Andhra
Pradesh government today presented a Budget for Rs 1,35,689 crore for
2016-17, with an estimated fiscal deficit of Rs 20,497 crore and
revenue deficit of Rs 4,868 crore. The budget for 2016-17 marks an
increase of 20 per cent over the previous budget, Finance Minister
Yanamala Ramakrishnudu said while presenting the annual financial
statement in the AP Legislative Assembly. The outlay for financing
the state development plan is set to go up by 42.8 per cent to Rs
49,134.4 crore while the non-plan expenditure will grow by 10 per
cent to Rs 86,554.6 crore in 2016-17, the finance minister said. "We
continue to carry a revenue deficit of Rs 13,897 crore inherited from
2014-15 as a consequence of irrational bifurcation of the state,"
he said. The division also resulted in the residuary state receiving
46 per cent of the revenues of the combined entity with 58.3 per cent
of its population. This resulted in a revenue deficit of Rs 16,200
crore in the first 10 months of the new state's existence. "Thus
far, the central government released only Rs 2,303 crore to bridge
the resource gap, leaving the state with a huge revenue deficit
overhang of Rs 13,897 crore," Ramakrishnudu said. "The
legacy of huge revenue deficit, an overhang from 2014-15, will
continue to haunt us in 2016-17. We expect the central government to
step up its support to the state development plan in the form of
increased central assistance and special grants... to partially
offset the revenue deficit of 2014-15," the minister said. He,
however, said the state's own revenues were expected to grow by 16
per cent, to Rs 57,813 crore in 2016-17 from Rs 49,764 crore in
2015-16. Yanamala hoped that the Centre would release Rs 935 crore as
compensation towards central sales tax due to the state and also
provide Rs 3,500 crore for construction of the Polavaram irrigation
project. He sought the Centre's support for construction of the
state's new capital Amaravati with a grant of Rs 1,000 crore. "We
earnestly hope that the goods and services tax legislation will be
passed by Parliament and will become operational in 2016-17,"
the minister added.
Yanamala's
8th Budget in full e-format
In
a first, Andhra Pradesh Finance Minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu today
presented the 2016-17 Budget in full electronic format with budgetary
proposals supplied to the MLAs in Tablet computers. Tablet PCs loaded
with the Budget proposals, the Socio-Economic Survey 2015-16, and
other related documents were give to the legislators while
journalists got all that on an 8-GB pen drive. It was for the eighth
time that Yanamala, as Finance Minister, presented the Budget,
including three in the truncated state. "I am happy to inform
the House that the Budget for 2016-17 is unique on several counts.
First and foremost, it's an e-Budget with all documents being made
available in easily readable format on a Tablet that you can carry
anywhere and refer to at anytime," the Minister said in his
speech. It was also a "truly decentralised" Budget as each
of the 20,800 drawing and disbursing officers (DDO) in the state
prepared the proposals for the unit under their control, he said.
"This is a genuinely outcome-focused Budget with unwavering
focus on performance and outcomes rather than the traditional
input-based Budget. It is also a demand-driven Budget based on the
needs of the grassroots and expectations of the people. We have
obtained inputs from the public and incorporated them suitably,"
he told the Assembly. Yanamala, who took 125 minutes to read out the
57-page text, quoted eminent personalties like A P J Abdul Kalam, H W
Longfellow, Swami Vivekananda, Shakespeare, Winston Churchill, Thomas
Jefferson, Franklin D Roosevelt, B R Ambedkar, and Wilfred Peterson
in his speech. His colleagues and fellow legislators of the ruling
TDP and the BJP congratulated Yanamala as he completed his Budget
presentation.
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