‘9% growth in 12th plan will be difficult’

In the wake of the grim domestic and global economic situation, the top government advisory body — the Planning Commission — on Thursday felt that attaining the target of 9% economic growth in the 12th five year plan (2012-17) would be difficult. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Jan 5, 2012, 22:52:33 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

In the wake of the grim domestic and global economic situation, the top government advisory body — the Planning Commission — on Thursday felt that attaining the target of 9% economic growth in the 12th five year plan (2012-17) would be difficult. But in spite of that view the plan panel refrained from revising the target.

“We are not revising the GDP growth target of 9% for 12th plan as of now,” said a senior plan panel official, after a day-long closed-door meeting held at Central for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) conference room.

The government had already lowered the economic growth target from 9.5% to 9% for the plan considering economic slowdown in United States, eurozone crises and uncertain foreign investment flow into India.

The fiscal deficit is expected to be more than 5.5% for the current financial year as against the target of 4.6% leaving very less scope for the government to provide additional funds for reviving economy and developmental projects.

The increase in funds for developmental schemes would be around 10%, less than the average inflation for the year, in the budget to be tabled in March after results of elections in four states are announced.

In light of these facts, Planning Commission deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia discussed the economic prospects for the 12th plan with most members being of the view that revival of economy would take more time than expected.

“The meeting was held to reflect the changing dynamics of domestic and global economic scenario and its impact on the country’s future prospects,” said Planning Commission member Arun Maira.

Members made presentation on the projected impact of the slowdown in different sectors of the economy and discussed ways to tackle the situation.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Stay updated with the latest Business News on Petrol Price, Gold Rate, Silver Rates, Diesel Prices along with Income Tax Calculator