Chapter V

Planning commission v. Niti Aayog:

Top down approach (Planning Commission) vs Bottom up approach (NITI)

The planning commission followed a top- down method approach to developing India. This meant that
someone in the top decided what was suitable for people and provided monetary resources to the state
governments based on that.

Hence, the states which had lesser monetary resources compared the center had to depend upon the
planning commission for funds. There were two main problems with this setup :

 State governments had equal responsibility for the development of India, but they did not have
the funds
 Planning commission was an unelected body that was dictating the road map of development
to an elected state executive
This was an undemocratic approach because, a non - constitutional and unelected body had acquired
powers to decide how India was going to develop

Even in the central government, various departments had to chase the planning commission for
departmental allocations. In addition to this , there was no mechanism to assess the performance of
schemes suggested/ pushed by the planning commission.

Hence, India of the 21st century needs the states to be equal partners in the development story of India.
Since, the state governments are closer to the grassroots of this nation, they are better equipped to decide
how the money needs to be spent.

Role of states:

 The role of states in the planning commission era was limited. The states annually needed to interact with the
planning commission to get their annual plan approved. They had some limited function in the National
Development Council. Since Niti Ayog has all chief ministers of states and administrators of UT in its Governing
Council, it is obvious that states are expected to have greater role and say in planning/ implementation of
policies.
Formulation of central plans:

 While the planning commission formed Central Plans, Niti Ayog will not formulate them anymore. It has been
vested with the responsibility of evaluating the implementation of programmes. In this way, while Niti Ayog
retains the advisory and monitoring functions of the Planning commission, the function of framing Plans and
allocating funds for Plan assisted schemes has been taken away.