FOREWORD
 

The Government of India Resolution setting up the Planning Commis- sion inter-alia states that the Planning Commission will "appraise from time to time the progress achieved in the execution of each stage of the Plan and recommend the adjustments of policy and measures that such appraisal may show to be necessary". Accordingly, the Planning Commission had been undertaking appraisals of the past Five Year Plans. Mid-Term Appraisals were undertaken during the course of the plan period assessing the progress in different sectors of the economy, pointing to further action and suggesting corrective measures.

The Planning Commission, in its internal meeting held on the 28th June, 1994 decided to undertake the Mid-Term Appraisal of the Eighth Plan 1992-97. Accordingly, the exercise for the appraisal of the Eighth Plan was undertaken and a draft document was prepared. The draft Mid-term Appraisal of the Eighth Five Year Plan 1992-97 was discussed in the internal meeting of the Planning Corn- mission on the 6th July, 1995. Based on the deliberations of the meeting, a draft was prepared which was to be discussed in the full Planning Commission meeting scheduled for the 19th September. 1995. However, that meeting of the Full Planning Commission did not take place.

The Planning Commission, subsequently, sought the views of the Central Ministries of Agriculture and Cooperation, Power, Commerce, Finance, Industry and Petroleum on the contents of the draft Mid-Term Appraisal of the Eighth Five Year Plan 1992-97 and the first two chapters of the document were revised based on the comments of these Central Ministries.

The Planning Commission, reconstituted in July, 1996 after the General Elections, reviewed the status of Mid-Term Appraisal. As the Eighth Five Year Plan itself was coming to an end after a few months, the reconstituted Commission decided that no useful purpose was likely to be served by attempting to revise the earlier drafts which contained data up to 1994-95. Instead, it was felt that a fresh re-appraisal of the Eighth Plan, using latest available data, should be undertaken as part of the preparatory work for the Ninth Plan which is due to begin on 1st April, 1997. It was also decided that earlier drafts of the appraisal document even though these could not be considered formally by the Full Planning Commission, should be made available to the public for information.

Accordingly, the following drafts are being published in this document:

(1) Original draft, July, 1995; (2) Revised chapters 1 and 2, November, 1995. Comments of the members of the public and experts are welcome. The Commis- Sion proposes to take these comments into account in the formulation of the Ninth Plan.

The reconstituted Planning Commission will give its appraisal of the perform- ance of the economy during the Eighth Plan in the Approach Paper to the Ninth Five Year Plan.

NEW DELHI (Dr. S. R. Hashim) September, 1996 Member Planning Commission