Chidambaram 'mourns' NSC's death, blames government's 'malicious negligence'
With two members of the National Statistical Commission resigning, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram today said that one more venerable institution has died due to the government's "malicious negligence". The former finance minister's attack on the government came in the wake of two independent members of the National Statistical Commission (NSC) -- P C Mohanan and J V Meenakshi -- resigning on Monday.
'We mourn the death of National Statistical Commission'
The NSC officials resigned over disagreement with the government on certain issues. Mohanan was also the acting chairperson. "One more venerable institution died on 29 January 2019 owing to malicious negligence by the government," Chidambaram tweeted, adding, "We mourn the death of National Statistical Commission."
NSC now has only two members, including NITI Aayog CEO
In a series of tweets, Chidambaram said, "....and remember with gratitude its valiant fight to release untainted GDP data and employment data. May the NSC rest in peace until it is re-born again!" With the two members quitting, NSC now has only two members, Chief Statistician Pravin Srivastava and NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant. Last November, the NITI Aayog had come under fire.
Last November, NITI-Aayog had announced UPA's GDP data, drew ire
NITI Aayog came under fire for announcing the revised GDP data of the UPA years. NITI Aayog Vice-Chairman Rajiv Kumar and Chief Statistician Srivastava had announced the back-series data by the government. "There's nothing political about the new GDP series data," Kumar had said then.
