The Raghuram Rajan Committee report released on Thursday seems to have come as a blessing in disguise for political parties in Jharkhand, who have been raising their voices for special status tag for Jharkhand and also made it a major plank for upcoming elections.
The report that has put Jharkhand in 'least Developed' category with a need index of 0.746 has apparently brought the State's chances of getting Special Status very high with the State faring very low on several parameters of development.
leader of Opposition and former Chief Minister Arjun Munda, who has been fighting for the cause ever since he had raised the issue for the first time at National Development Council meet in 2011, said that the report would strengthen the cause of the State in many ways.
"I have been saying this since the very beginning that the method to ascertain State's development should be income based. The Human Development Index and the per capita income should have been the basis to measure the poverty. If the per capita income minus raw material is calculated the true picture would come out," Munda told The Pioneer over phone from Delhi.
"We are eligible for special status as per the development indicators. If the report is seen in the national perspective and the Centre doesn't play foul we will get the Special Status," he added.
Raising the demand for special status for the first time at a meeting of the National Development Council (NDC) and again in 2012, Munda had said the Centre's stand was completely unfair and appeared to be politically motivated.
The AJSU Party, which has recently taken up Special Status demand for Jharkhand as its prime issue for forthcoming polls, has also admitted that the report would strengthen the cause. However, it still raised doubts on the intentions of the Central Government.
"Jharkhand has been ignored by the Centre for decades. Although the report brings to light the reality, it doesn't portray the full picture. The share of the State in revenue is too high but what it gets is abysmally low. The recommendations of the report may not give justice to people of the State, unless we a get Special Status," AJSU Party chief Sudesh Mahto said.
While the State Congress said that fiscal management was more important than special status, the JVM welcomed the report with some sort of scepticism. "The report clearly indicates that we are lagging behind in many development indicators and we must get special status for the State. But, at the same time it was important to have a monitoring mechanism of funds that are there for development purposes," said JVM general secretary Praveen Singh.
"Successive Governments of the State have failed to properly use the development funds so monitoring of the utilisation of funds was more important than special status and package for the State," Singh added, indicating that the report would help in garnering public support.