Panel moots CSS overhaul, discom privatisation, subsidy bill pruning

The Commission flagged five big schemes, including PM Awas Yojana, that should be scrutinised

- HIMANSHI BHARDWAJ & NANDINI KESHARI

The 16th Finance Commission has asked the Centre to set up a high-powered committee to review all Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS), recommending the closure of programmes that fail to use resources productively. The government has said this proposal will be examined in due course.

“Though the CSS were restructured and rationalised in 2015-16, over the past decade, there has been an increase in their number, with more than 80 schemes currently in operation,” the Commission noted. Such schemes now make up more than half of Union transfers to states and about 1.5 per cent of GDP. Over 20 ministries run these schemes and almost none were wound up despite objectives being met, it observed. “Continuing schemes with low, or negative social returns has the effect of crowding out higher return schemes that could replace them,” stated the report by the Arvind Panagariya-led Commission tabled in the Parliament on Sunday.