Budget session in State Assembly to begin on July 7: Pranajit – aabtak24

Agartala, Jun 10, 2023, TRIPURATIMES Desk

Agartala/Shillong: Jun 10: Tripura Finance, Planning and Coordination Minister Pranajit Singha Roy told IANS that the budget session of the Tripura assembly would begin on July 7 and in this session, the full-fledged budget for the year 2023-24 would be placed.

After the February 16 assembly elections and the formation of the new government, the Tripura government passed a vote-on-account for the first four months of the current financial year (2023-24) in the last week of March.

“Our fiscal position is now good. We are making committed expenditures as well as releasing funds for major road and infrastructure projects. No major finance crunch in any sector,” Singha Roy claimed.

Meantime, according to a report of the “State Finances of North Eastern States”, published by the Research and Information Division of the Lok Sabha secretariat, financial assistance from the various central ministries reveals that the financial condition of the northeastern states including Tripura is better.

“But there are fields in which action is yet to be taken for the best utilization of financial assistance for the people and these states,” it said.
 

Notably, the 15th Finance Commission (2021-26) headed by N.K. Singh had earlier suggested that the northeastern states accelerate resources and revenue to strengthen their fiscal position.

Singh, a former member of the now-abolished Planning Commission, in his report, said that the northeastern states must accelerate their own resources and revenue to build up sustainable fiscal situations while each northeastern state has unique features and challenges.

“If we compare the population of the northeastern states with the rest of the Indian states it is much less. With this, if the resources available are in abundance and utilised sensibly the states can develop as sustainable, economically viable hubs for their people and India as well,” State Finances of North Eastern States read.

The report said that compared to the northeastern states, the other states of India pay more taxes.

One of the major reasons behind this is “As per section 10 (26) of the Income Tax Act, a member of a Scheduled Tribe residing in any area specified in the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution or in Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura is exempted from paying tax on any income that accrues from any source in the area or state”, the report said.

With 45.58 million people (2011 census), in the northeast region, which consists of 8 per cent of India’s total geographical area and 4 per cent of the country’s population, there is a lack of big and medium-scale industries in most of the states except Assam.

According to experts, the hilly region has huge untapped natural resources including gas, oil, water and forests, but their full utilisation is yet to be done, making for a poor revenue base for seven of the eight northeastern states.

To improve the basic minimum services and infrastructure in the region, the Central ministries and departments, keep 10 per cent of their Gross Budgetary Support (GBS) for the central sector (CS) and the centrally sponsored schemes (CSS) unless they are exempted.

Currently, the eight mountainous northeastern states, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand have the special category tag, and are getting higher financial support from the Centre.

As per the budget estimate, for the years 2014-15 to 2020-21, actual expenditure in the northeastern region by non-exempted Central government ministries and departments was Rs 2,65,766.67 crore.