Odisha has established a Chief Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, comprising experts across sectors, to guide its ambitious plan of reaching a $1.5 trillion economy by 2047, drawing parallels with similar panels in other states and emphasising a focus on innovative sectors.
Odisha has set up a Chief Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, a new panel of economists, former bureaucrats and industry specialists meant to guide the state’s long-term push towards a $1.5 trillion economy by 2047. According to a Finance Department notification reviewed by Business Standard, the body will advise the chief minister on macroeconomic management, fiscal discipline and broader economic strategy as the state tries to turn its growth plans into a sustained development programme.
The council has been created along the lines of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, and comes after the state’s earlier move to establish the State Institute for Transformative Initiatives, or SITI-Odisha, as a higher-level institution for development strategy and governance reform. Odisha is now the fifth state to form a similar expert panel linked to a trillion-dollar or near-trillion-dollar economic ambition, joining states such as Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, according to the reports.
The 11-member panel includes former Odisha chief secretary Jugal Kishore Mohapatra, former Paradip Port Authority chairman Santosh Kumar Mohapatra, former Union agriculture secretary Shobhana Kumar Pattanayak, former International Monetary Fund economist Arbind Modi, ICRIER economist Deepak Mishra, University of Hyderabad economist Srijit Mishra and Sarvam AI co-founder and chief executive Pratyush Kumar. The chief secretary and the development commissioner-cum-additional chief secretary will serve as ex-officio members, while the Finance Department will act as secretariat. The council is expected to meet at least twice a year, with expert members serving two-year terms.
In its terms of reference, the council has been asked to advise on economic developments at the global, national and state level, as well as taxation, public finance, industrialisation, investment, jobs, agriculture, MSMEs and climate resilience. It will also look at technology-led governance and emerging sectors such as artificial intelligence, the digital economy, green energy and the blue economy, reflecting the state’s effort to link its growth strategy with newer sources of productivity and employment.
The government has already framed its wider ambitions through two milestones: a $500 billion economy by 2036 under the Samruddha Odisha vision, and a $1.5 trillion economy by 2047 under the Viksit Odisha framework. Official budget documents project Odisha’s gross state domestic product at ₹11.07 trillion for 2026-27, with real growth of 7.9% in 2025-26 and a projected 12% expansion in FY27. Per capita income rose to about ₹187,000 in FY26, underscoring the scale of the task ahead.
Economists quoted in the coverage welcomed the creation of the council but questioned whether half-yearly meetings would be enough for a body meant to monitor a long-term economic transition. Amarendra Das, associate professor at the National Institute of Science Education and Research, said the panel would need more regular review, continuous tracking of indicators and quicker feedback on what is working and what is not. He also argued that SITI-Odisha should be made fully functional soon so that it can serve as the bridge between policy advice and departmental action.
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