The Hindu : Nanjundappa panel calls for regional development policy

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Apr 03, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Karnataka

Nanjundappa panel calls for regional development policy

By R. Vijaya Kumar

BANGALORE April 2. The High-Powered Committee for Redressal of Regional Imbalances has recommended framing a special eight-year development plan towards reducing regional imbalances in the State.

The committee, headed by the former Deputy Chairman of the Planning Board, D.M.Nanjundappa, has also worked out the plan details, including estimated outlays.

A tentative estimate of the net additional outlay on the recommended Special Development Plan is about Rs.16,000 crore for eight years (from 2003 to 2010).

In its final report, which runs into 1,000 pages, the committee has also urged the State Government to formulate a regional development policy based on the development profile of each district and taluk, giving a comparative picture of the development status as measured by as many as 35 indicators evolved by experts on it.

The report has made it very clear that the eight-year development plan will only supplement and not supplant the State's annual Plan.

The development plan will cover as many as 114 of the 175 taluks in the State that are identified as backward and it will cover five years of the 10th Five-Year Plan and three years of the 11th Five-Year Plan.

Among the 114 taluks identified as backward, 39 taluks are further classified as "most backward" while 40 others have been identified as "more backward" and the remaining 35 as "backward".

Of the 39 "most backward" taluks, 26 are in the seven districts of North Karnataka, namely Sandur and Kudlugi (Bellary District), Bhalki, Humnabad, Basavakalyan, and Aurad (Bidar District), Sedam, Shorapur, Yadgir, Chittapur, Afzalpur, Shahpur, Aland, Chincholi, and Jewargi (Gulbarga), Kushtagi and Yelburga (Koppal), Sindhanur, Manvi, Lingsugur, and Deodurga (Raichur), Bilagi (Bagalkot), and Muddebihal, B.Bagewadi, Indi, and Sindagi (Bijapur District).

Taking the development profile division-wise, the committee has earmarked the quantum of resource allocation in the proposed development plan based on the district-level Cumulative Deprivation Index (CDI).

According to its calculation, the Rs.16,000-crore additional resource outlay of the recommended Rs. 16,000 crore special development plan will be divided among the northern region and southern region of the State in the ratio of 60:40 per cent.

While Gulbarga and Belgaum divisions in the northern region will be allotted 40 per cent and 20 per cent, the Bangalore and Mysore divisions in the southern region will get 25 per cent and 15 per cent respectively.

Allocation wise, the northern region will get Rs. 9,600 crore of the total outlay of Rs. 16,000 crore, the remaining Rs. 6,400 crore will be allocated to the southern region.

Stating that regional imbalances "continue to persist" despite decentralised planning and the panchayat raj system in the State, the committee has recommended implementing several special schemes for the development of the northern region of the State, and calls for allocation of a major portion of the outlay of the special plan to irrigation (Rs. 7,800 crore), rural water supply (Rs. 4,500 crore), power (Rs. 3,000 crore), urban water supply (Rs. 3,000 crore), and tourism (Rs. 1,000 crore).

Referring to the power scenario, the committee has suggested that 40 per cent of the power generated be reserved for North Karnataka. Stating that North Karnataka lagged behind in industrial infrastructure as well as in development, it called for Government intervention in the form of "some push factor and some pull factor" to develop the region on a par with other regions. The report also recommended seeking international agencies to explore the availability of high value minerals such as gold deposits in Gadag and surrounding areas.

The committee, in keeping with its terms of reference, has pleaded that an optimal 60:40 ratio in favour of the northern region be implemented as a "basis for additional resource allocation, because only then we will be able to ensure that regional convergence is achieved and maintained in the long-run". Considering the fact that North Karnataka is not placed on a par with South Karnataka in the demographic aspect, the committee has called for strengthening sectors where agricultural labourers, small and marginal farmers, and artisans are concentrated.

The committee has also recommended effective implementation of employment guarantee schemes and education guarantee schemes in the 114 taluks identified as "backward".

It also recommended that one of the additional chief secretaries of the Government be designated as the authority with adequate delegation of power and fixing the responsibility on him for the effective implementation of these schemes.

The report also calls for strict measures to control population growth in the region, something that is possible only with health infrastructure facilities.

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Nanjundappa panel calls for regional development policy