Prasant Kumar

Background

About Prasant Kumar

Over 35 years dedicated to the Rural Development and Natural Resource Management - two very important sectors for any country - both at the policy making and implementation levels. As Special Secretary, Additional Secretary and Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India, led successfully the rural housing scheme - Pradhan Mantri Awaas Yojana - Gramin (PMAY-G)- for five years, since its inception in 2016. PMAY-G aims at 'Housing for All by 2024' with a target of construction 29.5 million rural houses - a humungous target. Achievements include reduction in average number of days taken for completion of a house from 314 days in 2015 to 114 days in 2017, quadrupling of annual completion of house completion in a span of 5 years, evidence based monitoring by capturing geo-tagged and time & date stamped photos of 5 stages of house construction, direct fund transfer from the provincial headquarter to the beneficiary's account, use of performance index dashboard to monitor performance of geographies and on each of the 10 parameters to instill a sense of healthy competition. A result-oriented person, the experiences gained, skill sets acquired in the areas of Planning, Business Process Re-engineering, Capacity Building, Leadership Development, Programme Management including coordination skills, Performance Improvement and Quality Assurance, while working in the Ministry of Rural Development, would be extremely useful, both nationally and internationally. Additionally, worked as Part Time Official Director of National Housing Bank, NEPA Limited, MP Minor Forest Produce Development Federation and MP Forest Development Corporation. Passion for the environment, forests and wildlife and their habitat, natural resource management and a keen interest to pursue that passion got reflected during the service period of more than 16 years at the Provincial level. Not only dealt with the implementation but also with the policies and policy instruments. Planned and executed long and short-term initiatives towards the desired future conditions of the forests, with increased diversity, improved forest health and productivity. The climate change mitigation, addressing livelihood issues of the forest dependent communities were some other aspects. All these required planning skills which took care of minutest details and then its effective implementation leading to desired results, leadership skills, team-building capabilities, decision-making and monitoring skills. and effective communication skills.