Maharashtra to establish institute on lines of CPR

After appointing an Officer of Special Duty (OSD) in the chief minister’s office (CMO), who, many a time, supersedes the decisions of bureaucrats and decides policies, the Maharashtra government will now establish a “think tank” that will be named as Institute of Policy Research (IPR) and will work on the lines of Centre for Policy Research, (CPR) reviewing existing schemes and policies.

Speaking with select media on condition of anonymity, a senior state government official said that the IPR would study schemes, policies and services and find out whether they need any amendments or improvements in implementation so that taxpayers’ money is utilised properly.

The government is in the process of finalising the draft proposal expected to be tabled before the state cabinet for final approval. After its notification in the Government Resolution, the government expects to implement it from January 2017.

Initially, the government will take up some policies on a pilot basis and later, cover the rest of the schemes, policies and services.

The state administrative training institute, YASHADA, in Pune, will anchor the research. The state government may appoint a few administrative officers and hire private experts on policy for the purpose. The official added that the state government would take assistance from the reputed Harvard Business School in this exercise.

The official pointed out that at present, there was no system or method to evaluate existing schemes or policies. The IPR system would definitely help to improve the policy of implementing process. The study would be helpful in seeing whether the policy, scheme or service is being properly implemented or not, or the policy itself has a loophole, or whether the policy, scheme or service should be continued at all.