No problem between me and Kamal Nath: Montek
New Delhi: Dr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, the Deputy Chairperson of the Planning Commission, has said that Road Transport Minister Kamal Nath’s recent criticism of the Commission was not an “attack” but an example of “creative tensions” in the government.
Nath, last week, called the Planning Commission an “armchair advisor” which was ignorant of ground realities. He said at a lecture that the new terminal at Delhi’s International airport was possible because the “Planning Commission and their people had nothing to do with it.”
Ahluwalia was at the lecture attended too and he says he encouraged Nath too express his “problems” he had with the Commission. “I don’t think I will call it a sharp attack. I was on the dais at the time, and Kamal had asked me look, I have some problems with the way Planning Commission handles things and I said well, go ahead and express them,” Ahluwalia told Karan Thapar on CNN-IBN’s Devil’s Advocate show.
“Government is about creative tensions. We criticize many things the ministries do. I don’t think there is anything wrong with ministries criticizing us.”
Ahluwalia was asked about Nath’s allegation that Planning Commission advisors were good at writing books but didn’t know about building roads.
Ahluwalia admitted that “building roads is certainly different from writing guidelines” but said the Planning Commission’s advice to ministries is necessary and helpful.
“Let us be clear: we are not an implementing body. Equally, it doesn’t mean that you don’t need advice. I mean accountants are not people who build roads but you can’t build roads without having decent accounts.
“There is a functional role that the different parts of the government play. When you are dealing with the approval process, when you are dealing with due diligence, when you are dealing with how bidding is competitive none of this requires you to be knowledgeable about the implementation process,” said Ahluwalia.
“My view is that you cannot run a government only with people who know how to build roads. You have to give them a set of rules, they have got to react to those rules but you have to be flexible.”
Ahluwalia insisted there was “absolutely no problem” between him and Kamal Nath.
“I genuinely believe that we ought to be able to discuss things and people should know that there are different points of view,” he said.
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