Govt forms NIC standing committee

The Centre on Tuesday announced constitution of the standing committee of the National Integration Council with home minister P Chidambaram as its chairman and four Union ministers and nine chief ministers as members. HT reports.

The Centre on Tuesday announced constitution of the standing committee of the National Integration Council (NIC) with home minister P Chidambaram as its chairman and four Union ministers and nine chief ministers as members.

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The agenda items for the meeting of NIC will be finalised by the Standing Committee, an official release said.

The government had constituted a 147-member NIC in April this year.

The Union Ministers, who are members of the committee, are: Pranab Mukherjee (Finance), M Veerappa Moily (Law and Justice), Mamata Banerjee (Railways) and Sharad Pawar (Agriculture).

The Chief Ministers of West Bengal, Assam, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Gujarat are also members of the standing committee.

The announcement said five co-opted members of NIC —Shobhana Bhartia, chairperson, Hindustan Times; Asgar Ali Engineer; Fali S Nariman; Barkha Dutt, Group Editor, NDTV; and E Ahmed, President, Indian Union Muslim League — were also in the standing committee.