NITI Aayog meet: Modi focused on governing model, cooperative federalism, says Jaitley

New Delhi: The first meeting of National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog was held earlier on Sunday.

It was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the focus was on empowering the states. Three sub-groups of Chief Minister's will be set up on rationalisation of central schemes, skill development and clean India.

Modi called on the states to develop and maintain the strength of a team India model of cooperative federalism. The NITI Ayog was formed by the Modi government as a revamped version of the Planning Commission.

The PM has asked each state to set up two task forces, one on poverty alleviation and another on agriculture sector.

The PM in the meeting sought suggestions for better coordination between Centre and states. This is expected to lay the foundation for a new mechanism for the allocation of the funds from the Centre to the states.

"General consensus was that states need to be empowered. States should push economic development and growth," said Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. In a nutshell, Jaitey said that it was an extremely useful meeting.