institution, which is likely to be headed by the Prime Minister as was the case in Planning Commission, may have four divisions - Inter-state council, plan evaluation office, UIDAI and DBT. All the divisions would have experts from the Centre and state governments as also experts from the industry.
The
Direct
Benefit
Transfer
(DBT)
Mission
earlier
was
part
the
Planning
Commission
but
was
moved
to
the
finance
ministry
later.
According
to
sources,
the
new
body
could
also
be
the
secretariat
for
the
inter-state
council
which
is
at
present
under
the
home
ministry
and
met
rarely
during
the
UPA
term.
This
council
used
to
meet
regularly
during
the
previous
NDA
regime.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day speech had announced that the commission would be abolished and replaced with a more relevant institution.
Since
then
the
commission
has
held
several
meetings
with
experts
to
discuss
the
new
structure
of
the
proposed
institution.
Country's
first
Prime
Minister
Jawaharlal
Nehru
had
set
up
the
Planning
Commission
to
steer
the
nation's
economic
destiny
at
that
time.
Set up by a Cabinet Resolution, the commission has enjoyed power and prestige with Prime Minister as its chairman. Its most important functions have been fixing targets for sectoral growth and allocate resources.
The deputy chairman of the commission has often been a political stalwart holding the rank of a Cabinet Minister.
Gulzarilal Nanda, V T Krishnamachari, C Subramaniam, P N Haksar, Manmohan Singh, Pranab Mukherjee, K C Pant, Jaswant Singh, Madhu Dandavate, Mohan Dharia and R K Hegde had been deputy chaiman at differnt points of time.
Montek Singh Ahluwalia was the last deputy chairman.
PTI