Professionals to help district collectors implement central schemes

NEW DELHI:Professionals could soon be on board to help district collectors implement flagship programmes of the Centre. Absence of skilled manpower at the disposal of district officials has been identified as a key impediment in delivery of outcomes.

The minutes of a district collectors meet held in New Delhi in September show Cabinet Secretary Ajit Kumar Seth agreed with the bureaucrats that professionals are required to be involved in monitoring centrally-sponsored schemes.

“Participating district collectors said that though they are the main implementing agency, they face a huge human resource crunch. A team of professionals is necessary to assist them in management of the implementation of various schemes,” the minutes said, mentioning concerns plaguing centrally-sponsored schemes like MNREGA, mid-day meal scheme and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan. It was suggested at the conference that a monitoring committee of professionals be allowed to be constituted under every collector from 2014.


The National Advisory Council in August had also recommended recruiting qualified staff to improve effectiveness of key social welfare programmes. The issue hence came up at the collectors’ conference where Sindhushree Khullar, Secretary, Planning Commission gave a presentation to bureaucrats on the revised format of centrallysponsored schemes in 12th Five Year Plan. The Cabinet Secretary asked collectors to be innovative and technology savvy to “break usual inefficient public delivery systems.”