Full-time members of the commission are former expenditure secretary and former member of the 15th Finance Commission Ajay Narayan Jha, former special secretary, expenditure, Annie George Mathew, and Artha Global executive director, Niranjan Rajadhyaksha, it said.

State Bank of India (SBI) group chief economic advisor Soumya Kanti Ghosh has been appointed as a part-time member, it added.

“The Sixteenth Finance Commission has been requested to make its recommendations available by October, 31, 2025, covering an award period of 5 years commencing 1st April, 2026,” the statement said.

The government last month appointed former vice-chairman of NITI Aayog and Columbia University professor Arvind Panagariya as the 16th FC chairman, which would suggest a devolution formula for tax revenues between the Centre and states.

The order of Panagariya’s appointment came about a month after the government on November 29 announced the terms of reference (ToR) for the 16th commission, which also asked the body to suggest measures for augmenting states’ resources for local bodies, besides reviewing existing arrangements for financing disaster management initiatives.

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On November 6, Ritvik R Pandey, a 1998-batch lAS officer and a joint secretary in the department of revenue, was appointed as officer on special duty for the advance cell of 16th Finance Commission in the rank and pay of an additional secretary.

“The distribution between the Union and the States of the net proceeds of taxes which are to be, or may be, divided between them under Chapter I, Part XII of the Constitution and the allocation between the States of the respective shares of such proceeds,” the first ToRs for the commission said.

“The principles which should govern the grants-in-aid of the revenues of the States out of the Consolidated Fund of India and the sums to be paid to the States by way of grants-in-aid of their revenues under article 275 of the Constitution for the purposes other than those specified in the provisos to clause (1) of that article,” is the second ToR.

The third ToR pertains to the measures needed to augment the consolidated fund of a state to supplement the resources of the panchayats and municipalities on the basis of recommendations made by respective state finance commissions.

The 16th FC may review the present arrangements on financing disaster management initiatives, with reference to the funds constituted under the Disaster Management Act and make appropriate recommendations, it said.