PM awards to bureaucrats in 2020 to be based on a district's economic development

NEW DELHI: The economic development of a district and its contribution to the national goals of economic development will be the new criteria for awards to be given away by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to bureaucrats for excellence in public administration this year, after the scheme has been restructured under the aegis of the Prime Minister’s Office.
The awards will be given away by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sardar Patel’s birth anniversary on October 31, 2020, at the Statue of Unity in Kevadia, Gujarat. The annual awards were started in 2006 and were last restructured in 2014 by the Modi government for recognizing the performance of District Collectors in Priority Programs, Innovations and Aspirational Districts. “The Scheme has been restructured again in 2020, to recognize the performance of District Collectors towards economic development of the District,” the Central government has told states in a letter this week.

The awards will now recognize the contribution of civil servants in strengthening of inclusive development through credit flow to the priority sector, promoting people’s movements (Jan Bhagidari) through Swachh Bharat Mission (Urban and Rural) and improving service delivery and redressal of public grievances, the letter says. “The scope of the awards has been expanded to identify areas of overall outcome-oriented performance in the districts across sectors,” the letter adds. The awards will also seek to recognize the efforts of the District level officials in Namami Gange Programme.

The PMs Award for the Aspirational Districts Programme has also been revamped to reward the District having the best overall progress following two years of implementation. “Aspirational Districts will be ranked and then awarded,” the letter says. Another category of the PMs Awards is the Innovations category which has traditionally received the highest number of nominations. “The scheme has been broad-based to recognize Innovations at National, State and District level for innovations in environment conservation, water conservation, energy, education, health, women and child-centric initiatives, sustainable farming, promoting livelihoods, boosting the economy and improving governance, the letter says.

The credit programme will be a major focus for the PMs Awards this time. “An Annual Credit Plan is prepared every year in each district which indicates a plan for purveying credit by the banks in the district for priority as well as non-priority sectors. In almost all the districts, priority sector credit plays an important role in the development of various sectors of the district’s economy. Thus, the performance of a district in selective categories under priority sector lending will be taken as the assessment criterion for awarding the districts,” the letter has specified.

Another criterion will be bureaucrats who have improved service delivery and redressed public grievances as the District Collector has a direct interface with the public and promotes ease of living at the district level in a number of ways. The PMs Award for innovation would consider an idea or project that brought perceptible improvement in processes and building institutions, made public delivery systems responsive and the preparedness or performance in emergent situations and disasters.

An Empowered Committee makes its recommendations to the Prime Minister for final selection of Awards.