Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh today sought the personal intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to stop the practice of making frequent changes in the guidelines of Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY).
In a letter to the prime minister, Amarinder urged him to direct the Union Ministry of Agriculture to refrain from making frequent changes in the operational guidelines of the RKVY, a flagship scheme.
The scheme was initiated as an Additional Central Assistance, 100 per cent grant-in-aid scheme with a mandate to increase investment in agriculture and allied sectors and provided flexibility to the states to adopt projects as per their agro-climatic zones.
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A directive to the concerned ministry against recurrent changes would go a long way towards providing greater flexibility to the state governments for deployment of RKVY funds in the spirit of cooperative federalism, said the chief minister.
Noting that the guidelines of the scheme were changed and its pattern of assistance modified to 60:40 (Centre:State) sharing basis in the year 2015-16, Amarinder pointed out that even though Punjab was undergoing a transitional phase of financial stress, it was still providing its 40 per cent share in view of the importance of the scheme.
He further said during 2017-18, the criteria of inter- state allocation has been further changed, making it more favourable for the states which are non-performers, and the formula to assess this parameter has also been made more complicated.
Similarly, components within the scheme have been changed, laying more emphasis on infrastructure development with funds earmarked to the tune of 50 per cent for this purpose, while the component of productivity growth has also been linked with value addition, making it more complicated.
Funds to the tune of 10 per cent have been reserved for innovation, entrepreneurship and skill development, he added.
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