Education, Skill Development top priority in 12th Plan

Planning Commission Member Narendra Jadhav has said that education and skill development would be the "overriding priority" of the 12th Five Year Plan. He added that the two areas will be on top despite India's current slow economic growth rate which might affect total outlay of the plan.

“Allocation for the 12th Plan period (2012-17) would be declared in a month and the total size of the plan outlay would be "commensurate with the growth rate," Jadhav said.While in 2011-12, the economy grew at 6.5 per cent, according to Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia, deficient monsoon could pull down the growth rate to close to 6 per cent.Ahluwalia recently said the Planning Commission might lower its ambitious growth target for the 12th Five-Year Plan to 8.2-8.3 per cent from 9 per cent.

Jadhav said that since education and skill development followed by healthcare and infrastructure got little from the central government in the 11^th Plan, these areas will be top priority in the current plan.

[Source: IBNLive]