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Kerala opposition flays Plan size reduction

Our Bureau

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM Aug. 9

THE Opposition Left Democratic Front (LDF) in Kerala has strongly criticised the reduction in the State's annual Plan outlay for 2001-02.

The leader of the Opposition, Mr V.S. Achuthanandan, said in a statement that the cut in Plan size from Rs. 3,317 crore in the previous year to Rs 3,015 crore in the current year would jeopardise the State's development process and called for urgent step s to rectify the situation.

He said the Chief Minister and his team of officials had gone to Delhi only to get the Plan size of Rs. 3,600 crore as proposed by the previous LDF Government reduced to just Rs 3,015 crore.

On the other hand, the State had enough avenues for additional resource mobilisation. But the UDF Government appears to be determined on slashing the Plan size and this was unacceptable, he said.

The State could have stuck to the Plan outlay as proposed by the LDF Government if it was willing to go in for additional resource mobilisation. The reduction in the outlay would adversely affect the decentralisation process, he said. The worst-hit would be the three-tier local bodies which had received nearly three-fourths of the annual Plan during the first four years of the Ninth Plan, he added.

The Opposition leader pointed out that the local bodies would now get only 29.5 per cent (Rs 860 crore) of the total Plan outlay and this would deal a major blow to the efforts of decentralisation.

There was a continuous decline in the level of funds devolution to the States in the last few years, he said. During the last year of the LDF rule, the Centre had cut the funds to Kerala by Rs 1,264 crore.

At the same time, States such as Kerala and West Bengal had demanded that at least 50 per cent of the Central tax revenues should be devolved to the States. The Centre had not yet accepted the demand, he added.