The Hindu Business Line : Kerala pegs draft Plan size at Rs 7,605 cr

Thiruvananthapuram, Dec 15 The draft annual plan size for Kerala for 2008-09 has been put at Rs 7,605 crore, which marks an increase of Rs 655 crore over the current year’s Rs 6,950 crore.

This was decided at a meeting of the State Planning Board on Friday.

The Chief Minister, Mr V.S. Achuthanandan, told newspersons after the meeting that agriculture and traditional industries sectors, which had been identified as thrust areas for the Eleventh Plan period, would get priority in the annual plan also. Additionally, industry, information technology and tourism sectors would also get full support in the annual plan.

The allocation for local bodies in the 2008-09 annual plan would be Rs 1,877 crore as against Rs 1,790 crore in the current plan.

The Chief Minister said the plan would be discussed in the State Cabinet and later forwarded to the Planning Commission for approval. He expected the whole process to be completed by this month-end.

In reply to a question, he said that the achievement of the current plan was only 26 per cent till the end of November. Though this was better than last year, it was not enough, he said and added that he was closely monitoring the implementation of various programmes under the plan and hoped the process could be speeded up.

Mr Prabhat Patnaik, Vice-chairman of the Planning Board, said the plan size had been kept as lean as possible and foreign aid that remained unutilised had not been included in it. The social welfare sector would get Rs 1,557 crore as compared to Rs 1,300 crore in the current plan.