NEW DELHI-Fifth Plan Approach Ditched

NEW DELHI Fifth Plan Approach Ditched THE Planning Minister's efforts to put together some kind of a draft of the Fifth Plan and to beat the September- end deadline which had been earlier set for the completion of the task have run into a stalemate. The discussions with the state governments and the Union Ministries and Departments have been completed and the chapters on the sectoral programmes and allocations have been written by officers working overtime in Yojana Bhavan. But the key issues of policy and the main parameters of the Plan, which had been broadly outlined in the Approach document, instead of getting more precisely defined after the endorsement of the Approach by the government, have got totally confused. Even the general endorsement earlier accorded to the Approach would appear to have been withdrawn by the political leadership, so that the Approach can no longer be said to form the basis for the drawing up of the draft Fifth Plan. Even more embarrassing, the Planning Minister, while issuing directives to the Planning Commission to guide its work, can no longer claim with any degree of assurance that he commands the confidence of the Prime Minister.