Bhubaneswar: With more resources available from Own Revenue sources, spending by the Government Departments has increased and Utilization of Budget has risen.
While State Government in Department of Finance is keeping a tab on the spending on various sectors, stress is on expenditure in the sectors like Social, Infrastructure and other Development Areas.
While Annual Budget Estimate is Rs.1,45,350 Crore, Total Expenditure during the first five months of the Financial Year of 2021-22 touched Rs.40,292 Crore. This is much more than the corresponding period of previous year, officials admit.
While Expenditure as on 31 August 2020 was Rs.33,770 Crore, State Government has spent Rs.6522 Crore more during the corresponding period of 2021-22.
Expenditure as on 30 July, 2021 was Rs.32,776 Crore and during the month of August more than Rs.7500 Crore was spent by the Government. So utilization of Budget is on rise, officials admit.
Notably the percentage of Budget Utilization has gone up to 27.72 Percent as compared to 23.9 Percent during 2020-21.This is a positive trend, admit officials.
Similarly, Program expenditure during April-August, 2021 touched Rs.18,827 Crore as compared to Rs.14,715 Crore spent during corresponding period previous year.
Percentage of Budget Utilization on Program Expenditure was 24.43 Percent as compared to 19.34 Percent during 2020-21.
So Financial Advisors say that the expenditure has shown good progress during the period compared to previous year.
While during 2020-21Covid-19 Pandemic caused havoc, due to efficient management in tackling the Virus Menace, situation has improved a lot, officials say.
Spending by Food, Supplies, Consumer Welfare, Cooperation, Disaster Management, tops the list of Departments, funds are mostly spent on welfare schemes.
Food Security is one of the prime areas of the State Government, which requires lot of spending, so spending in Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare was 43.70 Percent.
Social Sector Spending is on rise as the Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has all along harped on strengthening the sector for which Health and School and Mass Education spending has gone up as compared to previous years.
Spending in Infrastructure Sector was a bit slow due to various reasons including rainy season. As more funds are provided in infrastructure sector, it was expected that pace of spending will be accelerated.
However, Program Expenditure during first five months of Fiscal 2021-22 has gone up as compared to corresponding period of 2020-21.
Now stress is being given for more spending under CAPEX Program as level of spending in this sector requires improvement, officials admit.
While continuous monitoring of spending is being done, more field visits are needed to be taken up by senior officials to boost spending at field level, opine experts in Government Spending.