Planning Commission - Introduction, Overview, 11 five plan details & objective, Current objective of 11th five year plan(2007-2012)

Planning Commission - Introduction, Overview, 11 five plan details & objective, Current objective of 11th five year plan(2007-2012)

The economy of India is based in part on planning through its five-year plans, developed, executed and monitored by the Planning Commission. With the Prime Minister as the ex officio Chairman, the commission has a nominated Deputy Chairman, who has rank of a Cabinet minister. Montek Singh Ahluwalia is currently the Deputy Chairman of the Commission. The tenth plan completed its term in March 2007 and the eleventh plan is currently underway

First plan (1951-1956)

The first Indian Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru presented the first five-year plan to the Parliament of India on 8 December 1951. The plan addressed, mainly, the agrarian sector, including investments in dams and irrigation. The agricultural sector was hit hardest by the partition of India and needed urgent attention. The total planned budget of 206.8 billion (US$23.6 billion in the 1950 exchange rate) was allocated to seven broad areas: irrigation and energy (27.2 percent), agriculture and community development (17.4 percent), transport and communications (24 percent), industry (8.4 percent), social services (16.64 percent), land rehabilitation (4.1 percent), and for other sectors and services (2.5 percent). The most important feature of this phase was active role of state in all economic sectors.

Second plan (1956-1961)

This plan functioned on the basis of a nude model. The Mahalanobis model was propounded by Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis in the year 1953.[citation needed] The second five-year plan focused on industry, especially heavy industry. Unlike the First plan, which focused mainly on agriculture, domestic production of industrial products was encouraged in the Second plan, particularly in the development of the public sector. The plan followed the Mahalanobis model, an economic development model developed by the Indian statistician Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis in 1953. The plan attempted to determine the optimal allocation of investment between productive sectors in order to maximise long-run economic growth

Third plan (1961-1966)

The third plan stressed on agriculture and improving production of rice, but the brief Sino-Indian War of 1962 exposed weaknesses in the economy and shifted the focus towards the Defence industry. In 1965-1966, India fought a war with Pakistan. The war led to inflation and the priority was shifted to price stabilisation. The construction of dams continued. Many cement and fertilizer plants were also built. Punjab began producing an abundance of wheat.

Fourth plan (1969-1974)

At this time Indira Gandhi was the Prime Minister. The Indira Gandhi government nationalised 14 major Indian banks and the Green Revolution in India advanced agriculture. In addition, the situation in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) was becoming dire as the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 and Bangladesh Liberation War took place.

Funds earmarked for the industrial development had to be diverted for the war effort. India also performed the Smiling Buddha underground nuclear test in 1974, partially in response to the United States deployment of the Seventh Fleet in the Bay of Bengal.

Fifth plan (1974-1979)

Stress was laid on employment, poverty alleviation, and justice. The plan also focused on self-reliance in agricultural production and defence. In 1978 the newly elected Morarji Desai government rejected the plan. Electricity Supply Act was enacted in 1975, which enabled the Central Government to enter into power generation and transmission.

Sixth plan (1980-1985)

The sixth plan also marked the beginning of economic liberalization. Price controls were eliminated and ration shops were closed. This led to an increase in food prices and an increase in the cost of living. This was the end of Nehruvian Plan and Rajiv Gandhi was prime minister during this period. Family planning was also expanded in order to prevent overpopulation.

Seventh plan (1985-1990)

The Seventh Plan marked the comeback of the Congress Party to power. The plan laid stress on improving the productivity level of industries by upgrading of technology.

The main objectives of the 7th five year plans were to establish growth in areas of increasing economic productivity, production of food grains, and generating employment opportunities.

