The plethora of ‘Pradhan Mantri’ schemes
In her Budget Speech, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced a proposal for improving the socio-economic condition of tribal communities. She said that the government will launch the ‘Pradhan Mantri Janjatiya Unnat Gram Abhiyan’, which will cover 63,000 villages benefitting 5 crore tribal people. The new government scheme is welcome though it is a new addition to the already very high number of Prime Minister (PM) schemes.
Already there are too many Union government schemes competing with each other. For instance, there is a Rashtriya Kisan Vikas Yojana which could be shaped as a comprehensive scheme for overall agricultural development. Yet there have been four new PM schemes for agriculture: Pradhan Mantri Annadata Aay Sanrakshan Yojna (PM-AASHA), Pradhan Mantri Kisan Man Dhan Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan), and PM Fasal Bima Yojana.
The government provides public goods and services under two types of schemes: central sector schemes, and centrally sponsored schemes.
The central sector schemes assist in sectors that fall in the Union List of the Constitution, such as banking, railways, and defence, among others. In 2024-25, there are 676 central sector schemes compared to 722 in 2023-24.
The centrally sponsored schemes assist under the concurrent list of the Constitution. The Constitution specified separate sectors for the states (health, agriculture, law and order, etc.) and prepared another list of sectors which applied to both the Centre and the states. In 2024-25, there are 75 centrally sponsored schemes compared to 59 schemes in 2023-24.
Within these two scheme categories, there is a dramatic rise in the number of PM schemes. The FY 2024-2025 Budget documents show that currently there are 48 PM schemes classified across 20 ministries. The actual number of PM schemes is not clear given the multiplicity of names and inconsistent reporting in the various documents.
Of these 48 PM schemes (the new scheme announced in 2024-2025 Budget is not yet accounted for), 31 are central sector schemes and 17 are centrally sponsored schemes. The 48 PM schemes comprised 34.5 per cent of total government expenditure under the two schemes in 2022-2023 before declining to 30.2 per cent in 2023-2024 (Revised Estimates). In 2024-2025, this share is projected to increase dramatically to 52 per cent mainly on account of two schemes. In central sector schemes, it is the new Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana which was started in the 2024-2025 Interim Budget and has been budgeted at Rs 2.05 lakh-crore. In the centrally sponsored schemes, the allocation for Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban) has been increased from Rs 22,103 crore to Rs 3.01 lakh-crore.
In terms of total budget expenditure, the share of PM schemes has gone up from 5 per cent in 2022-2023 to 10 per cent.
Naming government schemes after the prime minister or a politician is not a new development. In the Congress era, the government named schemes posthumously after its prime ministers like the Jawahar Rozgar Yojana and the Indira Awaas Yojana, among others. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has honoured Atal Bihari Vajpayee by naming five schemes under his name.
Before 2014-2015, there were three PM schemes: the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana, and the Pradhan Mantri Adarsh Gram Yojana. If we exclude these three PM schemes, 40 schemes have been launched in the last 10 years.
How do we assess this rise of PM schemes? What is its significance?
First, it gives a signal to the voters that the prime minister is the one who is giving us these benefits. Earlier, one saw the government providing welfare to citizens as its fundamental duty. In the new system also termed as techno-patrimonialism model of governance we see citizens become labharthis (beneficiaries) who are receiving welfare directly from the prime minister. Over the past decade, the government has positioned itself around the personality of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This is reflected in the naming of the schemes as well.
Second, it also leads to confusion among the labharthis and Budget watchers. There are existing schemes which serve similar purposes or can be tweaked to add additional benefits. By adding more schemes which serve a similar purpose, it only adds to the plethora of existing schemes. There are some schemes which have been renamed as PM schemes: e.g., the Indira Awas Yojana has been renamed as the PM Awas Yojana. There have been lots of discussions on streamlining and lowering the number of schemes but all we are seeing is the addition of more schemes and a new category of PM schemes is being created. In the current Budget, one new scheme was introduced Pradhan Mantri Janjatiya Unnat Gram Abhiyan (its allocation is not in the Budget documents) and in the Interim Budget two new schemes were introduced: the PM Surya Ghar Muft Bijli Yojana and the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana.
Third, one way to look at this strategy of naming welfare schemes as PM schemes is that they will continue even with the change of the government. But then that is true for general government schemes too. It is not that a new government will come and scrap the existing schemes. Despite political adversity, we have seen subsequent governments continue with the welfare schemes.
To sum up, in the last 10 years, the government has created a new label of welfare schemes: PM schemes. The government has used every opportunity to create and enhance the brand of the prime minister. Should the Budget be used for glorifying personalities over the larger purpose of providing welfare to citizens? Are these PM schemes helping the government achieve objectives more transparently and efficiently? Or is it merely a political exercise? Based on the evidence, the government seems to be more focused and paying more attention to PM schemes.
Amol Agrawal is an economist teaching at Ahmedabad University.
(Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH).