Pawar to head central schemes restructuring panel

GoM has been constituted after the cabinet recently deferred a decision to prune the number the Centrally Sponsored Schemes from 147 to 59

Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar is tipped to head a new Group of Ministers (GoM) to restructure 147 centrally sponsored schemes, as suggested by the B K Chaturvedi Committee, sources said.

The Chaturvedi panel had suggested bringing down the number of centrally sponsored schemes (CSS) from 147 to 59 by either clubbing smaller programmes into larger ones or abolishing them completely. Schemes with an annual allocation of less than Rs 100 crore would be either clubbed or abolished completely, leading to substantial saving for the government.

The Cabinet recently deferred a decision to prune the number the CSS and give more flexibility to states to run the programmes due to opposition from some Union ministries and departments. According to officials, Finance Minister P Chidambaram is also part of the GoM. “After the GoM comes out with some suggestions, a fresh Cabinet note will be drafted,” said a senior government official.

The Chaturvedi panel also proposed to have a system of flexi-funds. According to this, state governments can use 20 per cent of the Budget allocated for CSS (10 per cent in case of flagship schemes), within the broader framework of the programme.

Officials said if the panel’s report was accepted in full, 11 CSS under the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare could come down to just five. The government spent Rs 18,000 crore in 2011-12 on the 11 programmes.

Big programmes such as the national mental health programme, national programme for prevention and control of diabetes, cancer control programmes, and programmes for health care for the elderly will form part of the broad national programme on non-communicable disease.

In the Department of Rural Development, the National Rural Livelihood Mission could subsume schemes such as the Swarnajayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY) and the programme for development of district-level rural development agencies called the DRDA Administration.

Similarly, of the 13 CSS run by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, the panel has recommended bringing them down to five and also further making them more targeted.