New Delhi: Stung by criticism about wasteful spending, the rural development ministry is proposing real-time evaluation of its entire expenditure, the largest by any department outside defence.

Rural development minister Jairam Ramesh. Photo: Ramesh Pathania/Mint

The new proposal by rural development minister Jairam Ramesh is for a Concurrent Evaluation Network (Cenet), under the overall control of the soon-to-be-set up Independent Evaluation Office (IEO).

“Concurrent evaluation is far more useful than post-mortems,” said Ramesh.

The body will be an independent society that will be established under the aegis of the rural development ministry and will aim to improve the “efficiency and quality of outcomes”, according to Ramesh.

At present, evaluation of spending is undertaken after the conclusion of the fiscal year; this is done by the respective ministries, the plan coordination division within the Planning Commission and the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, the statutory body that reports to Parliament.

A blueprint of the proposal for Cenet has already been approved by Ramesh. In a 22 January letter addressed to the Prime Minister, Ramesh said: “I have been struck by the fact that we really do not carry out concurrent evaluation of these schemes and programmes, which would be helpful to policymakers to intervene on a real-time basis. Such concurrent evaluations, you will yourself recall, were an integral part of rural development programmes in the late ’70s and ’80s, but for some reason were given up subsequently.”

The government is in the process of starting IEO. Economist Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is the front-runner for the post of its director general (DG). IEO will monitor state-run programmes and work closely with the Plan panel to improve their effectiveness. Cenet may be the first project of IEO, setting the stage for its formal launch.

Mint had reported on 20 January that IEO was in the process of being constituted.

“We’re waiting for a final word on the post of a DG, IEO,” said a Plan panel official, who did not want to be named.

The proposal to set up IEO was announced by President Pratibha Patil in 2009 at a joint session of both houses of Parliament after the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance came to power for a second consecutive term.

In November 2010, the cabinet approved the establishment of IEO to provide an “impartial and objective assessment of various public programmes and improve the effectiveness of public interventions”.

According to an official statement issued at the time, IEO is expected to function at an arm’s length distance from the government to assess outcomes and impact of the Centre’s flagship welfare programmes.

The Cenet proposal was conceived by Rohini Pande, a Harvard University economist. Cenet will be guided by an advisory council under the chairmanship of the rural development minister.

Functionally, Cenet will be jointly headed by a DG (a secretary-level rank) and a scientific director. Both are expected to be hired from outside the government, with the latter overseeing the analytical work of Cenet.

“The office will have the flexibility and budget to contract researchers from top academic institutions, who will work with local institutions and researchers to develop knowledge and capacity,” according to the proposal.

The idea of Cenet has been greeted cautiously by experts.

“It is a good proposal—the setting up of this kind of a body. Better late than never,” said N.C. Saxena, a member of the National Advisory Council, the body headed by Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi that sets the social agenda of the government. “However, what is important is that we need to see that this body, too, does not come out with reports, but actually acts, sorts out problems. Evaluation itself is not enough to plug leakages and shortcomings.”

elizabeth.r@livemint.com