Bid to take central schemes to more minority areas

NEW DELHI: The Centre is considering ways to bring in more members of the minority community in the ambit of its development programmes. The minority affairs ministry is working on a scheme similar to the central government funded multi-sectoral development programmes focusing on 90 minority-concentrated districts.

The multi-sectoral development programme is a scheme aimed at improving the socio-economic parameters in districts with minority concentration. The 90 districts covered by the scheme have at least 25% minority population, or in the case of heavily populated districts, the threshold is 20% or 5 lakh minority population. Minority affairs minister Salman Khurshid said that his ministry was working out a way to reach out to areas which had a sizeable minority population, but did not qualify as a minority concentrated district under population norms.

Besides the population criteria, there are eight other parameters for selecting districts. They include socio-economic criteria ��� literacy rate, female literacy rate, work participation rate, female work participation rate, and basic amenities ��� percentage of houses with pucca walls, with safe drinking water, electricity and toilets. The contention is there are many pockets of minority concentration which would fall below the national averages in these parameters but fail the population requirement, as a result of which these pockets cannot be included in the current programme.

���There are areas which have a minority population which is just shy of the 25% cut-off, these areas can be brought under a separate scheme. The basic administrative unit for this effort will need to be identified. We are in the process of considering options,��� Mr Khurshid said.

The ministry could look at the block level for this new scheme, as it would help identify pocket where a multi-sectoral development programme would help raise basic levels of education, health and other amenities. However, Mr Khurshid made it clear that his ministry was not considering expanding the existing programme but to set up a similar one to ensure that more pockets of minority population could benefit from a multi-sectoral development programme.