India's Plan to Become 5 Trillion Economy Unleashed

The Narendra Modi government has set a target of $5 trillion for the Indian economy and that to be achieved within a certain deadline of 7-8 years. The master plan for achieving this massive target has been readied too. This includes a common development vision starting from the district level, through a participatory mechanism, revealed Union Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu.

Advocating involvement of the districts more actively in the growth of the Indian economy, Suresh Prabhu emphasised the need to accelerate growth in the districts to ensure growth at the national level, said the Ministry of Commerce & Industry statement. He added that a District Plan will be created to ensure this goal is met.

"There is need to create resource based plans, for the districts based on a bottom-up approach and implement the plan by going beyond a silo-based mind-set. An addition of 3% growth at the district level will ensure that $ 5 trillion target for the Indian economy becomes achievable," the statement said.

Further, the minister said that the Plan will provide specific interventions taking into account resources, strengths of the districts, sectoral interventions for agriculture including mapping of cropping pattern, industry including MSME and services relevant for the districts, skilling initiatives, Ease of Doing Business, access to credit and convergence of existing efforts in public and private sectors.

"Active participation of the State governments and district administration will be sought for effective implementation of the plan," he added.

According to the statement, the initiative will begin with 6 districts, including Sindhudurg and Ratnagiri in Maharashtra, Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, Muzaffarpur in Bihar, Vishakapatnam in Andhra Pradesh and Solan in Himachal Pradesh have been selected.

A Steering Committee, headed by Minister for Commerce and Industry with members from different Ministry of Union Government and representatives from State Governments of Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Andhra Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh, will be formed to oversee creation and implementation of the plan.