Disbanding of the 66 Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS), often a reason for tiff with the states, has started with finance minister Arun Jaitley retaining only 31 schemes with 100% Central funding in his budget.
The casualty of this are some schemes dedicated to the cause of upliftment of backward and poorer regions of the country such as Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF) will be shifted to the states and the states will have to bear higher the financial burden of achieving national objectives like Swachh Bharat and Health Mission.
Quoting Finance Commission’s increase in state funds by 10 percentage points, the government had transferred 8 schemes including BRGF, police modernisation, national e-governance plan, setting up of 6,000 model schools and capacity building of panchayats to implement government schemes to the state governments.
From the next financial year, the state governments will have to shell more to implement 24 CSS. “The changed sharing pattern will be worked out by the administrative ministries with the states,” Jaitley said. The schemes to be fully funded include Sarva Siksha Abhiyan, Project Tiger and Elephant and National Nutrition Mission among others.