The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) is set to consider on Tuesday clearance to an ambitious, youth-friendly project that will create sports facilities in each of the country’s 6,545 blocks spread across 634 rural districts.
The cost to the exchequer? An estimated Rs. 12,808 crores, spread over a period covering the remainder of the current 12th Plan period and the 13th Plan.
And the name? Rajiv Gandhi Khel Abhiyan.
If the CCEA gives its approval, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi are likely to launch the project later this month at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. As the countdown to the notification for the general elections slated early next month begins, the UPA government is racing to announce as many people-friendly schemes as possible. If the major objective is to reach out to the rural youth through this project, there are plans to give it a special emphasis in the troubled north-east and in the Left Wing Extremism-affected districts in the hope that engaging the youth in sports activities will not only help utilise their talents but also wean them away from those drawing them towards extremism. By launching it so close to the general elections, sources said, it was hoped to enhance Mr. Gandhi’s image as a youth icon: indeed, the Congress’s pre-election ads are centred round him.
The financing for the scheme is complicated and envisages convergence of a part of the funds allocated for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (Rural Development Ministry), Backward Region Grants Fund (Panchayati Raj Ministry), Non-Lapsable Central Pool of Resources (Development of North Eastern Region Ministry), Additional Central Assistance for LWE districts (Planning Commission) and the to-be-created Rajiv Gandhi Khel Abhiyan of the Youth and Sports Ministry, the nodal ministry, headed by the youthful MP from Alwar, Jitendra Singh, who is part of Mr. Gandhi’s inner circle.
The project plans to hold Special Area Games in the northeast and give cash incentives to the three States that will perform the best. The expenditure for the scheme is to be shared by the States: while the forward States will have to shell out 25 per cent, the backward one will contribute 10 per cent, while the Centre will pick up the entire tab for the union territories. The object, says a government note, is that “availability of special infrastructure at the block level will be a motivating factor.”
