Niti wants to link Aadhaar with students’ scholarships

New Delhi: Having dragged its feet in formulating the mid-term appraisal of the 12th Five Year Plan for the past two years, the Niti Aayog has now completed the last minute exercise of preparing a complete assessment report of the Plan period as it ended on March 31, 2017.

The report envisions compulsory registration for all domestic NGOs with the government; otherwise allotment of grants could become difficult for them. It also emphasised that Aadhaar should be linked with other hitherto untouched areas like students’ scholarships, primarily with the idea of doing away with intermediaries in public dealings.

The final assessment report is likely to be approved by the PMO this month, sources aware of the developments, told this newspaper.

They added the government think-tank — in the assessment report — has taken into consideration the status of the fulfilment of physical and financial targets of the 12th Plan period while preparing a roadmap for the future. It has also underlined the need for all domestic NGOs to register themselves with the Centre.

As of now, NGOs voluntarily register themselves, though sources said Niti Aayog has made it clear that unless every domestic NGO does not register themselves with the government, they will not get the Central grants.

Also with Aadhaar registration already reaching the 100-crore mark, sources said that in the assessment report, the Aayog’s 12th Plan period assessment report says that Aadhaar linkage should also cover scholarships for students, as this will reduce paperwork and help in doing away with intermediaries.

While Aadhaar has been linked to LPG subsidy, efforts are afoot to link it to other subsidised items like kerosene and public distribution system.

The government think- tank is also of the view that states should ensure that a greater financial autonomy is provided to local self-government institutions or panchayati raj institutions. This way, they will become more self-reliant to introduce socio-economic reforms, sources said.

Since the NDA government had last year said the Nehruvian legacy of the five-year plan period will be replaced with its 15 year vision document from the start of the financial year 2017-18, the preparation of a mid-term appraisal or the complete assessment report of the 12th Plan period got pushed into background, said sources.

In fact the Niti Aayog was under pressure from various quarters over the past two years, especially from the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, to submit the mid-term appraisal report on the 12th Plan period, however it never materialised.

Sources said that since the 12th Plan period ended on March 31, there was no point in preparing a mid-term appraisal report, and the think tank subsequently readied the final assessment report with whatever data of physical and financial performance it had of the past five years.