Limit Plan consultants' role: BJP

After the fracas between the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government and its Left allies over the inclusion of consultants from foreign and multilateral agencies, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) too decided to jump into the fray.

Senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha said the BJP was for a restricted role for foreign consultants as well as Leftist economists who seemed to be "proliferating" the Planning Commission.

The frequent fight between the Left and the UPA government showed the fragility of the alliance, he said. "Not a day passes without the Left parties barking at the government over some issue or the other," Sinha said.

"This is soon followed by ministers and think-tank members supplicating before the Communist bosses to give up their rigid stand," he added.

"Quite frequently the Prime Minister and the 'super' prime minister are seen engaged in fire fighting efforts. The fire is doused only after the government caves in," he said.

"The BJP feels the government should be free to obtain the best available advise. However, as far as foreign or multilateral agencies are concerned we believe their involvement should be limited to specific assignments," he said.

He admitted that state and central governments had been availing advise from foreign consultants in the past. "Care should be taken to ensure that only such information, which is in the public domain is shared with these agencies," he added.

"In this context we would also like to contest why the Planning Commission has constituted its advisory bodies in such a way that they are dominated by Leftist economists, many of whom are activists of the communist parties," Sinha said.

He said this might prejudice the advise given by the Planning Commission to different states, especially the BJP-ruled states.

"By letting Leftist economists monopolise advisory inputs to the Planning Commission, and even to play an overly political role, the UPA government has shown how vulnerable to the communist pressure it has become," he said.

The controversy over the Planning Commission consultants has given the party a fora to attack both the UPA government and the Left parties. However, the timing of picking up the issue may have more to do with its own internal troubles than any other reason.