National

Decentralisation has helped: Digvijay

By V. Jayanth

CHENNAI July 10. During the past 10 years that he has been the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Digvijay Singh, says that "investment in the social sectors" has paid off and the growth momentum of the State as well as the social indicators have picked up.

Mr. Singh said that decentralisation of power and people's involvement in development programmes had started paying dividends and this was getting reflected in various studies and surveys — by the UNICEF, UNDP and some of the national agencies.

Mr. Singh, who visited The Hindu office during his brief visit to the city, said that gram sabhas in his State had been fully empowered and provided with complete and full devolution of finances — including royalties from forest produce. There were 2.5 lakh self help groups (SHGs) in the State of which 1.9 lakhs were for women, with a membership of over two million. While micro-credit had encouraged micro-business, marketing of these products posed a challenge.

The private sector Hindustan Lever had been invited to look at a marketing strategy and this should help.

The Chief Minister outlined the fiscal reforms programme and said there would be a 30 per cent cut in government jobs; about 80,000 jobs had been identified for the purpose and once the incumbents retired, they would not be filled. The Government was taking recourse to "contractual jobs" for teachers, doctors and other services.

"We have cut down drastically on non-Plan expenditure. Our salary bill accounts for 38 per cent of the total revenue and pensions take 20 per cent more. By 2014, the pension bill will overtake the salaries. We have to deal with these problems," he said.

Mr. Singh said the reforms in the State Electricity Board were also in place. The Board had been restructured and the revenue had increased by 30 per cent, thanks not only due to the tariff revision, but better collections.

The Education Guarantee scheme was working well and any community with 40 children (or 25, in the case of tribal hamlets) could "demand" a school. The Government provided the grant/ salary for a teacher, who was appointed by the community and accountable to it.

This project could be replicated anywhere and the Chief Minister said it was being extended to the health sector for instance.

Despite being a land-locked State, he said Madhya Pradesh ranked seventh in the overall investments and eighth in attracting Foreign Direct Investment. His focus was on "IT for the masses" and the Information Kiosks were playing a major role in this area.

The first software park in Indore was full and a second was under development.

Mr. Singh said Madhya Pradesh was the first to adopt a VAT Bill, but when the Centre refused to reimburse the projected loss of revenue in its implementation, it had to pull out. "We will want the VAT to go through", he added.

Asked if he and the Congress were not adopting a "soft Hindutva line" for the approaching elections, the Chief Minister said "Hindutva is not related to religion. And a Hindu is one who is tolerant, compassionate and non-violent. The BJP and the VHP are anything but that. But let me tell you, the Congress is not irreligious. We believe that every religion must be respected. In the post-Godhra flare up, there was no incident in Madhya Pradesh. During the last 10 years there has been no communal clash at all".

© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu