Preparations are afoot to formulate the budget for the financial year 2016-17. The State Government has issued instructions to administrative departments to furnish their budgetary requirements now so that the final shape of the budget for the next financial year is clear by December 2015. Under normal circumstances the administrative departments would begin budgetary exercise in the month of November but according to the instructions issued by the Finance Department, they are required to submit their requirements by the end of current month. Perhaps the idea is to hammer out all angularities of the budget in good time so that after it is forwarded to the Central Government, discussions on various priority areas are held in good time. The Government is serious in preparing the budget in right time and has clearly issued instructions that any responsible functionary found to be charged with dereliction of duty will have to face the consequences.
We fully appreciate that this Government does not want to take any chance and does not want to hurry up at the last minute and scramble for data, which may not be forthcoming that easy. Last time it did happen with the previous Government that delayed submission of budget resulting in depriving the state of many facilities. We may remind our readers that during the course of the year Finance Department has found huge variations in the projections made by the departments and the actual transfers made by the Planning and Development Department in respect of the erstwhile Plan Revenue Expenditure transferred to the Finance Department. With a view to know the actual requirement with respect to the sanctioned posts the departments are advised to project complete details separately on such transfers.
In short, we appreciate initiation of timely exercise for the preparation of the annual budget for the coming financial year. We hope that the proposed budget now under preparation will be balanced one and superfluous expenditure will avoided to run smooth Government.
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