A four-member delegation of the 16th Finance Commission (FC), led by chairman Arvind Panagariya and comprising eight officials, arrived here on Monday for a three-day official visit to the state. The other members of the FC include Ajay Narayan Jha, Annie George Mathew, and Dr. Manoj Panda.
Official sources said a memorandum would be submitted to the visiting delegation seeking grants-in-aid amounting to over Rs.70,000 crore for various sectors including revenue deficit grant, education, health, urban and local bodies, state projects (department centric, road maintenance) etc.
The team is scheduled to hold a meeting with chief minister Neiphiu Rio, cabinet ministers, two advisers and senior state government officials at Hotel Vivor on Tuesday.
Later, an official programme will be held where State Finance Commissioner will make power point presentation, followed by general discussion (question and answer) and closing remarks by the 16th FC chairman. Rio and Panagariya will also address the meeting.
The FC delegation would also address the media, which would be followed by meeting with representatives of trade, industries and commerce, rural local bodies, urban local bodies and political parties in the evening.
On November 6, the team would visit Kepamodzu, after which it would meet women entrepreneurs and review their work on empowerment-oriented experiential tourism.
The team would take an aerial view of Khonoma traditional village and landslides area of national highway by chopper, before leaving the state the following day. On Monday, the team was received by deputy CM, Y. Patton and other officials at Dimapur airport.