Bhubaneswar: With the beginning of new financial year 2024-25, Principal Secretary Finance Vishal Kumar Dev asks all Departments to expedite the pace of expenditure during the first quarter of the financial year as it is the working season before the onset of monsoon.
The Appropriation (Vote on Account) Bill for 2024-25 has been passed by the State Legislature and enacted. The Administrative Departments are authorized to incur expenditure for four months of the Financial Year 2024-25 beginning from 1st April, 2024 to 31st July, 2024, Shri Dev said in a letter to the Heads of all Departments.
The State Government had presented vote on account or interim budget with estimating the total budget outlay for the financial year at Rs 2.55 lakh crore, of which a sum of Rs 1.18 crore is proposed in the vote on account for first four months of FY 2024-25.
The Departments should carefully chalk out their work programme from the beginning of the financial year and make available the provision made in the Demand for Grants and Appropriations within the overall limit, he said.
The Principal Secretary Finance said, “Expenditure on creation of capital assets and completion of projects; economy in Administrative Expenditure on establishment, operations and maintenance should be given top most priority.”
He advised the Departments to release funds according to a definite action plan for achieving the quantifiable physical target fixed for the year. The Secretaries of Administrative Departments are advised to review physical achievement against expenditure by 15th of every month against monthly/quarterly targets.
On release of funds for Central Sector Schemes and Centrally Sponsored Schemes, Dev said, expenditure for these schemes is to be made against availability of Central Assistance only during 2024-25.
However, in case of urgent necessity for release of funds for continuing CSSs, the Administrative Departments can incur expenditure to the extent of 30% of the provision under the respective scheme or 50% of the annual allocation made by the concerned line Ministry whichever is less, during April to July, 2024 pending receipt of Central assistance under these schemes with concurrence of the financial advisor/AFA of the Departments, he stated.
Further, in case of continuing schemes, the administrative Departments can incur expenditure on the salary component up to 50% of the provision, during April to July. 2024, he pointed out.
The Departments have been asked to furnish utilisation certificate (UC) and statement of expenditure in time to the respective line Ministries of Government of India in order to obtain the Central assistance due.
