social services . progress in the social services in recent years is reflected in the demand for increased expenditure ; advance in this field will be even more marked than under the second plan . it is hoped that compulsory primary education will cover all children in the 6 to 11 group . the number of registered doctors is expected to grow from 84,000 at the end of the second plan to 103,000 at the end of the third ; hospital beds will increase from 160,000 to 190,000 ; hospitals and dispensaries from 12,600 to 14,600 ; primary health centres from 2,800 to 5,000 ; and family planning clinics from 1,800 to 2,000 . the third plan envisages a substantial expansion in the programme of building houses for the low-income groups and industrial workers , slum clearance and acquisition of land for building purposes . there is also an extensive programme of local development works to enable rural areas to provide themselves with certain minimum amenities , such as an adequate supply of drinking water , roads linking each village to the nearest main road or railway station and the provision of a village school building which could serve as a community centre and library . financing the plan . the third plan envisages a total investment of Rs.10,200 crores , of which Rs.6,200 crores will be in the public sector and Rs.4,000 crores in the private sector . including the current outlay of Rs.1,050 crores , the total outlay in the public sector will thus be of the tune of Rs.7,250 crores . the state is basically concerned with covering basic capital investments and also current expenditure , such as salaries , subsidies , etc . yet , the private sector still contributes about 90 per cent of India &apos;s total national income . the third plan looks for an increase of about 51 per cent in total investments , of about 70 per cent and 58 per cent respectively in public investment and current expenditure and about 29 per cent in private investment . the following table gives some indication of percentage allocation of investments : external resources . it is in the field of external resources that the greatest difficulty arises in estimating the budget of the third plan . considering foreign trade trends , the draft outline estimated that the total export earnings over the third plan period would be Rs.3,450 crores - an average of Rs.690 crores per year , as compared to Rs.576 crores in 1958-59 and Rs.645 crores in 1959-60 . the balance left for financing imports would be Rs.3,070 crores . as against this , imports of raw materials , intermediate products , food-grains , capital goods etc would amount to Rs.3,570 crores . thus , there would be a deficit of Rs.500 crores , which is about equal to the repayments on loans falling due in the plan period . the gap in India &apos;s external resources would , therefore , be particularly large in the initial years of the plan because of heavy repayments falling due in these years . this gap is expected to narrow in subsequent years as output from large-scale projects now in hand become available . in addition machinery , equipment and other capital goods to be imported as the foreign exchange component of the third plan will be in the order of Rs.1,900 crores . further essential imports of components and semi-manufactures will amount to about Rs.200 crores . the total requirements of external assistance for the third plan would thus amount to Rs.2,600 crores . foreign aid . the following foreign assistance was already promised or under-written before the launching of the third plan : ever since the draft outline was published , the Indian government had been conducting negotiations with the aid to India consortium ( world bank , U.S.A , U.K , Canada , France , Japan and West Germany ) for assistance ; an agreement was announced in Washington at the beginning of June , 1961 , by which the consortium undertook to furnish a maximum of Rs.1,060 crores to cover the first two years of the third plan , that is almost half of the total foreign exchange requirements for the plan . with her national income and indigenous resources still in the under-developed stage , India &apos;s foreign exchange difficulties and consequent dependence on foreign aid are bound to continue for some time . however , given timely assistance , she faces the future with confidence . as the draft outline of the third plan declared : the balance of payments difficulties the country is facing are not a temporary or fortuitous phenomenon . they are part and parcel of the process of development . for a period , the excess import requirements have to be met from external assistance . but it is important to aim at a progressive reduction in the imbalance , so as to eliminate it within a foreseeable period . reliance on special foreign aid programmes has to be steadily reduced and after a period of years dispensed with . the social implications of planning . in the last analysis , planning is not an end in itself : it is a means to an end . a brief review has already been made of the progress expected under the third plan in education , which is the first essential of any social progress . another important aspect of social advance is improvement in housing and sanitation , especially in the rural areas . the third plan provides for an outlay of Rs.25 crores for social welfare . a prominent role is played by the central and state social welfare boards . the central board itself has assisted more than 4,500 voluntary social welfare organizations during the last seven years . some of the priorities recommended under the third plan include : ( 1 ) intensified measures for the prevention and treatment of juvenile delinquency ; ( 2 ) moral and social hygiene programmes under the suppression of immoral traffic act ; ( 3 ) aftercare services ; ( 4 ) prevention of beggary and vagrancy ; ( 5 ) prison welfare services and ( 6 ) welfare of physically and mentally handicapped persons . prohibition forms an important item on the programme of the state governments ; several of them took intensive measures during the second plan to restrict drinking in public places and to extend dry areas ; these measures may be further intensified under the third plan . the rehabilitation of refugees from West Pakistan has now been more or less completed . however , rehabilitation of refugees from East Pakistan still remains to be accomplished . the third plan provides for programmes for this purpose ; including the