Regional Planning and Sustainable Development in India

1. Planning in India: Five Year Plans, the Planning Commission and NITI Aayog

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• Planning (Class 12, Planning and Sustainable Development in Indian Context) means three steps: thinking, making a scheme, then acting to reach a goal. Here it means a planned process of economic development. This is unlike "hit-and-miss" reform done by trial and error.
• India began with centralised planning after Independence. It later moved to decentralised multi-level planning, with planning bodies at the Centre, in the states and in the districts.
• Planning Commission: set up in March 1950 by a Union Cabinet resolution, with the Prime Minister as chairman. It made the plans and shared out plan funds. It brought in target area and target group approaches (Fourth and Fifth Plans), special area programmes (Eighth Plan) and agro-climatic regional planning (from 1988, beyond NCERT).
• Five Year Plans: India's medium-term development plans. There were twelve, from 1951-56 to 2012-17. After the Twelfth Plan they gave way to vision and strategy documents.
• NITI Aayog (1 January 2015) replaced the Planning Commission. It is a policy think tank (an advice body). It brings states into economic policy-making, which is called cooperative federalism, and it gives strategic and technical advice to the Centre and the states. It does not allocate plan funds.
• NITI Aayog runs the Aspirational Districts Programme and the SDG India Index (Sections 6 and 9). The economy subject's planning-mixed-economy covers the plans in detail.

2. Sectoral and regional planning; why regional imbalances arise

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Sectoral planning	Regional planning
Schemes for single sectors: agriculture, irrigation, manufacturing, power, construction, transport, communication, social infrastructure, services	Takes a spatial perspective (looks at places, not only sectors)
Does not deal directly with gaps between places	Aims to reduce regional imbalance
—	NCERT MCQ: regional planning = area-specific approach

• Why imbalance arises:
• Development depends on the resource base. It also needs technology and investment, so even resource-rich areas can stay backward. Examples are the mineral-rich tribal Chota Nagpur belt and KBK in Odisha.
• Hills, deserts and drought act as physical barriers.

• Colonial investment patterns and the clustering of industry in metros widen the gaps.

• Beyond NCERT: gaps are measured by per capita state income, HDI and the NITI Aayog Multidimensional Poverty Index by state (verify current).

• Growth pole theory (Francois Perroux, 1950s; beyond NCERT): growth gathers around "propulsive" (leading) industries at a few points. It should then spread ("trickle down") to the region around them. India used it in planned steel towns (Bhilai, Bokaro, Rourkela, Durgapur), industrial estates and growth centres. The spread was weak. Instead there was backwash, where the centre drains people and money from its tribal hinterland. See also industrial corridors (manufacturing-industries-india).

3. Target area and target group planning

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• Cause → response:
• After about 15 years of planning, regional imbalances were growing, not shrinking.

• The Planning Commission brought in target area and target group approaches to stop regional and social gaps from widening.

• Target area planning: development aimed at backward places. Its programmes are Command Area Development, Drought Prone Area, Desert Development and Hill Area Development.

• Target group planning: development aimed at disadvantaged people. Examples are the Small Farmers Development Agency (SFDA) and the Marginal Farmers and Agricultural Labourers Development Agency (MFAL/MFDA).
• Eighth Plan: special area programmes built infrastructure in hill areas, north-eastern states, tribal areas and backward areas.
• Command Area Development Programme (1974-75): closes the gap between irrigation capacity created and irrigation actually used in canal commands. Its tools are field channels, lining of watercourses, land levelling, warabandi, drainage and afforestation. It is now part of PMKSY's Har Khet Ko Pani (verify current).
• Desert Development Programme (1977-78) covers:
• hot deserts of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Haryana
• cold deserts of Jammu and Kashmir (now Ladakh) and Himachal Pradesh

It aims to control desertification (land turning into desert) through afforestation, shelterbelts (rows of trees that block wind), pasture and water harvesting. In 2009-10, DPAP, DDP and IWDP were merged into the Integrated Watershed Management Programme, now WDC-PMKSY (verify current).

