Planning Department of Maharashtra Government, on Thursday, appointed 20 persons as nominated members and special invitees to District Planning Committee (DPC) of Nagpur. The list of names is dominated heavily by the elected members and workers of Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), and Shiv Sena -- constituents of Mahavikas Aghadi (MVA) that is ruling alliance in Maharashtra. The two positions of nominated members were to be filled from Member of Parliament or legislators in the district. Krupal Tumane, Member of Parliament from Ramtek, who belongs to Shiv Sena; and Raju Parwe, Umred MLA of Congress, have been nominated to these two positions. In the category of persons ‘having knowledge of district planning’, four members have been nominated to DPC. These include Praful Gudadhe, Congress corporator; Chandrashekhar Chikhale, former Vice-President of Zilla Parishad (ZP) belonging to NCP; Rajendra Harne, District President of Shiv Sena; and Sheshrao Rahate.

 

The list of 14 special invitees to DPC is also dominated mainly by Congress and NCP workers. Harshwardhan Nikose, former Chairman of Social Welfare Committee of ZP; Kunda Raut, ZP member; Prasanna Tidke, Prakash Wasu, are among the prominent Congress workers nominated to DPC as special invitees. As far as NCP is concerned, Duneshwar Pethe, its Nagpur city chief; and Vedprakash Arya, former corporator, are the prominent names. The other special invitees include Dilip Mathankar, Haribhau Kirpane, Suresh Patil, Subhash Khode, Rajesh Jaiswal, Kishor Chaudhary, Brijbhushan Tiwari, and Shrikant Kaikade. DPC is headed by Guardian Minister of district. It is entrusted with the task of taking up planning of various developmental activities, and allocate funds. There is district annual plan comprising general sector, tribal sub-plan, and other tribal sub-plan etc. It is supposed to be a powerful body that plays a vital role in setting development priorities for the district.