Odisha Govt Constitutes 6th State Finance Commission Headed By Retd IAS Officer Arun Panda

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government on Wednesday announced the constitution of the much-awaited sixth State Finance Commission.

As per the notification issued by the government, the 6th Finance Commission is constituted with retired IAS officer Arun Kumar Panda as its Chairman.

Prof Asit Ranjan Mohanty of XIMB, Prof Amaresh Samantray of the Department of Economics, Pondichery University and Prof Bibhu Prasad Nayak of TISS will be its members, while Dr Satya Priya Rath, Additional Secretary, Finance Department will be the member secretary.

The Chairman and other members of the Commission including member secretary shall hold office for a period of six months, the notification said.

The Chairman and other members (except the member secretary) will render whole time or part time service to the Commission. The member secretary will render whole time service to the Commission in addition to his own duties.

The formation of the 6^th SFC comes over a year after the Centre constituted the 16^th Finance Commission. The Commission will be recommending the formula for grant and devolution of funds to the panchayati raj institutions (PRI) and urban local bodies (ULBs), sources said.

The commission, whose recommendations are valid for five years, is required to identify assignment of taxes to be levied by ULBs and PRIs and recommend what percentage of the state’s own taxes are to be shared with these institutions.

The panel also recommends the ways and means for devolution of resources from the state level to ULBs and PRIs for five years and suggest measures to empower these institutions.

It may be noted here that the first State Finance Commission was headed by Justice S K Mohanty. Similarly, Trilochan Kanungo was the chairman of the second Finance Commission. Noted economist Sudhakar Panda and retired IAS officer Chinmay Basu were the chairmen of the third and fourth Finance Commission, respectively.

In 2018, the Odisha government had formed the fifth State Finance Commission headed by retired IAS officer Rabinarayan Senapati as its chairman. It submitted its report on August 2, 2019, while the ATR was laid on February 17, 2020, sources said.

The recommendations of the fifth State Finance Commission are valid for five years commencing from April 1, 2020.