NEW DELHI, Dec 23 – The Prime Minister’s package for the socio-economic development of the North Eastern region has almost doubled to Rs 13,388.90 crore, even as the strategy of the North Eastern Council (NEC) has been redrafted for the 10th Five Year Plan period (2002-2007) with thrust on completion of ongoing priority works. The 10th Five Year Plan cleared by the National Development Council (NDC) here on Saturday, would see the Planning Commission continue to advocate the area approach and aim to strengthen decentralisation of planning. Focused developmental programmes for backward areas are expected to reduce imbalances and speed up the economic development of the region.
Significantly, the Prime Minister’s agenda for socio-economic development of the North eastern states and Sikkim that covers 28 programmes and schemes has estimated to aggregate over Rs 13,000 crore. The entire financial requirement is to be met through plan and non-plan budgets of the Central ministries and agencies through financial support from institutions such as NABARD and NEDFi. The execution of the PM’s package during the 10th Plan period is expected to help bridge infrastructural gaps particularly in the sectors of power, rural infrastructure, roads, air-links, horticulture, roads, medical and health services.
The outlay for the 10th Plan of the NEC has been fixed at Rs 3,500 crore marking a marginal hike over the Ninth Plan’s agreed outlay of Rs 2,450 crore. As against the agreed outlay there was a shortfall to the extent of 13.7 per cent in the budgeted outlay at Rs 2,114 crore. The strategy to be adopted by the NEC for the 10th Plan is to put more thrust on completion of ongoing priority works, initiation of a few major projects, consolidation of schemes, better monitoring and improvement in project implementation. The Council continue to emphasize on financing of projects with regional approach.
According to the 10th Plan document the North Eastern region, under the Non-Lapsable Central Pool of Resources, is expected to get over Rs 5,000 from various ministries. The State governments of the region have identified the priority areas in their 10th Plan in light of the objectives laid down in the approach paper and the various departments of the Central government have drawn up their sectoral strategies for implementation. The Eight and Ninth Plan period and strategies adopted for removal of infrastructural bottlenecks, provisioning of basic minimum services and creating an overall environment for private investments. Despite these efforts, the recent growth performance of these States has not been encouraging.
During the period 1993-1994 – 1999-2000, only the economy of Tripura grew at a rate higher than national average. All the other states had lower growth rates. Assam along with other North Eastern states were all lagging behind in all sectors. Take for instance per capita consumption of electricity in Assam in 1996-1997 was 107.6 KwH as against the all India average of 334 KwH. In Assam, 45.86 per cent of household have access to safe drinking water as against the all India average of 62.30 per cent. The basic economic parameters like credit-deposit ratio was also low in case of Assam at 32.4 as against the all India average of 58.5.