4. Hill Area Development, Drought Prone Area Programme and backward regions

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• Hill Area Development Programme (Fifth Plan) covered 15 districts: all hill districts of Uttar Pradesh (now Uttarakhand), the Mikir Hills and North Cachar Hills (Assam), Darjeeling (West Bengal) and the Nilgiris (Tamil Nadu). Plans were made to fit topography, ecology, society and economy. They used local resources through horticulture, plantations, farming, animal husbandry, poultry, forestry and small village industry.
• National Committee on the Development of Backward Areas (1981): all hill areas above 600 m that are not under the tribal sub-plan should be treated as backward hill areas.
• Drought Prone Area Programme: began in the Fourth Plan to provide jobs and create productive assets. It first relied on labour-intensive civil works. Later it moved to irrigation, land development, afforestation, grassland and rural infrastructure such as electricity, roads, markets and credit. The 1981 Committee found it was limited to farming and ecology. It asked for alternative jobs and integrated micro-watershed development, keeping water, soil, plants, people and animals in balance.
• Identification: the Planning Commission (1967) named 67 districts. The Irrigation Commission (1972) used a 30 per cent irrigated-area criterion.
• Drought-prone belt: arid and semi-arid Rajasthan, Gujarat and western Madhya Pradesh; Marathwada; the Rayalaseema and Telangana plateaus; the Karnataka plateau; interior Tamil Nadu. Punjab, Haryana and north Rajasthan are protected by irrigation.
• Beyond NCERT:
• Bundelkhand region: 13 districts across Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. It is a rocky plateau with unreliable rain, migration and farm distress. It got a special package in 2009, and the Ken-Betwa link is meant to help it.
• KBK region: the undivided Kalahandi, Bolangir and Koraput districts of western and southern Odisha. It suffers drought, hunger deaths and distress migration, and has had a special plan since the late 1990s.

5. Case study: the Integrated Tribal Development Project in Bharmaur

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• Bharmaur tribal region: Bharmaur and Holi tehsils of Chamba district, Himachal Pradesh, notified as a tribal area on 21 November 1975.
• It lies at 32°11'-32°41' N and 76°22'-76°53' E, covers about 1,818 sq km, and mostly lies at 1,500-3,700 m.
• The Pir Panjal is to the north and the Dhaula Dhar to the south; the two meet near Rohtang Pass.
• The Ravi and its tributaries the Budhil and Tundahen cut deep gorges. They split the area into four parts: Holi, Khani, Kugti, Tundah.
• Winters are freezing with snow (January mean 4°C, July mean 26°C).

• Census 2011: population 39,113, density 21 per sq km.

• Gaddi: the tribal people of Bharmaur. They speak Gaddiali and traditionally practised transhumance (moving with sheep and goats between high summer pastures and low winter pastures). They were long isolated and deprived, and were listed as a scheduled tribe in the 1970s.

• Tribal sub-plan (Fifth Plan, 1974): sets aside plan funds for tribal areas, at least in proportion to their population. Under it, Bharmaur became one of five ITDPs in Himachal Pradesh.
• Integrated Tribal Development Project: an area development unit for tribal regions. Its top priorities are transport and communications, agriculture and allied work, and social and community services.
• Impact of ITDP in Bharmaur: schools, health care, drinking water, roads, communications and electricity were built. Most of the gain went to villages along the Ravi in Holi and Khani, while remote Tundah and Kugti lag behind. Female literacy rose from 1.88% (1971) to 65% (2011), the gender gap narrowed, the sex ratio improved and child marriage fell. More pulses and cash crops are now grown, but still with traditional tools. Only about one-tenth of households still practise transhumance, and many migrate to Kangra in winter for wage work.
• PM JANMAN (beyond NCERT): launched in November 2023 with about ₹24,000 crore. It brings housing, roads, piped water, electricity, health, schooling and livelihoods to habitations of the 75 PVTGs (Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups).

6. Development and sustainable development: the evolution of the idea

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• Development (Class 12, Planning and Sustainable Development in Indian Context) is multi-dimensional. It is a positive change in economy, society and environment that cannot be reversed. It grows out of how people interact with nature, and that interaction depends on technology and institutions.
• How the meaning changed:
• After World War II: development meant economic growth, measured as GNP and per capita income.
• 1970s: growth came with rising poverty, so "redistribution with growth" and "growth and equity" were added.

• 1980s: development came to mean wide social and material well-being, including health, education, equal opportunity, and political and civil rights. The HDI is covered in human-development.

• Roots of sustainable development: environmental worry in the West in the late 1960s, shown in Ehrlich's The Population Bomb (1968) and Meadows et al.'s The Limits to Growth (1972, Club of Rome).

• Brundtland Report: the UN World Commission on Environment and Development, headed by Norway's Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland, published Our Common Future (1987). Its definition: development "that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." It joins ecological, social and economic sustainability (Fig. 6.3).
• Beyond NCERT: Stockholm (1972), Rio and Agenda 21 (1992), the MDGs (2000), then 17 SDGs with 169 targets (2015).
• SDG India Index (NITI Aayog, since 2018) ranks states and UTs on SDG progress. In 2023-24, Kerala and Uttarakhand were top, Bihar was lowest, and India scored 71 (verify current).

7. Case study: the Indira Gandhi Canal (Nahar) project and its command area

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• Indira Gandhi Canal (earlier the Rajasthan Canal) is one of India's largest canal systems.
• It was conceived by Kanwar Sain in 1948 and launched on 31 March 1958.
• It starts at the Harike barrage in Punjab, where the Satluj and Beas meet.

• It runs parallel to the Pakistan border, about 40 km from it on average, through the Thar (Marusthali).

• Command area: the land a canal can irrigate. Its cultivable part is the culturable command area (CCA). Planned system length: 9,060 km. CCA: 19.63 lakh ha. About 70% was to be irrigated by flow and the rest by lift.

	Indira Gandhi Canal Stage-I	Indira Gandhi Canal Stage-II
Districts	Ganganagar, Hanumangarh, northern Bikaner	Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Barmer, Jodhpur, Nagaur, Churu
Land	Gently undulating	Shifting sand dunes, summers up to 50°C
CCA	5.53 lakh ha	14.10 lakh ha
Irrigation began	Early 1960s	Mid-1980s

• Lift irrigation: water is pumped up so it can flow against the slope of the land to higher ground. All lift canals start on the left bank of the main canal. All right-bank channels are flow channels (Figs. 6.4-6.5).
• Beyond NCERT: the water comes from Pong (Beas) and Bhakra storage under inter-state shares. Punjab-Rajasthan disputes and canal-lining issues are covered in water-resources-india.

8. Impacts of the Indira Gandhi Canal and measures for sustainable development

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• Impact of Indira Gandhi Canal:
• Positive: soil stays moist for longer, and CAD afforestation and pastures greened the land. Wind erosion and canal siltation fell. Cultivated area and cropping intensity (number of crops grown on the same land in a year) rose. Gram, bajra and jowar gave way to wheat, cotton, groundnut and rice. Crop and livestock output rose sharply.

• Negative: heavy irrigation and over-use of water caused waterlogging (water table rising to the root zone) and soil salinity (salt building up in soil). These harm farming in the long run, and four decades of experience have proved the scholars' doubts right.

• Sustainability measures in the Indira Gandhi Canal command: there are seven measures, and five aim at ecological balance. 1. Strict water management: protective irrigation in Stage-I and extensive irrigation of crops and pasture in Stage-II. 2. No water-intensive crops; grow plantation crops such as citrus. 3. CAD works: lining watercourses, levelling land and warabandi, to cut water lost on the way. 4. Reclaim waterlogged and saline land. 5. Eco-development: afforestation, shelterbelts and pasture, especially in fragile Stage-II. The NCERT MCQ names this the most crucial factor. 6. Social sustainability: money and institutional support for poor land allottees. 7. Economic diversification: link basic villages, agro-service centres and market centres.

• Warabandi: canal water is shared by rotation. Each farmer under an outlet gets water for a fixed time on a fixed day, in proportion to the size of their land. This is fair and cuts waste.

• Beyond NCERT: there are similar problems in Punjab-Haryana, Tungabhadra and Chambal. Remedies include sub-surface drainage, drip and sprinkler irrigation, and crop planning (verify specifics).

9. Outcome-based regional programmes: Aspirational Districts, Aspirational Blocks and Vibrant Villages

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• Aspirational Districts Programme (NITI Aayog, January 2018; beyond NCERT) aims to improve 112 of the most backward districts fast. It works through the 3 Cs:
• Convergence: bringing central and state schemes together
• Collaboration: officials, citizens and civil society working jointly

• Competition: live ranking on the Champions of Change dashboard

• It tracks 49 indicators in five themes: health and nutrition; education; agriculture and water resources; financial inclusion and skill development; basic infrastructure.

• Many of these districts lie in the tribal central belt, the eastern states and Left Wing Extremism-affected areas. UNDP and others rated it a success but raised doubts about data quality (verify current).
• Aspirational Blocks Programme (January 2023): 500 blocks in 329 districts, about 40 indicators covering health, nutrition, education, agriculture and basic infrastructure. It takes the target-area idea down to the block level. This echoes Bharmaur, where Tundah and Kugti lag inside a single project area.
• Vibrant Villages Programme (2023): a centrally sponsored scheme for villages on the northern border in Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Ladakh. It builds livelihoods, roads, housing, tourism and culture so that people do not leave strategic border villages. Phase II (2025) covers villages on other land borders (verify current). See also border roads and the Arunachal Frontier Highway (india-transport-communication).

