Bhubaneswar: National Institution for Transforming India (Niti Aayog) vice-chairman Rajiv Kumar on Saturday urged the Odisha government not to boycott the Aayog's meetings and said the central planning body would address all the issues concerning the state.
Kumar made this request while meeting chief minister Naveen Patnaik at the state secretariat here.
"It aims to convince the chief minister to make Niti Aayog their medium of communication with the Centre, so that the state's problems are properly addressed," Kumar said. He also urged the government to join the Niti Aayog's programme, particularly its aspirational districts programme. Under the programme, the Centre provide financial assistance to 115 backward districts across the country and monitors its implementation. On January 4 and 5, the Niti Aayog organised a programme in New Delhi for the selected 115 districts and Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the district collectors. But, the Odisha government had not sent any representatives on the ground that it had not been consulted while eight districts of the state were selected.
The selected districts were Kalahandi, Rayagada, Dhenkanal, Kandhamal, Balangir, Gajapati, Malkangiri and Koraput. The Centre said the districts were selected based on various parameters such as nutritional level, illiteracy and availability of infrastructure for this exercise. The state also had objections against the Centre's decision to appoint senior officers in the rank of joint secretary to monitor the development of the backward districts in the state as " parbhari officers".
Kumar on Saturday took up the issue with the state government saying that the Aayog would only include names of those districts recommended by the state government.
After his meeting with the chief minister, Kumar said: "Many important issues were discussed at the meeting. The state has also placed many of its demands with us relating to Odisha such as coal royalty. As it concerns some other states and involves financial aspects, we will look into it separately."
At the meeting, the Odisha government on Saturday reiterated its demand for special category state status and restore central assistance for the districts of the KBK region, Integrated Action Plan and Backward Region Grant Fund. It also demanded revision of coal royalty.
A release issued by the chief minister's office said Naveen had asked the Aayog to consider the state's proposal to open more bank branches in 4,376 unbanked panchayats in the state and extend mobile networks in its 11,200 villages.
The state also demanded relaxation of tender norms for road building under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana in 38 blocks affected by the Maoist activities. The chief minister urged Kumar to increase the Centre's contribution to disaster response fund from 75 per cent to 90 per cent and sought inclusion of some districts in the Amritsar-Calcutta industrial corridor and extend it to Visakhapatnam.
He also urged to include beneficiaries under the Pradhan Mantri Matru Bandana Yojana modelled on Odisha's Mamata Yojana.
