Who among the following is regarded as the architect of Indian Five Year Plans ?

Question

Accepted Answer

The correct option is 2:
Prasanta Chandra (P. C.) Mahalanobis is rightly regarded as the architect of Indian Five Year Plans, particularly the Second Five Year Plan (1956–1961). This plan was heavily based on the "Mahalanobis Model," a statistical framework he developed that emphasized rapid industrialization by prioritizing the establishment of heavy industries and capital goods production. Mahalanobis, a renowned statistician and founder of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), believed that investing in core sectors like iron and steel, cement, and machine tools would create a strong foundation for long-term economic growth and self-reliance. His deep collaboration with Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru shaped India's early economic strategy towards a mixed economy with a strong public sector focus.

The incorrect option is 1:
Chintamani Deshmukh (C. D. Deshmukh) was a prominent economist and the first Indian Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, later serving as the Finance Minister of India. While he played a key role in post-independence economic governance and policy, his primary contributions were in finance and banking, not in designing the core structural model of the Five Year Plans.

The incorrect option is 3:
C. Subramaniam was a key political leader and administrator best known for his role in initiating the Green Revolution in India during the 1960s. His focus was on modernizing Indian agriculture and achieving food self-sufficiency, which occurred during later plans, not the foundational planning model established by Mahalanobis.

The incorrect option is 4:
Verghese Kurien is famously known as the "Father of the White Revolution" (Operation Flood), which transformed India into the world's largest milk producer. His contributions were revolutionary in the dairy sector and cooperative movement, but he was not involved in the macro-economic and industrial planning framework of the initial Five Year Plans.