Nitish demands change of criteria for devolution of funds

Commenting on the Economic Survey, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today favoured a rethink on the criteria used for devolution of funds.
Kumar referred to the chapter 13 of Economic Survey on Human Resources Development.
"The comparison of performance of states on different indicators showed that some states performed well in terms of growth indicators but performed poorly in terms of other indicators like poverty, rural-urban disparity, unemployment, education, health and financial inclusion.
This called for a rethink on the criteria used for devolution of funds as weightage was given to criteria like income distance or fiscal capacity distance along with population but none of the human development indicators or financial inclusion indicators was used, he said.

Similarly, the criteria used for awarding special category status to states (hilly and difficult terrain, low population density and/or sizable share for tribal population, strategic location along borders with neighbouring countries, economic and infrastructural backwardness) needed to be revisited, Kumar said.
Addressing a meeting of JD(U) legislature party, he said as per survey recommendations, Bihar was the "best performer" in terms of growth during 2011-12 at 16.71 per cent. It is followed by Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.

"States with the highest growth rate for the period 2005-06 to 2011-12 are Bihar (10.17 per cent) followed by Gujarat and Maharashtra," he said.

In terms of growth in per capita income, the best performer is Bihar (15.44 per cent) followed by MP and Maharashtra due to high growth in gross domestic product in 2011-12 and despite their high decadal growth in population, Kumar said.
Making a veiled attack on RJD chief Lalu Prasad, he said "those pointing fingers at us should read the recommendations to update knowledge.