Social media should be used to formulate inclusive plans for the country, said planning commission member, Arun Maira. Championing for the cause of inclusiveness and transparency, he said, they have floated an idea of single holding structures (SHS) for public sector units with the government, which will help PSUs being effectively managed.

Maira, said, “Social networking sites would help them in this inclusive approach. Stating the challenges in consulting over 1.2 billion people, he said the people could put their views forward in social networking sites and later the civil society organisations could communicate the same to the policy makers. “There are over 4 million CSO’s and they could be sent in to digest this information”, Maira stated.

Speaking on the sidelines of the Sixth Knowledge Summit in Bangalore, Maira, said, “social network is a force that cant be stopped” as they keep re-inventing and coming back. Elaborating about the conflict between government and social media, he said, “I think we have to be charitable towards our government. “Some body using the social media were to cause some havoc. Government is having very tough time in managing some tension and allowing the openness and the openness doesn’t create destabilisation in society”.

Maira said, “Social media is a fact. Technology is producing faster means to communication and providing information. Because it is so new, it is enabling things which never happened before. And this newness is what can worry established system. Any thing new can be a threat to established system”. Speaking about ‘approach’ for 12th Five-year plan, he said that that they would have to take more action to ensure inclusive growth in order to grow at 9% or more. “Inclusion should happen during growth and not after growth”, he stated.

sameerrbakshi@mydigitalfc.com