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Saturday, Aug 07, 2004

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National

President's vision for economic uplift

By Our Special Correspondent

— Photo: Rajeev Bhatt.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, Kerala Fisheries Minister K.V.Thomas, Himachal Chief Minister Vir Bhadra Singh, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh and Minister for External Affairs Natwar Singh at the Chief Ministers' conclave in New Delhi on Friday. — Photo: Rajeev Bhatt.

NEW DELHI, AUG. 6. The President, A.P.J Abdul Kalam, today outlined his vision for making India an economically empowered nation by the year 2020 and gave out specific solutions to tackle long standing problems such as unemployment, the poor lot of the farmers and the recurring floods in Bihar and the northeast.

Making an exhaustive PowerPoint presentation at a Chief Ministers' Conclave organised here by the India Today newsmagazine, Prof. Kalam said competitiveness had emerged as the key factor for progress and ways had to be found to make the States competitive so that the nation as a whole could be competitive in today's world. "Every Chief Minister is the CEO of the State. His or her vision for the development of the State will lead to generation of multiple missions, based on the core competence of the State and the people. All that we have to do is to make up our minds and have a conviction that the nation is above all of us. Let us empower our people to work with indomitable spirit towards the mission of nation building.''

National missions

The President suggested the launch of five national missions on water, energy, education and skills, infrastructure and employment generation, that will enable achievement of 10 per cent growth rate which had to be sustained for 10 years. These missions would generate a movement in the States to create healthy people, a fully literate society, generate employment potential and provide a transparent governance system, he said.

Emphasising the urgent need to find a long-term solution to the recurring problem of floods, particularly in Bihar and Assam, the President recommended the construction of "layered wells'' at the entry points of the Kosi river from Nepal. These wells could store the floodwater at different levels and control the devastating effects on low-lying areas. The water thus stored would be useful during shortage period, he said.

Similar solutions could be found for the northeastern region, he said and recommended the nomination of an expert team to carry out the feasibility study for flood control projects immediately.

Employment potential

Mr. Kalam advocated a three-pronged strategy to make education more attractive, making it skill imparting and simultaneously creating employment potential.

This would involve preparing the students right from the college level to get oriented towards setting up enterprises which would provide them creativity, freedom and ability to generate wealth.

Banks would have to be proactive to support innovative products for enabling wealth generation by young entrepreneurs by setting aside the conventional tangible asset syndrome, he stressed.

The President drew up a seven-point plan of action for promoting the interests of the farmers. These included creation of cooperatives in major centres involving Government, NGOs, consultancy services, R and D organisations and people as partners. In his scheme of things, farmers would provide land and labour and would be partners in profit. The NGOs and consultants would identify the opportunity, draw the business plan and organise value addition and marketing.

The cooperatives, on their part, would provide finance, critical inputs, crop insurance and technical guidance to the farmers on issues such as arrival of monsoon and combating natural calamities.

Empowering panchayats

Mr. Kalam also sought empowering panchayati raj institutions to provide facilities such as sanitary and health centre, support for primary school education, self-employment through self-help groups and micro credit and desilting of water ponds.

Noting that the country had a large coastline of 7,500 km, he said there should be a number of mega seawater desalination plants using solar energy.

He stressed that every region could consider connecting small and big rivers as a mission.

Emphasising that water harvesting should become mandatory for all, he said to improve water table, there was a need to build checkdams, develop watersheds and desilt ponds and rivers.

Alternative energy

Pointing out that India would need at least three lakh MW of power generating capacity by 2020 while the present installed capacity was only one lakh MW, he said the additional power had to come from nuclear energy, hydroelectric systems, renewable energy and thermal energy. While contribution from renewable energy, especially from solar and wind energy, had to be increased to one lakh MW, urgent measures were also required to reduce the distribution loss to less than five per cent from the existing 25 per cent, he said. He suggested the building of several 100 MW solar power stations capable of meeting the needs of the farmers with minimum maintenance expenditure.

Holistic planning

The President emphasised that a holistic planning and development had to be region based. He said economic development of the country would not be complete unless the living conditions of 35 crore people living in States such as Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh were uplifted. He was of the view that unified planning, and decentralised execution with empowerment of the local bodies would lead to overall development of the regions. Progressive shift of the workforce from the agriculture sector to the manufacturing sector and to the service sector should take place through well-conceived industrial growth.

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