Pawan Chamling and Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia

Gangtok: The annual plan of Sikkim for 2011-12 has been raised to Rs.1400 crore, which is a 19.15% hike compared to last year’s plan size. The declaration was made following a meeting of Chief Minister Dr. Pawan Chamling and his team with Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission, Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia and other Commission members at Yojana Bhawan, New Delhi, on Wednesday March 9.

At the outset, Deputy Chairman welcomed the Chief Minister and his delegation to the meeting. The Deputy Chairman said that the Planning Commission has been preparing an approach document to the 12th Five Year Plan for which the experience of vast administrative experience of Dr. Chamling as the longest serving Chief Minister would be taken into consideration before finalizing the document. He further said, the Planning Commission considers infrastructure development in the North East requires focused attention. Sikkim has been a good performing State where many of the things were taken up first that are now being followed in other states too. He then requested the Chief Minister to make his presentation.

The Chief Minister opened the discussion from the State side by pointing out that the State Government has been on an aggressive pace of development both for long term and short term. The priority areas were thus been followed with focused attention.

The Deputy Chairman requested the other Members of the Planning Commission to give their observations and comments. Mr. B.K. Chaturvedi, Member, applauded the performance of the State in several areas as outstanding. He made specific mention that the initiative of the State in organic farming, floriculture, environment, health, power sectors etc. are now being taken up by other States. In this respect, he thanked Sikkim Chief Minister for being the torchbearer for many of the States. However, he cautioned that the population growth of the State was higher than the national average. Therefore, the State needed to generate its own resources in the long run to grow, he said. Mr. Chaturvedi specifically requested and sought for the suggestions of the Chief Minister which would be included in the approach document to the 12th Plan both in the context of North East development and the national level.

Dr (Mrs.) S.Hameed, Member, congratulated the Hon’ble Chief Minister for the noble CATCH program under health sector introduced in the State as well as for winning 1st Nirmal Rajya Puraskar in the Country. She appreciated the good work done through the Aganwadi workers and the ICDS schools. She however wanted to know the status of the coverage under Hepatitis B vaccination program launched in 2001. She however expressed that the State had to do something to reduce the anemia level in the reproductive age group of 15-49 amongst women.

Plan body members, Mr. Arun Maira and Dr. K. Kasturirangan also spoke in the meeting. Dr. Kasturirangan congratulated the Chief Minister for doing an excellent work in organic farming, bio resource management and bio-technology park etc. which have been “unique initiatives of the State Government”. Glacier Commission constitution was another area of praise, he noted. He suggested to the State Government to increase forest cover from the present level of 40-45 percent.

Mrs. Sudha Pillai, Member Secretary of the Commission, praised the performance of the State Government in decentralization and devolution to the panchayats and stated that this was the great statesmanship and wisdom of the Chief Minister. She suggested other areas of skill development to be also looked into. The Chief Minister was accompanied to the meeting by the Chief Secretary, Mr. TT Dorji, Additional CS-cum-Development Commissioner, Mr. Karma Gyatso, Principal Secretary, Finance, Mrs. R. Ongmu, Principal Secretary to Chief Minister, Shri RS Basnet, Principal Resident Commission, Delhi, Mt. Arvind Kumar, Secretary Power, Mr. P. Wangchen and other officials of Planning and Finance Departments, Government of Sikkim.

(FROM SIKKIM REPORTER / EDITED BY ASHOK CHATTERJEE)