Jaipur, August 19: The Centre, which is facing mutiny in the ranks over the issue of revenue allocation, has an unusual ally: Congressman and Rajashtan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot.Gehlot today wished that the BJP's partners would consider ``the propriety of openly questioning and decrying the recommendations of a constitutional body'' while articulating their views. In a letter to Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, he stated that ``some people are asserting that poor states may not be compensated. This would imply that these states would continue, ad infinitum, to remain poor due to a vicious circle of economic backwardness and would not be able to achieve even average levels of development.'' Gehlot pointed out that every finance commission reviewed not only the financial status of the states, but also their geo-physical conditions, developmental history as well as prospects of development while assigning different weights for working out the inter-state share of resources. ``Indeed the idea behind the establishment of the Finance Commission under Article 280 of the Constitution is to augment the resources of states so as to enable them to have a balanced governance anddevelopment.''The Rajasthan Chief Minister said that certain states had been backward since Independence, and needed the Centre's helping hand. States like Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh were termed as BIMARU because of their poor infrastructure, less than average per capita income and low social development indicators. The 11th Finance Commission had recommended an increased percentage for them as compared to the 10th. Gehlot felt that this ``should not be grudged by the relatively more developed or high income states.''Gehlot claimed that Rajasthan had been a ``pioneer'' in fiscal reforms, having been the first state to have entered in to a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Centre in April 1999. Rajasthan had also widened its tax net by introducing new taxes like the entry tax on several commodities, turn-over tax and profession tax, apart from increasing irrigation rates by 100 per cent and electricity duty by 125 per cent.Gehlot concluded by observing that ``we are thankful that the 11th Finance Commission has considered the infrastructural backwardness of states with slightly greater weight, and has also kept in view the fiscal discipline being introduced by some states. These parameters, once recognised, would underscore the need to further improve them which will go a long way in correcting regional imbalance and checking the fiscal profligacy.''
