Plan panel tweaks make-up to take on ‘MMNJ’ factor

The government has roped in its key trouble-shooters to overcome the ‘MMNJ factor’ at the National Development Council (NDC) -- body of all chief ministers and key Central ministers -- on Thursday, reports Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Dec 25, 2012, 24:11:00 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The government has roped in its key trouble-shooters to overcome the ‘MMNJ factor’ at the National Development Council (NDC) — body of all chief ministers and key Central ministers — on Thursday.

The council is meeting to discuss and approve the 12th five-year-plan (2012-17) prescribing development agenda for the next four years. This is the last council meet before the next general elections.

But, the government's top functionaries believe that the combine of Narendra Modi, Mamata Banerjee, Nitish Kumar and J Jayalalithaa, called 'MMNJ factor', can prove to be a roadblock in getting the plan approved as the central government has not met many of their demands.

Anticipating trouble, the Centre had last week changed the composition of the Planning Commission bringing in parliamentary affairs minister Kamal Nath, health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad and law minister Ashwini Kumar as members of the panel.

Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh is now out of the panel.

Modi, who was last week elected as Gujarat chief minister for third time, has sought more flexibility for the states to utilise allotted funds. The council will provide him the platform to showcase his Prime Ministerial aspirations, a senior official said, terming it a "headache".

Bihar CM Nitish Kumar has already declared that he would not support a plan unless his state gets special category status, meaning higher allocation of money from the central kitty.

Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa had accused the UPA of using planning commission to control the state governments functioning through disbursement of funds.

West Bengal CM has been demanding three year moratorium on repayment of loans and higher central allocation to meet state expenses.

The unhappiness of non-UPA CMs over the document has sent jitters among top plan panel functionaries who feel that such a strong political opposition can cause embarrassment to the government.

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

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