Finance Commission to take innovative approach for development

The Fifteenth Finance Commission (FFC) would take positive and innovative approach to fast track the development of the economy of Nagaland, a top official of the commission has said.

A team of the FFC led by its chairman N K Singh is on a three-day visit of Nagaland.

The FFC team held talks with a Nagaland government team led by Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio, different political parties, Naga civil societies, rural and urban local bodies to discuss about their demands on Wednesday.

"We have had a very full and rich discussion with all stake holders in Nagaland while the state government presented a formal memorandum to the commission detailing their expectations from the award and recommendations of the FFC," Singh told a press conference here Wednesday.

Nagaland government has put forth four proposals which include post devolution revenue deficit grants amounting to Rs 74,000 crore, on critical infrastructure development Rs 7,212 crore, Village Councils and Urban bodies Rs 1,700 crore and for disaster management Rs 1,080 crore totalling to Rs 86,834 crore, in addition to the critical connectivity projects.

"The commission is going back sanguine and enthused by initiatives of the state government and by the development metrics which currently are on the go," he said.

"It will be the endeavour of this FCC to encourage and fully support the innovative measures which are currently underway to accelerate the growth momentum of Nagalands economy which can improve the per capita income more significantly and enable it in harnessing its multiple competitive factors," Singh said.

The FFC chairman said the demands are there through the memorandum and the team will have further consultations within the commission and see the totality of the demands in the lights of the supplementary memorandum before coming to conclusions and firming our recommendations for Nagaland.

"We also had deliberations with village councils and village development boards, tribal organisations, trade and commerce and all political parties and they made oral and written memorandum to the commission," he said.

Singh said the commission is impressed by the great strides which Nagaland has made on several important critical parameters including the indices of human resource development - the rate of literacy, infant and maternal mortality rates are significantly above the national average.

He said that commission is greatly impressed with the interactions with village council and VDBs and the states approach towards the communitisation of resources which is unique to Nagaland.

Singh said the Commission recognises that 75 per cent of Nagaland is under forest with quite a large percentage in dense forest while most are moderate and open forest, which contributes greatly to the national carbon sync.

The contribution of Nagaland towards the environmental and ecological friendly approach towards reducing the fossil fuel footprint is commendable and needs to be recognised, the FFC chairman said.

He said the Nagaland government has also requested for setting up of national institutes, particularly management, medical and engineering college in the state to harness the huge potential of the young population of Nagaland.