provision of housing , development of industries , education , training and other schemes . work continues on the Dandakaranya area project , which is intended to rehabilitate displaced persons from East Pakistan and the local tribal population . the community development movement . no account of the social and economic achievement of planning in India would be complete without a mention of the community development movement and the national extension service . starting in 1948-49 as a project for the development of a group ( block ) of villages in the Nilokheri area of the Punjab , primarily for the resettlement of refugees from West Pakistan , the community development movement was firmly entrenched in the rural life by the end of 1951 . on 22nd October ( Mahatma Gandhi &apos;s birthday ) , 1952 , the movement was officially launched as a national undertaking in 55 selected projects , each covering 300 villages - about 500 square miles and a population of about 200,000 . by the beginning of 1959 , the programme covered 2,548 blocks , that is , 339,518 villages ( out of a total of 558,000 villages in India ) , with a population of 173 million , that is nearly two-thirds of the rural population of India . as has already been mentioned , by October , 1963 , the whole of the country will be covered by community projects . under the first plan , there was a provision of Rs.52.4 crores for expenditure on community projects ; the amount allocated under the second plan was Rs.200 crores and under the third plan Rs.400 crores . the community development programme is defined as a programme of aided self-help , to be planned and implemented by the villagers themselves , the state offering technical guidance and financial assistance . its primary objective is to develop self-reliance in the individual and initiative in the village community . agriculture naturally receives highest priority in the community development programme , as it is still the mainstay of 70 per cent of the rural population . among other notable activities undertaken in the programme are the provision of means of communications , improvement in health and sanitation , better housing , mass education , especially the adult literacy campaign , women &apos;s and children &apos;s welfare and the development of cottage and small-scale industries . however , an even more important aspect of this unique movement is the speeding up of the process of democratic decentralization ; in 1959 the government decided to delegate , by progressive stages , responsibility for using power and resources for planning and execution of development projects to the people &apos;s elected representatives . village self-rule has thus become the accepted principle of democracy in India . a U.N technical mission which visited India recently has declared that it is the most significant experiment in economic development and social improvement in Asia at the present time . achievements and prospects . India is still not self-sufficient in several respects such as food or the production of heavy machinery . poverty , unemployment and illiteracy have yet to be mastered completely ; and the common man can not , in general , feel relaxed under the umbrella of the welfare state . nevertheless what is surprising is not that planning has achieved so little in its first ten years , but that it has achieved so much in so short a time in a country which inherited problems created by centuries of foreign rule . before the war , India was almost completely dependent on foreign countries for the most elementary articles of consumption - from needles to locomotives , and from tooth paste to heavy chemicals . today , the Indian people have attained virtual self-sufficiency in most articles of daily consumption . a start has been made with health schemes and sickness insurance in different occupations ; for instance , every civil servant is entitled to state-aided medical care ; the railways have their own medical scheme , so have the banks and large undertakings in the private sector . it must always be realized that 80 per cent of the Indian people still live in villages and 70 per cent of the Indian population still depend on agriculture and rural industries for their living . by 1965 , the proportion of the population dependent on agriculture will go down to 60 per cent and urbanization will increase accordingly ; so that , in the long run , a balance ought to be established between the agrarian and industrial labour force . in the meantime , the peasant derives many benefits from the management of the economy - he is to a certain degree cushioned against the natural calamities which made life so difficult in the past . above all , he is being given the means of improving his social and economic lot . the peasant can get credit from the local co-operative society and most important of all , if he needs assistance for the purchase or training for the use of implements , seeds , fertilizers , etc , the community development organization can be relied upon to help him . above all , he has become increasingly conscious that his future depends not on his moneylender or landlord or even the administrative officer , but on himself and a democratic system which extends from his village to New Delhi . Britain &apos;s role . of course , the centuries of British rule have been blamed for many of the shortcomings of the Indian economy in this day and age . no doubt , much of this criticism is well founded . nevertheless it should always be remembered that the British created the framework within which the development of a democratic India has become possible . the legacy of the Indian civil service forms much of the foundation of the relative efficiency of the Indian machinery of government without which no plans could be implemented . the respect for law and the existence of an independent judiciary are safeguards which make certain that in India centralized planning and political liberty go hand in hand . today British money continues to play an important part in the Indian economy . there has been a relative decrease in the proportion of private British investment ; this was partly because investors from other countries , especially the U.S.A and Western Germany are coming into the Indian field on an increasing scale . the net flow of capital from the U.S.A amounted to Rs.22 crores in 1959 , that is three-fifths of the total net inflow of Rs.38 crores during that year . 