MoU Aimed At Improving Socio-Eco Outcomes Signed

Hyderabad, Oct.16 (Maxim News): The State Finance and Planning Departments, signed a tripartite Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS), on Wednesday in the presence of Minister of Finance T Harish Rao , Vice-Chairman of State Planning Board, B Vinod Kumar , Advisor (Finance) G R Reddy . This MoU was signed by K Ramakrishna Rao , Principal Finance Secretary and Principal Secretary (FAC), Planning Department and Prof. Karthik Muralidharan, Founder and Scientific Director of CEGIS.

The partnership is aimed at improving socio-economic outcomes and the quality of public expenditure in Telangana by adopting a four-pronged approach: Regular and independent data collection on key outcomes and processes across multiple sectors; Using this data to improve performance and personnel management; Strategic budgeting and planning to improve the quality of public expenditure; and Creating evidence based policy-roadmaps for reform in key sectors and tracking the impact of these reforms on outcomes.

The intellectual leadership to CEGIS is provided by Prof. Karthik Muralidharan, Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego and Honorary Adviser to NITI Aayog. He is also a Board Member and Global Chair of Education of J-PAL’s education sector – the organization co-founded by two of the winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics – Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo. Prof. Muralidharan has 15+ years of research experience on public service delivery in Telangana/Andhra Pradesh.

Taken together, these initiatives will foster a focus on outcomes and data based goal setting, and decision making across departments. These measures are an extension of the work done by the State Government in improving development outcomes, and is aimed at propelling the state towards the target of achieving a Bangaru Telangana, improving the lives of the people, and becoming a national leader in social and economic development.(Maxim News)