The thrust areas of the 7th Five year plan have been enlisted below:

• Social Justice
• Removal of oppression of the weak
• Using modern technology
• Agricultural development
• Anti-poverty programs
• Full supply of food, clothing, and shelter
• Increasing productivity of small and large scale farmers
• Making India an Independent Economy

Eighth plan (1992-1997)

Modernization of industries was a major highlight of the Eighth Plan. Under this plan, the gradual opening of the Indian economy was undertaken to correct the burgeoning deficit and foreign debt. Meanwhile India became a member of the World Trade Organization on 1 January 1995.This plan can be termed as Rao and Manmohan model of Economic development. The major objectives included, containing population growth, poverty reduction, employment generation, strengthening the infrastructure, Institutional building,tourism management,

Ninth Plan (1997 - 2002)

Ninth Five Year Plan India runs through the period from 1997 to 2002 with the main aim of attaining objectives like speedy industrialization, human development, full-scale employment, poverty reduction, and self-reliance on domestic resources.

The main objectives of the Ninth Five Year Plan of India are:

• to prioritize agricultural sector and emphasize on the rural development
• to generate adequate employment opportunities and promote poverty reduction
• to stabilize the prices in order to accelerate the growth rate of the economy
• to ensure food and nutritional security
• to provide for the basic infrastructural facilities like education for all, safe drinking water, primary health care, transport, energy
• to check the growing population increase
• to encourage social issues like women empowerment, conservation of certain benefits for the Special Groups of the society
• to create a liberal market for increase in private investments

Tenth plan (2002-2007)

• Attain 8% GDP growth per year.
• Reduction of poverty ratio by 5 percentage points by 2007;
• Providing gainful and high-quality employment at least to the addition to the labour force;*All children in India in school by 2003; all children to complete 5 years of schooling by 2007;
• Reduction in gender gaps in literacy and wage rates by at least 50% by 2007;*Reduction in the decadal rate of population growth between 2001 and 2011 to 16.2%;*Increase in Literacy Rates to 75 per cent within the Tenth Plan period (2002 to 2007);

Eleventh plan (2007-2012)

The eleventh plan has the following objectives:

Income & Poverty

• Accelerate GDP growth from 8% to 10% and then maintain at 10% in the 12th Plan in order to double per capita income by 2016-17
• Increase agricultural GDP growth rate to 4% per year to ensure a broader spread of benefits
• Create 70 million new work opportunities.
• Reduce educated unemployment to below 5%.
• Raise real wage rate of unskilled workers by 20 percent.
• Reduce the headcount ratio of consumption poverty by 10 percentage points.

Education

• Reduce dropout rates of children from elementary school from 52.2% in 2003-04 to 20% by 2011-12
• Develop minimum standards of educational attainment in elementary school, and by regular testing monitor effectiveness of education to ensure quality
• Increase literacy rate for persons of age 7 years or above to 85%
• Lower gender gap in literacy to 10 percentage point
• Increase the percentage of each cohort going to higher education from the present 10% to 15% by the end of the plan

Health

• Reduce infant mortality rate to 28 and maternal mortality ratio to 1 per 1000 live births
• Reduce Total Fertility Rate to 2.1
• Provide clean drinking water for all by 2009 and ensure that there are no slip-backs
• Reduce malnutrition among children of age group 0-3 to half its present level
• Reduce anaemia among women and girls by 50% by the end of the plan
• Women and Children
• Raise the sex ratio for age group 0-6 to 935 by 2011-12 and to 950 by 2016-17
• Ensure that at least 33 percent of the direct and indirect beneficiaries of all government schemes are women and girl children
• Ensure that all children enjoy a safe childhood, without any compulsion to work

Infrastructure

• Ensure electricity connection to all villages and BPL households by 2009 and round-the-clock power.
• Ensure all-weather road connection to all habitation with population 1000 and above (500 in hilly and tribal areas) by 2009, and ensure coverage of all significant habitation by 2015
• Connect every village by telephone by November 2007 and provide broadband connectivity to all villages by 2012
• Provide homestead sites to all by 2012 and step up the pace of house construction for rural poor to cover all the poor by 2016-17

Environment

• Increase forest and tree cover by 5 percentage points.
• Attain WHO standards of air quality in all major cities by 2011-12.
• Treat all urban waste water by 2011-12 to clean river waters.
• Increase energy efficiency by 20 percentage points by 2016-17.

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