Ministries told to earmark funds for SC/ST classes

The Planning Commission has issued revised guidelines to central ministries asking them to earmark 15 per cent of their annual plan for scheduled castes and 7.5 per cent for tribals as part of a sub-plan.

The notifications are being sent to the Union ministries days before they submit their annual plan proposals and a year after the Planning Commission sent revised guidelines to the state governments.

Asked about the delay, Planning Commission member B Mungekar said there was considerable resistance from ministries as they considered resources for some programmes as divisible and others as indivisible.

However, the Commission has now suggested that each central ministry earmark funds for the sub-plan reflecting the percentage of the population of these socially disadvantaged groups.

He said that the plan proposals of the ministries would be rejected if they are not accompanied by sub-plans for ST and SC.

He said it is known that the tribal sub-plan, which started in 1973, and the Special Component Plan for SC, which started in 1980, have done little to improve the lot of SC and ST. This year, however, these have been renamed as SC Sub-Plan and ST Sub-Plan and it is meant to reflect a change in strategy.

He said the change started a year ago with revised guidelines sent to states. "When they ignored the guidelines and came for their annual funds, we sent them back. They returned again with a sub-plan each for SC and ST in every programme," he said.

"We cannot apply a different rule to the Centre while asking the states to have separate budgets for SC/ST," he said.

The ministries will face their litmus test in the first week of January when they start coming with their annual plan proposals, the member said.