Bihar “Tired” of Demanding Special Category Status, will now Seek Special Assistance

NEW DELHI, Sept 27: The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar, in which the BJP is a major partner, on Monday said that it has decided to drop the demand for giving Bihar a “Special Category Status” as it was “tired” of the centre’s repeated refusal to it. Instead Bihar would now seek special assistance in every field. Brijendra Yadav, a senior minister of the Nitish Kumar cabinet, said the decision was taken because the government was ‘tired’ of demanding the special status. “There is a limit to it. Now we will seek special assistance in every field,” Yadav said. Bihar’s demand for special category status is a long-pending one and the ruling party Janata Dal (United) made it the primary election agenda throughout several elections.

The special category status is accorded to states which have hilly and difficult terrain, low population density, presence of a sizable tribal population, strategic location along international borders, economic and infrastructural backwardness and non-viable nature of state finances. This criteria was introduced by the government in 1969 acknowledging that several regions of the country were disadvantaged than the others.

The states of Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Nagaland, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Sikkim and Tripura were accorded special category status. Jammu and Kashmir, however, lost the special status and a special category status since Article 35A was scrapped in 2019.

Bihar MP from the JD(U) Rajiv Ranjan Singh had during the monsoon session, asked in the Lok Sabha if the Centre was considering giving special status to Bihar, but the government in its reply said the 14th Finance Commission gives states more fiscal space for implementation of projects.

The Centre in 2015 said the implementation of the 14th Finance Commission and forming of the Niti Aayog removed the concept of Special Category Status. It says that according to the 14th Finance Commission recommendations, the share of states in the divisible pool of central taxes has increased from 32% to 42%.

Bihar earlier this year cited a NITI Aayog’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) India Index Report 2020-21 which showed that Bihar’s composite score was lowest among all states to reignite the demand of giving special category status to the state. The report also showed that 33.74% of the population was living below the poverty line and 52.5% of the population was suffering from multidimensional poverty.

9Manas Dasgupta)