10. Sustainability planning for fragile regions: Western Ghats, coasts and Himalayan towns

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• These cases apply the NCERT project idea ("make a sustainable development plan for your own area") to India's most fragile regions. All of this section is beyond NCERT.
• Western Ghats ecologically sensitive area:
• The Gadgil-led WGEEP (2011) proposed treating about 64% of the Ghats as ecologically sensitive, in three zones.
• The Kasturirangan-led HLWG (2013) cut this to about 37%, mainly natural landscape.
• Draft notifications have been issued again and again since 2014. Kerala and Karnataka have resisted them, and the final notification is still pending (verify current).

• The Wayanad landslides (2024) revived the debate.

• Coastal Regulation Zone: rules under the Environment (Protection) Act since 1991 control building within 500 m of the high tide line and along tidal rivers and creeks. They were revised in 2011 and 2019. The 2019 rules eased curbs: the no-development zone fell to 50 m in densely populated rural areas, and beach tourism was allowed. The trade-off is livelihoods, tourism and ports (Sagarmala) against protection from erosion, storm surge and sea-level rise (verify current).

• Himalayan carrying capacity: the most population, tourism and building a hill town can bear. After the Joshimath land subsidence (sinking of the ground) in January 2023, the Supreme Court (2024) sought carrying-capacity studies of Himalayan towns. Related issues include Char Dham road widening, hydropower tunnels and unregulated hotels. These cases extend HADP's rule that hill plans must fit topography and ecology.

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Exam angles

Prelims — high-yield facts and traps

• Programme and plan pairs:
• DPAP: Fourth Plan
• HADP and tribal sub-plan: Fifth Plan (1974)
• CADP: 1974-75
• DDP: 1977-78

• Special area programmes: Eighth Plan

• SFDA and MFAL/MFDA are target group programmes, not target area ones. A statement calling them area programmes is FALSE.

• HADP's 15 districts: Uttar Pradesh hills (now Uttarakhand), Mikir and North Cachar Hills (Assam), Darjeeling, Nilgiris. The 1981 Committee used a 600 m criterion.
• DPAP: 67 districts (Planning Commission, 1967); 30% irrigated-area criterion (Irrigation Commission, 1972). Punjab, Haryana and north Rajasthan are protected by irrigation.
• Bharmaur: Chamba district; Gaddis; notified 21 November 1975; Ravi, Budhil and Tundahen; Pir Panjal (north) and Dhaula Dhar (south); female literacy 1.88% (1971) to 65% (2011). It was one of five ITDPs in Himachal Pradesh.
• Indira Gandhi Canal: Harike barrage; Kanwar Sain (1948); launched 31 March 1958; CCA 19.63 lakh ha (Stage-I 5.53 + Stage-II 14.10). Lift canals are on the left bank. "Lift canals on the right bank" is FALSE.
• Stage-II districts: Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Barmer, Jodhpur, Nagaur, Churu. Ganganagar and Hanumangarh are Stage-I.
• Books and dates: Our Common Future (1987, Brundtland); The Population Bomb (1968, Ehrlich); The Limits to Growth (1972, Meadows).
• NITI Aayog (1 January 2015) does not allocate plan funds.
• Aspirational Districts: 2018, 112 districts, 49 indicators, 5 themes. Aspirational Blocks: 2023, 500 blocks.
• Vibrant Villages phase I states: Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Ladakh. It does not cover Jammu and Kashmir.
• Western Ghats: Gadgil 64% vs Kasturirangan 37%. CRZ: 500 m from the high tide line.

Mains — GS-I and GS-III themes

1. Distinguish sectoral and regional planning. Why did India adopt target area planning, and how far has it reduced regional imbalance?
2. Write a note on the Drought Prone Area Programme and its role in dryland farming (the NCERT question). Discuss the watershed approach as its successor.
3. Bharmaur ITDP: its gains, and the unevenness of tribal development within the region. What lessons does it hold for PM JANMAN?
4. Suggest measures for sustainable development in the Indira Gandhi Canal command area. Discuss waterlogging and salinity in canal commands.
5. Aspirational Districts as a new model of regional planning: convergence, competition and data.
6. Development vs ecology in fragile regions: the Western Ghats ESA, CRZ relaxations and Himalayan carrying capacity.

Current-affairs hooks

• NITI Aayog delta rankings of aspirational districts and blocks; new SDG India Index releases (verify current).
• Roll-out of Vibrant Villages phase II and border-village development.
• Progress of PM JANMAN in PVTG habitations.
• The Western Ghats ESA final notification; Wayanad-type landslides and state objections.
• CRZ clearances for ports; Himalayan town subsidence and carrying-capacity studies.
• Indira Gandhi Canal water shares and lining work; progress of the Ken-Betwa link in Bundelkhand.