A planning region is a segment of territory (space) over which economic decisions apply. The term ‘planning’ in the present context means taking decisions to implement them in order to attain economic development. Planning regions may be administrative or political regions such as state, district or the block because such regions are better in management and collecting statistical data. Hence, the entire country is a planning region for national plans, state is the planning region for state plans and districts or blocks are the planning regions for micro-regional plans.
For proper implementation and realization of plan objectives, a planning region should have fairly homogeneous economic, to zoographical and socio-cultural structure. It should be large enough to contain a range of resources provide it economic viability. It should also internally cohesive and geographically a contagion area unit. Its resource endowment should be that a satisfactory level of product combination consumption and exchange is feasible. It should have some nodal points to regulate the flows.
Delineation of Planning Regions
Following are some of the attempts made the scholars to divide India into planning regions,
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1. V. Nath (1965)
V. Nath prepared a scheme of Resource Development Regions and Division of India based at the homogeneity in physical factors, and agricultural land use and cropping pattern. Although the regions cut across the state boundaries, the division is kept within the state limit.
Thus the entire country has been divided into 15 main and 48 sub regions. These major resource development regions include (1) Western Himalaya, (2) Eastern Himalaya, (3) Lower Ganga Plain, (4) Middle Ganga Plain, (5) L Upper Ganga Plain, (6) Trans-Ganga Plain, (7) Eastern Plateaus and Hills, (8) Central Plateaus and; I Hills, (9) Western Plateaus and Hills, (10) Southern Plateaus and Hills, (11) Eastern Coastal Plains and Hills, (12) Western Coastal Plains and Ghats, (13) Gujarat Plains and Hills, (14) Western Arid Region, and (15) Island Region.
2. L.S. Bhat and V.L.S. Prakasa Rao (1964)
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Bhat and Rao proposed a regional framework for resource development. Delineation was done with the help of qualitative maps of distribution of important natural resources. The major regions cut across the state boundaries. However, administrative convenience was not ignored. The scheme included 7 major and 51 minor regions. Seven major regions include: (1) South India, (2) Western India, (3) Eastern Central India, (4) North-Eastern India, (5) Middle Ganga Plain, (6) North-Western India, and (7) Northern India.
3. NATMO
Under the directorship of Professor S.P. Chatterji (1966), the National Atlas Organisation
proposed a 4-tier scheme of economic regions. In this scheme macro regions constitute a group of states delineated with reference to the factors like population, politico-historical considerations, economic ties, agricultural output, and complementary character of natural resources.
4. P. Sen gupta
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Following the Soviet concept of economic regions and production specialisation, P. Sen Gupta (1968) presented a framework of economic regions of different order. She started with the discovery of planning units of the lowest order and then grouped and regrouped them to achieve planning regions at meson and macro levels. In her scheme of economic regions, Sen Gupta gave much importance to natural regions and used modality, production specialization and utilization of power resources as bases of delineation. Her 7 macro regions include: (1) North Eastern Region, (2) Eastern Region, (3) Northern Central Region, (4) Central Region, (5) North-Western Region, (6) Western Region, and (7) Southern Region. These are further divided into 42 meson regions.
5. Town and Country Planning Organisation
In 1968, the Town and Country Planning Organisation suggested a scheme of planning regions delineated on the principle of economic viability, self-sufficiency and ecological balance at the macro and meson levels. The emphasis of the scheme was to introduce regional factor in economic development.
This approach would complement the macro planning at the national level, with a component of regional policies, aimed at reducing regional disparities in the development. The macro- regionalization sought to link a set of areas, rich in one type of resources with areas having complementary resources or even resource poor areas, so that the benefits of economic activity in the former may flow into the latter.
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These planning regions cut across the State boundaries, but do not completely ignore the basic administrative units. The 13 macro- regions proposed under the scheme include: (1)
South Peninsular (Kerala and Tamil Nadu), (2)Central Peninsular (Karnataka, Goa, Andhra Pradesh (3) Western Peninsular (western Maharashtra coastal and interior districts), (4) Central Decca (eastern Maharashtra, central and southern Madhya Pradesh), (5) Eastern Peninsular (Orissa, Jharkhand north-eastern Andhra Pradesh and Chatting (6) Gujarat (Gujarat), (7) Western Rajasthan, ( Aravalli Region (Eastern Rajasthan and wasted Madhya Pradesh), (9) Jammu, Kashmir and Lad (10) Trans Indo-Genetic Plains and Hills (Pune Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, West Uttar Pradesh and Uttaranchal), (11) Ganga-Yamuna Plains (central and eastern Uttar Pradesh, and northern Madhya Pradesh), (12) Lower Ganga Plains (Bihar and West Bengal Plains), and (13) North-Eastern Region (A Sam and north-eastern states including Sikkim and north Bengal).
These macro regions are further divided into 35 meson regions and 3 metropolitan are recently (1983) L.S. Bhat has suggested different approach forregionalisation. His identify typologies of development under-development presented by human settlements, their spatial arrangement and functional organisation under the impact of physical environment and resource structure. This can be a basis for characterisation of different regions on the basis of which development strategies appropriate to different regions can be formulated (Gupta, 1996, pp. 228-229).