Chief of statistics panel quits over job data row

New Delhi: Two independent members of the National Statistical Commission (NSC), chairman P.C. Mohanan and J.V. Meenakshi, have resigned over disagreement with the government on certain critical issues, an official said Tuesday.

According to reports, the two key reasons cited for resigning from the NSC were — withholding the publication of the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO)’s employment survey for 2017-18 and a lack of consultation with the commission before releasing the backdated Gross Domestic Product (GDP) series last year.

Expressing disappointment over the treatment being meted out by the government, Mr Mohanan, who was the acting chairperson, was quoted in a report as saying, “We have resigned from the NSC. Over the months, we have been feeling that we were not been taken seriously and being sidelined by the government. Recent decisions of the NSC were not being implemented.”

The immediate trigger for the resignation, reports said, was the delay in releasing the NSSO’s first series of the household survey, known as periodic labour force survey, for 2017-18. Sources said the NSC had approved the survey report in its meeting held on December 5 in Kolkata and it was supposed to be released by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation, as per convention. “The report was approved and should have been released immediately, but was not the case. I thought I should not watch silently what was happening,” Mr Mohanan said. However, almost two months after the approval, the report hasn’t been made public. A former member pointed out that the government was uncomfortable with the findings of the NSSO’s latest household survey.

The NSC, under the ministry of statistics and programme implementation (MoSPI), is to have seven members, as per its website. Already, three posts were vacant. And now, with the two members quitting, the NSC now has only two members, and none of them external — chief statistician Pravin Srivastava and NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant.

The tenure of Mohanan and Meenakshi was to end in June 2020. They joined as members in June 2017.

In November last year, the NITI Aayog had come under fire for announcing the revised GDP data of the UPA years.

NITI Aayog vice-chairman Rajiv Kumar and chief statistician Srivastava had announced the back-series data by the government.

“The NSC was essentially meant to bring about a sense of credibility to the data put out by the National Statistical System and if the NSC feels that it is not being permitted to carry out its functions then it is entirely appropriate that it resigns,” Pronab Sen, who was the chairman of NSC between 2013 and 2016, said.