UP to restructure state Planning Commission on the lines of 'Niti Aayog'

Aayog had suggested UP to model Planning Commission on the lines of the federal think tank

The Adityanath government is planning to restructure the Uttar Pradesh Planning Commission on the lines of ‘Niti Aayog’.

Niti Aayog, which earlier signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the state and created a joint working group, had suggested UP to restructure the Planning Commission on the lines of the federal policy think tank.

“We are looking at strengthening our Planning Commission and there was a suggestion from the Niti Aayog that the UP government could adopt the federal Niti Aayog structure,” UP health minister and government spokesperson Sidharth Nath Singh told Business Standard today.

He is also the chairman of the UP-Niti Aayog joint working group, which was constituted for taking up the process of reorganisation of state government departments for greater efficiency and transparency.

Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant and UP chief secretary are other members of the joint working group, which was tasked with preparing a roadmap for speedier socioeconomic development of UP in line with the action points and indicators suggested by the Aayog.

Singh underlined that UP was deliberating on the issue as to what aspects of the federal Niti Aayog could be incorporated in Planning Commission. “The government has to take the final call in the matter.” The radical policy change would have to pass the state cabinet scrutiny before it could be enforced," he said.

Since, Adityanath has pitched UP to become a $ trillion economy by 2024 in keeping with the ambitious target of Prime Minister Narendra Modi for India to achieve the $5 trillion mark in the next 5 years, the state government is now trying to synchronise its programmes with the Centre for optimal leveraging.

Meanwhile, UP is in the process of reducing the number of state ministries for leaner government. In 2017, Niti Aayog, which had replaced the erstwhile vaunted Planning Commission at the Centre, had asked the state to reorganise ministries for accountability and swifter decision making.

However, the proposal could not be implemented because of various reasons, including elections.

Last month, the state cabinet had considered the proposal of reorganisation, which would primarily comprise merging a few ministries and creating new ones. However, the cabinet felt that some more deliberations were needed on the issue.

Since, some new ministries have been created at the Centre, including for water conservation, UP will revisit the restructuring proposal for having parallel ministries in UP as well under the spirit of ‘minimum government, maximum governance’ expounded by Modi, Singh had told the media after the cabinet meeting.

Besides, the government had mooted disbanding schemes, which had outlived their utility. It was also planned to abolish non-essential government posts. The state had constituted two committees to identify non-essential schemes and posts in the government departments.