By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, February 27, 2018: Odisha finance minister Pradip Kumar Amat on Monday presented a Rs 1,06,911 crore budget for 2017-18 with focus on infrastructure, social welfare, education, health and agriculture in the state.

Amat also presented a separate agriculture budget of Rs.14,930 crore in the state Assembly here like previous two years.

In line with the union budget, the finance minister had done away with the distinction between Plan and Non-Plan for 2017-18 Budget Estimates. The Estimates of Expenditure have been grouped into four broad categories such as Administrative Expenditure, Programme Expenditure, Expenditure out of Disaster Response Fund and Transfers from the state government. However, within these broad categories, revenue and capital account will continue as before.

The budget allocation for the next fiscal is up by 14 percent against Rs 94,052.65 crore for 2016-17. Total Administrative expenditure is pegged at Rs.47,465 crore in 2017-18 including provision of Rs.22,000 crore for salaries, Rs.11,313 crore for pension, Rs.5,000 crore for interest payment and Rs.5,177 crore for maintenance of capital assets.

Total Programme expenditure outlay for the financial year 2017-18 has been fixed at Rs.57,800 crore which includes an outlay of Rs.52,800 crore for the Government sector and Rs.5,000 crore for the Public Sector Undertakings.

Amat claimed that the budget enhanced grants for capital outlay to Rs.20,774 crore, which is about 5.04 per cent of GSDP. In addition the Loans and Advances, grants for creation of capital assets and other expenditure for capital formation put together account for Rs.9,023 crore which is 2.2 per cent of GSDP.

The budget expenditure will be financed through estimated revenue receipts of Rs.88,932 crore, recovery of loans and advances of Rs.130 crore and borrowing and other receipts of Rs.17,849 crore.

Total revenue receipts include State’s share in central taxes for Rs.31,422 crore, State’s Own tax for Rs.26,800 crore, Own Non-tax revenue of Rs.9,500 crore and grants from Centre for Rs.21,210 crore. The Tax/GSDP ratio would be 6.50 per cent in 2017-18, Amat said.

The budget has the largest outlay of Rs.18,404 crore for education and skills up by 27.57% over last year. The outlay includes Rs.181 crore for infrastructure development of universities, government colleges and non-government aided colleges. Besides, the FM has allocated Rs.269 crore for infrastructure development of Technological Universities and Engineering Colleges, Engineering Schools and Polytechnics and ITIs.

“We have also sought financial assistance from the World Bank for strengthening the higher education system of the State. The project cost is estimated at Rs.1,020 crore”, Amat informed the House adding that the budget provides Rs.110 crore for this purpose in 2017-18.”

Also the total budgetary allocation for Health and Family Welfare Department has been enhanced to Rs.5,690 crore from Rs.4,772 crore in 2016-17 up by 20 per cent.

Claiming that the State has been able to reduce the infant mortality rate from 65 in 2005-06 to 40 in 2015-16 as per National Family Health Survey 4, Amat said the state government would shortly launch a new scheme called Mukhya Mantri Swasthya Seva Mission for infrastructure development the existing medical colleges and peripheral healthcare institutions and financial assistance upto Rs.3 lakh to needy and poor patients to cover the cost of treatment for critical illness among other things.

In 2013-14, when the state launched a separate Agriculture Budget, it had an outlay of Rs.7,162 crore. The budget for agriculture and allied sector has gone up by almost by 100 per cent with an outlay of Rs.14,930 crore in 2017-18, Amat told the House.

Similarly, the allocation under central plan and centrally sponsored schemes include Rs.311.33 crore and Rs.44.83 crore respectively. The plan outlay includes Rs.45,600 crore for the government sector and Rs.4,400 crore for the public sector undertakings while non-¬plan expenditure includes Rs.18,800 crore for salaries, Rs.9,500 crore for pensions and Rs.4,650 crore for interest payments, the finance minister told the House.

The state government proposes to launch Augmentation of Basic Amenities & Development of Heritage & Architecture [ABADH] for holistic development of Puri in its bid to transform the holy town to a World class heritage city. For this purposed, Rs.100 crore has been earmarked for the scheme in 2017-18.

Amat is confident that State economy would most likely grow in the range of 8- 8.5 per cent during 2017-18 despite adverse situation the state has been facing post demonetisation and industrial slow down.

The budget will have a revenue surplus of Rs 6694.29 crore and fiscal deficit of Rs 14434.71 crore. The debt stock for financial year is estimated at Rs 76,744.12 crore which is 18.61% Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) compared to 16.96% last year.