Highlights of Initiatives under NITI Aayog

A 15-year Vision Document, and 7-year Strategy beyond 12th Five Year Plan: NITI Aayog has prepared the 15-year vision document which includes social goals set for the next 15 years; it also includes a strategy document for the next seven years till 2023-24 to convert the longer-term vision into implementable policy.

Agricultural Marketing and Farmer Friendly Reforms Index: It was the first-ever index of this kind with the objective to sensitise states about the need to undertake reforms in the three key areas of Agriculture which are Market Reforms, Land Lease Reforms and Forestry on Private Land (Felling and Transit of Trees).

Reforming Medical Education: Scrapping of the Medical Council of India and its replacement by a new body for regulating medical education is recommended.

Digital Payments Movement: In 2016, the NITI Aayog established a Committee of Chief Ministers on Digital Payments, with Chandrababu Naidu, the then-chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, as its convener, to promote transparency, financial inclusion, and a healthy financial ecosystem across the country. In 2017, the Committee submitted its preliminary report.

The NITI Aayog has taken the lead on Blockchain applications in e-governance, coining the term “IndiaChain” to describe the technology stack. NITI Aayog’s ambitious project to create a nationwide blockchain network is known as IndiaChain.

Atal Innovation Mission: The government has developed the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) within NITI Aayog with the goal of strengthening the country’s innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem by developing institutions and programmes that promote innovation in schools, colleges, and businesses in general. The following big schemes were implemented in 2016-17:

- Atal Tinkering Labs (ATLs): AIM is assisting 500 ATLs in schools across India to promote innovation and scientific temper in students, where students can design and construct small prototypes to address problems, they find around them, using rapid prototyping technologies that have emerged in recent years.
- Atal Incubation Centres (AICs): AIM will provide Rs. 10 crores in funding and capacity building for the establishment of AICs across India. This will help startups in expanding faster and enabling innovationentrepreneurship in core sectors such as manufacturing, transportation, electricity, education, agriculture, water and sanitation, and so on.

Indices for Measuring States’ Health, Education, and Water Management Performance: The NITI Aayog has developed some indices which will measure incremental annual outcomes in critical social sectors like education, sanitation, health, drinking water with a view to nudge the states into competing with each other for better outcomes.
Task Force on Elimination of Poverty in India: It was constituted on 16th March 2015 under the Chairmanship of Dr. Arvind Panagariya. The report of the Task Force primarily focuses on issues of measurement of poverty and strategies to combat poverty.
The National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) has drafted a Model Agricultural Land Leasing Act, 2016, so as to recognise the rights of tenants and also to protect the interests of landowners, in response to an increase in incidents of leasing in and out of land and suboptimal usage of land with fewer cultivators.
Transforming India Lecture Series: NITI Aayog, the government’s premier think tank, sees knowledge development and transition as a primary enabler of real change in states. On August 26, 2016, NITI Aayog launched the ‘NITI Lectures: Transforming India’ with the aim to create the knowledge systems for States and the Centre.

The Government of India’s flagship programme, Digital India, aims to transform Indian

society into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy.

With My Gov-Participation of citizens in governance and decision-making processes which is critical to the democracy’s efficient functioning can be ensured.

- MyGov is a one-of-a-kind citizen engagement and crowdsourcing platform designed to engage citizens in policy development and programme execution, as well as build citizen-government partnerships for India’s equitable progress.
- MyGov allows ministries and departments to tap into citizens’ knowledge and ability to improve policy texts as well as seek creativity such as logos and mascots.

Digital farming—Information and communication technology (ICT) has ushered in a new era in the agricultural sector. Kerala’s KISSAN is a citizen-centric e-governance project that provides integrated and multi-modal information to the state’s farming community.
CSCs (Common Services Centres) are the centres through which villagers can access e-governance as part of a village-level entrepreneur model to empower people. Agriculture services, Education and training services, Health services, Rural banking and insurance services, and so on are the main focuses of CSCs.

- NITI Aayog is a consultative body. It is a think tank, no power to impose policies on the state.
- It does not have the authority to allocate monies. There has been increased interaction with centre and states to ensure cooperative federalism, there is a platform for structured interaction with states.
- The Planning Commission has fewer members than the Planning Commission.

The Planning Commission had the authority to impose its policies and plans on states.
It had the authority to allocate funds to various programmes.
The state government was not represented on the planning panel. It lacked structural ways for interaction of centre and states.
The previous commission had eight fulltime members.
State Chief Ministers and Lieutenant Governors were represented on the National Development Council.