Underlining the need for a shift from the socialist-era vestige, Narendra Modi on Friday announced scrapping of the 64-year-old Planning Commission and the Government’s determination to replace it with a new institution.
Modi said the Government was working towards setting up a new institution that would focus on optimum resource utilization, skill development and strengthening the federal structure of the country.
He said the new institution would be set up keeping in mind the economic changes internally and globally.
Modi stressed that the internal conditions of the country have changed since the 1950’s when the Planning Commission was set up to cater to the needs of earlier times. Modi had on several occasions questioned the utility of the Planning Commission and termed it as ‘outdated’.
Outlining his economic agenda, the Prime Minister announced that a new structure would be put in place soon that would bring in creativity besides fresh ideas, thinking and hopes by utilizing to the optimum level public-private partnership and youth power.
“The Planning Commission was born at a time when there was a need felt for it. It has done its service in its own way. But now, things have changed internally in the country and also the global situation has changed. Now, Governments are no longer the centre of economic activity. States also play a key role in taking the nation forward. We need to strengthen the federal structure more. The Centre and States have to become a team,” Modi said.
Modi described the Planning Commission a Soviet-style body that has over the decades failed to catch up with the fast pace of economic transformation in India and abroad.
“The internal situation of the country has changed, global environment has changed... If we have to take India forward, then States will have to be taken forward. The importance of the federal structure is more today than it was in the last 60 years,” he added.
The Planning Commission was set up in March 1950 by India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to promote a rapid rise in the standard of living of the people by efficient exploitation of the resources of the country, increasing production and offering opportunities to all for employment in the service of the community.