A Selection from Questions and Answers in Lok Sabha

Abstract

Whether it is a fact that the list of projects for execution during the Five Year Plan period is not rigid but flexible and that there is scope for more useful schemes not enumerated in the list to be taken in and executed within the limits of the funds available; and if so, the projects for which claims of priority have been pressed or are being pressed by the State Governments and the action taken or likely to be taken in respect of those claims? The Minister of Planning and Irrigation and Power (Shri Nanda): (a) Within the limits of the resources available for the Five Year Plan, it is possible for a State Government to propose to the Planning Commission new schemes in substitution of others which may have been included in the Plan. Generally speaking, since the larger schemes in the Plan are almost all under execution, the scope for such substitution is limited to relatively small schemes, on which much expenditure is not involved. There are no projects for which new priority claims have been pressed by State Governments within their present Plan. Shri Jhulan Sinha: May I know, Sir, if the State of Bihar has requested the Government of India to allow them to include the Gandak project in the Five Year Plan? Shri Nanda: That is in terms of my answer to (b). The position is that the Bihar Government has not pressed the Gandak scheme in substitution of any existing scheme.