The Hindu : National : Bharat Nirman behind schedule

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Friday, Dec 21, 2007
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Bharat Nirman behind schedule

Special Correspondent

It is meant to improve conditions in rural areas
Only sector showing good progress is rural telephony

NEW DELHI: Even as the just endorsed Eleventh Plan document lays great emphasis on the implementation and monitoring of various social sector programmes to usher in faster “inclusive” growth, it has also revealed that the progress report of the ambitious ‘Bharat Nirman’ programme has been less than satisfactory.

Formulated in 2005 by the United Progressive Aalliance government as one of its flagship programmes for implementation during 2005-09, it was designed to cover six core areas — village electrification, rural roads, drinking water, housing and irrigation — so as to develop the social infrastructure and living conditions in the rural areas for expediting the overall growth of the country.

However, according to the Plan document, the progress has been unsatisfactory as many sectors are running behind schedule and many of the targets are unlikely to be met.

On the progress of the rural electrification programme, for instance, the document says: “During the first two years, the progress under both the objectives [electrification of villages and households] has registered an achievement of 34 per cent and 6 per cent respectively. There are major shortfalls in this sector.”

Under the programme, the government had set a target to provide electricity to 1.25 lakh villages and 2.3 crore households living the below poverty line (BPL) during the four-year period.

Drinking water programme

On the drinking water programme, the Plan document noted that although the coverage of uncovered habitations progressed well, “there is a huge shortfall in covering the quality affected habitations in which only five per cent coverage was achieved.” In this sector, the government had targeted to cover 55,067 uncovered habitations by 2009 and all habitations suffering from problems with regard to the quality of water.

Bharat Nirman also proposed to create an additional irrigation potential of 4.30 million hectare (mha) in the first two years. Against this, the document pointed out that only 2.587 mha had been achieved till March 2007.

Turning to the road sector, the document noted that against the rural road construction target of 50,674.55 km during 2005-07, only 39,476.55 km had been achieved which worked out to a shortfall of nearly 22 per cent. Likewise, the programme to build 60 lakh houses in two years has also remained way off the target set as only 28.69 lakh houses have been constructed.

The only sector where the progress has been good is rural telephony. According to the document, 48,704 villages have been connected during the first two years itself as against the target of providing 66,882 villages with village public telephones (VPTs). Another 18,118 VPTs are expected to be provided by June next year.

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