People's Planning in Kerala - Modality of The Campaign

Modality of The Campaign

A high power guidance council was created with E.M.S. Namboodiripad as the Chairman, the incumbent and former chief ministers and the leaders of the opposition as Vice-chairmen, and a few persons of eminence as members with a view to have political consensus. The Kerala State Planning Board, hitherto an expert advisory body, suddenly acquired a political profile as the key manager of the Campaign. The board was reconstituted with party-political nominations that included two state-level party functionaries of the CPM. It was designated as the coordinating agency for all the programmes under ‘People’s Planning’. The board chalked out a five-phase program of activities, and went ahead with a high-speed mode of functioning unheard of in government organisations. A special decentralization cell was created to cope with the challenges of this new task. Many of the personnel in this cell were drawn from voluntary organisations with a track record of selfless work.