In planning, pursuit of profit was not seen as being in the social interest in the post-Independence years, but now profit is the sole motive. FOR two decades now the Government of India has pursued a policy of accelerated liberalisation, dismantling controls, diluting regulations and making the state a facilitator of private investment. It is not that the presence of the state has diminished during this period, but that its role...

-The Times of India   The Rs 32 per capita urban poverty line is a measure only of extreme poverty, not of acceptable consumption-linked daily expenditure. Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and rural development minister Jairam Ramesh have clarified this. They've also stated that prevailing BPL figures won't determine selection of the beneficiaries of social schemes. This hopefully will put an end to the high-decibel protests of opposition parties and...

The changing stances of the Planning Commission reflect the influence of the political climate. THE short note on the history of the Planning Commission on its website concludes thus: “For the first eight Plans the emphasis was on a growing public sector with massive investments in basic and heavy industries, but since the launch of the Ninth Plan in 1997, the emphasis on the public sector has become less pronounced and...

Though the methodology for determining the poor would be based on the socio-economic caste census being undertaken by the Rural Development Ministry, the (Suresh) Tendulkar poverty line would remain a relevant reference point “to see how development is helping to take more and more individuals above a fixed line over time and across States,” Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia told a news conference here on Monday. As per the...

Planning Commission’s affidavit to the Supreme Court states that adjusting for inflation, the poverty line for an urban person is Rs 32.5 per day per person and for a rural person it is Rs 29.3 per day per person. This has raised an outcry in media and the urban middle class, who consider them outrageously low. Based on these poverty lines, Planning Commission estimates that there are 40.74 crore persons...