Subhas Chandra Pattanayak
Orissa Government has not been able to present a complete Budget for the approaching financial year even though it has projected an estimate of Rs 36,744.78 crore against a possible Budget reflecting therein a non-plan estimate worth Rs 26,968 crore, State plan estimate worth Rs 7,489.60 crore and an expected Central plan worth Rs 748.48 crore. The Finance Minister, Prafulla Ch. Ghadei, has presented only a Vote-on-Account worth Rs. 15,054.02 crore to manage the State for four months. Giving the final shape to the Budget should be the responsibility of the next Government, he has stressed.
Asserting that recession would not affect it, Ghadei told the House on February 12 that when revenue expenditure is projected to be Rs.30,581 crore, revenue deficit is estimated to be Rs.2,284 crore as against income estimated at Rs.28,297 crore.
In the projected income, one Rupee will be constituted with State’s own tax worth 24.63 paisa, State’s own non-tax worth 6.74 paisa, State’s shared tax worth 31.92 paisa, grant-in-aid from Centre worth 21.72 paisa, recovery of loans and advances worth 0.73 paisa and loans from different sources worth14.26 paisa. In the projected expenditure, one rupee will constitute 12.75 paisa on debt servicing, 4.13 paisa on repayment of loans, 0.71 paisa on disbursement of loan (non-Plan), 55.33 paisa on other non-Plan expenditure and 27.09 paisa on expenditure in Plan sector.
But the vote-on-account, now before the House, aims at meeting the expenses incurred in implementation of the 6th Pay Commission as well as to provide fuel to various “development projects” though conscious peoples know that those are basically populist programs that the ruling politicians are to use as shock-absorbers while running during the elections.