Meeting of the State Planning Board has not been held for 11 long years, informed Planning and Convergence Minister Usha Devi in the State Assembly on Friday in reply to a question by BJP MlA Dilip Ray.
The Minister said the last meeting of the board had been held on October 15, 2007.
The board provides advice to the State Government on implementation of plans, their evaluation and execution.
Though the Chief Minister is Chairman of the State Planning Board, the list of functionaries and members provided by the Minister did not have the name of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.
However, the Minister stated that Bishnu Das is the Vice-Chairman of the board. According to the list provided by the Minister, the board has nine members including two MlAs. The members are Ramchandra Panda, Rabi Mallick, Girish Chandra Das, Iswar Panigrahi, Kamala Pujari, Sudhir Kumar Das, Sarat Mishra and MlAs Bed Prakash Agarwal and Raseshwari Panigrahi.
Besides, Rabi Narayan Das is the advisor and Sujit Kumar is the Officer on Special Duty, the Minister stated but didn’t clarify the reason why the board has not met even once in the last 11 years.