Rs 9,125 crore supplementary budget passed in Himachal Assembly

Tribune News Service

Shimla, March 2

The Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday passed the supplementary demands for grant of Rs 9,125.12 crore for the financial year 2020-21.

Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, who holds the finance portfolio, presented the supplementary demands for grant in the Vidhan Sabha. Of the total amount, Rs 8,448.17 crore falls under the non-plan category while Rs 280.84 crore is under the plan portion and Rs 396.11 crore under Centrally-sponsored schemes.

Under the non-plan expenditure, Rs 7,999.57 crore has been provided and means advance, which is a short-term facility on which the interest rate is much lower than the market borrowings. This amount gets paid during the year itself and its net effect on borrowings is zero. This year, the Central Government has enhanced this amount from Rs 550 crore to Rs 880 crore due to the Covid pandemic.

The Chief Minister said that as this year the revenue was affected due to Covid, the state government took the benefit of this enhancement so as to not add to the existing debt burden. “It was necessary to ensure that the committed obligations of the government are fully met. The relief was provided to every section of society and the state is coming out of the economic recession,” he added.

Thakur said that due to Covid, the sources of income such as the Himachal Roadways Transport Corporation (HRTC) and the HP Tourism Development Corporation (HPTDC) had been badly affected, making the payment of salaries and pension to the employees difficult. “Despite these constraints, the government ensured the payment of its committed liabilities to the employees of these two undertakings,” he added.

He said that Rs 258.76 crore had been provided as grant-in-aid to the HRTC. Besides, Rs 57.64 crore had been provided for the construction of bridges and plugging black spots, Rs 34.20 crore as tariff roll back subsidy, Rs 17.01 crore to the Animal Husbandry Department for Govansh, Rs 14.19 crore to provide honorarium to anganwari workers and helpers, and Rs 14.05 crore to the Election Department.

The Chief Minister said that the major expenditure proposed under the plan schemes included Rs 108 crore for the Health and Family Welfare Department, Rs 86.74 crore for World Bank-aided horticulture development projects, Rs 45.84 crore for the Bhanupali-Bilaspur-Beri railway line, Rs 17.36 crore for the Education Department and Rs 11.93 crore for the Public Works Department.

Thakur informed the House that under the Centrally-sponsored schemes, a supplementary demand was proposed for funding ongoing or new schemes, the money for which had been received from the Central Government. He said that Rs 153.66 crore had been received for the Pradhan Mantri Gramin Sadak Yojana, Rs 77.15 crore for the Central Road Fund, Rs 67 crore for the Smart City Mission, Rs 58.55 crore for advancing loan to cooperatives, Rs 9.76 crore for social security pensions and Rs 9.57 crore for the World-Bank assisted project for skill strengthening for industrial value enhancement programme.