The government has created a new economic advisory council. Four new members have been added and three earlier members dropped.

The new members are the Bharatiya Janata Party’s economic cell chief Jagdish Shettigar, National Council for Applied Economic Research director Rakesh Mohan, and senior economists Ashok Gulati and M. Narasimham. The three members who have been dropped are economists Arjun Sengupta and Ashok Desai, and Disinvestment Commission chairman G.V. Ramakrishna.

The council is expected to meet once a quarter and advise prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee on all matters concerning the economy.

The reconstituted council, which will be headed by Mr Vajpayee, comprises:

• I.G. Patel, former Reserve Bank of India governor
• P.N. Dhar, former principal secretary
• Kirit Parikh, head of the Indira Gandhi Institute for Research and Development
• Amaresh Bagchi, member of the 11^th Finance Commission
• Ashok Gulati of the Institute of Economic Growth
• Rakesh Mohan, director, NCAER
• Montek Singh Ahluwalia, member, Planning Commission
• M. Narasimham, former chairman of panel on financial sector reforms
• Jagdish Shettigar, economist
• Brajesh Mishra, principal secretary to the prime minister
• N.K. Singh, secretary to the prime minister (member-secretary)

Along with the reconstitution of the economic advisory council, the task force on infrastructure, set up to operationalise the execution of national highway development projects, upgradation of five airports and prepare an integrated transport policy has also been reconstituted. The task force now comprises:

• K.C. Pant, planning commission deputy chairman
• Nitish Kumar, surface transport minister
• Sharad Yadav, civil aviation minister
• Shankar N. Acharya, chief economic advisor
• Deepak Parekh, HDFC chairman
• Anand Mahindra, industrialist
• Secretaries of ministries of surface transport, civil aviation and expenditure
• N.K. Singh, secretary to the prime minister (member-secretary)

Besides these members, Tata group chairman Ratan Tata will be a permanent invitee to the meetings of the task force.