Social justice ministry, NITI Aayog pass the buck

The task of monitoring the Scheduled Caste Sub plan (SCSP), under which every central ministry is required to allocate budget for the welfare of Dalits, has no takers as NITI Aayog and social justice ministry have expressed their inability citing “lack of mandate” and staff shortage.

A coordination meeting called by NITI Aayog between it, the ministry of finance and the ministry of social justice and empowerment (SJ&E) to resolve the issue could not take place last Monday and is likely to be held later.

Since NITI Aayog was formed, the allocation of funds and budgetary support for planning of SCSP and STSP has been transferred to the ministry of finance.

However, the monitoring remained with the Aayog.

In a letter to SJ&E minister Thaawar Chand Gehlot, vice chairman of NITI Aayog, Arvind Panagariya said the erstwhile Planning Commission had dedicated resources for manning the SCSP units, which monitored the planning and implementation.

“However, the concept of fiveyear and annual plans and interactions with the ministries/states in this behalf are no longer in the mandate of the NITI Aayog,” Panagariya said, expressing inability to continue the monitoring.

In reply, Gehlot said his ministry was understaffed, and as the 12th Five Year Plan has only one year left, it was not advisable to shift the monitoring to his ministry. He also asked Panagariya to transfer NITI Aayog staff if it wanted to the ministry to do the monitoring.

In his response, Panagariya highlighted the downsizing of Aayog staff to 500 posts from 1,255 (at the time of erstwhile Planning Commission).

But Gehlot shot back, asking the NITI Aayog to approach the Cabinet Secretariat for resolving the matter.

The people of scheduled castes form 16.6 per cent of India’s population.

A sum of `38,000 crore has been allocated under the SCSP for 2016-17.