MPPSC 2023 Prelims Paper-I · Question 22 of 100

Correct — C, 1 January 2015. The Union Cabinet passed a resolution on 1 January 2015 replacing the Planning Commission with NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India), envisioned as a policy think-tank that fosters cooperative and competitive federalism in place of the Planning Commission's top-down, five-year-plan model.

• (a)31 March 2014 — No institutional replacement happened on this date; the Planning Commission continued functioning through 2014.
• (b)15 March 1950 — This is the date the Planning Commission itself was set up by a Cabinet resolution — the body being replaced, not the date of replacement.
• (d)11 January 2016 — No major reconstitution of NITI Aayog took place on this date; the institution was already about a year old by then.

NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India) is a Cabinet-resolution policy think-tank — not a constitutional or statutory body — that replaced the similarly non-constitutional Planning Commission (established 15 March 1950) on 1 January 2015. It shifted India's planning approach from a centralised, target-driven Five-Year-Plan model to a bottom-up, cooperative-federalism advisory model.

MPPSC and UPSC both like pairing 'old body → new body, replacement date.' Lock the chain: Planning Commission (1950) replaced by NITI Aayog (1 January 2015). A key functional difference tested alongside the date: unlike the Planning Commission, NITI Aayog has no power to allocate Plan funds to ministries or states — that role has shifted mainly to the Finance Commission and the Ministry of Finance.

• NITI Aayog constituted by a Union Cabinet Resolution on 1 January 2015.
• Full form: National Institution for Transforming India.
• It replaced the Planning Commission, which had been established on 15 March 1950.
• The Prime Minister is the ex-officio Chairperson of NITI Aayog's Governing Council.
• Unlike the Planning Commission, NITI Aayog has no authority to allocate Plan funds to ministries or states.

• Treating NITI Aayog as a constitutional or statutory body — it is neither, just like the Planning Commission it replaced
• Confusing the Planning Commission's founding date (1950) with NITI Aayog's founding date (2015)

Almost always a direct date-recall MCQ ('when was X replaced by Y') or a functions-comparison between NITI Aayog and the Planning Commission.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  NITI Aayog is best described as:

  • (a)A constitutional body
  • (b)A statutory body
  • (c)A non-statutory, Cabinet-resolution policy think-tank
  • (d)An autonomous body under the Finance Ministry

  Answer(c) A non-statutory, Cabinet-resolution policy think-tank — like the Planning Commission it replaced.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Who is the ex-officio Chairperson of NITI Aayog's Governing Council?

  • (a)Finance Minister
  • (b)Cabinet Secretary
  • (c)Prime Minister
  • (d)NITI Aayog CEO

  Answer(c) The Prime Minister.