In a paper prepared for the Associated Chambers of Commerce & Industry of India (Assocham), he says unless these states raise their SDP from 1.5 per cent in the nineties to 4 per cent, interstate inequalities will widen and poverty will become even more regionally concentrated.

Punjab and Haryana were the two richest of the 14 states in 1990-91.

However, the growth rates of the SDP of these two states in the nineties were not only lower than that in the eighties but in both cases actually fell below the national average.

Further, Maharashtra and Gujarat, which were just below Punjab and Haryana in terms of per capita income levels and therefore in the richer group, accelerated very significantly in the nineties and grew at rates much higher than the national average, says Ahluwalia.

On the other hand, three of the poorest states, Bihar, UP and Orissa, which together account for over a third of the population of the country, did very badly in the nineties. They did not become poorer on average, as they also had positive growth rates of per capita GDP, but these rates were very low. In the case of Bihar and UP, they were less than a third of the national average.

All the poorer states, however, did not lag behind. Rajasthan, for instance, experienced much stronger growth in per capital SDP, more than double than that of the other poor states. In fact, the performance of Rajasthan in terms of SDP is acutally better than the average of the 14 states but it slips below the average in per capita SDP growth because of higher rates of population growth, says Ahluwalia.

According to him, the performance of six middle income states, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Prades and Karnataka, clusters around the average rate. All of them grew faster in terms of per capital GDP than they did in the eighties.

The plan panel member has emphasised the fact that the mere fact that states grow at different rates should not viewed as a failure of policy. Given the size and diversity of the country, it is unrealistic to expect that all state will grow at the same rate. For instance, the green revolution technology was peculiarly suited to conditions in Punjab and Haryana, and this led to high growth in these states in the seventies. On the other hand, coastal states have a location advantage in a globalising world.

Further, some states are better managed, he says.

Ahluwalia has cautioned that the objective of balanced regional development should be pursued by following policies which seek to achieve equality through a process of "levelling down" by preventing states from reaching their full growth potential. On the contrary, well-manage states must be encouraged to reach their full growth potential, if only to show what is possible in Indian conditions.

He said the anti-poverty programmes in poor states can only supplement higher growth. For, a sufficient broad-based expansion in income earning opportunities can only come from a substantially higher rate of growth, including faster growth in the farm sector.