Briefing newsmen about the second meeting of the council on trade and industry here on Monday, secretary in the prime minister's office (PMO), N K Singh said that the empowered committee would be headed by deputy chairman of the Planning Commission Jaswant Singh and would have finance minister Yashwant Sinha and industry minister Sikandar Bhakt as members.

The empowered committee would go through the recommendations and those on which there would be consensus would be implemented straightaway. Some of the recommendations would be put to debate while a few of them might be rejected.

The prime minister said that all the reports will be put on the internet after which Ficci, CII and Assocham should hold seminars and discussions to secure a broad public consensus. "A healthy public debate was necessary for devising acoherent implementation plan", he said.

The council at its meeting on Monday considered the recommendations of the six working groups headed by industrialists. The working group on infrastructure was headed by Ratan Tata, capital markets and financial sectors (Mukesh Ambani), food and agro-industries management policy (Nusli Wadia), knowledge-based industries (N.R.Narayana Murthy), service industries (A.C. Muthaiah) and administrative and legal simplifications (K.M. Birla).

The working groups were set up by Vajpayee at the first meeting of the economic advisory council held in early October and were given six weeks time to finalise their reports. Prime minister in his opening remarks also stressed that the government could start implementing the recommendations in areas where there was broad consensus.

He added the reports had set out a "broad agenda of action" over a wide gamut of subjects which deserve careful consideration. He said many of the recommendations required "urgent attention" and quite afew of them provided valuable inputs for budget making process. In this connection, he said, the budget-making process should be "demystified" and made more transparent. A debate on many of the recommendations contained in the report would contribute to transparency in the budget-making process.

"While countries all over the world undertake important policy changes whenever they become necessary without waiting for budget, in India, regrettably we continue to be prisoners of the past in our approach to budget," he said. Later, the heads of various working groups made brief presentation of their respective reports.

According to N K Singh, all the reports would be placed on web site for wider discussion. He added that even the chambers of commerce were being asked to generate debates on the recommendations of the working groups. Talking about some of the specific recommendations, he said, working group on food and agro-industries management had suggested that a chain of cold storage be set up forpreservation of food products.