| This year's Budget Officer is Loretta Mary Vas, a 1977 batch officer of the Uttar Pradesh cadre. Unlike other line officers who are, at best, aware of one or two details in the Budget, Vas is privy to each Budget proposal, right down to their minutiae. |
| Unlike her predecessor Dhirendra Swarup (if you don't count K S Menon, who moved to his parent cadre in the CAG after a short stint in North Block), who was in the finance ministry when Dr Manmohan Singh presented his first Budget in 1991 and is reckoned to be the authority on all details of the Budget, this is Vas' first stint in the finance ministry, the better part of her career having been spent dealing with trade issues. |
| Since she's taken over at a time when the Budget-making exercise was at its peak, she hasn't had the luxury of settling down in her new assignment. |
| Indeed, since she joined after the Economic Editors' Conference took place, few outsiders have seen her at work "" at this conference, it is the Budget officer who usually has the finer details and is often consulted by secretaries while replying to the press. |
| At her first public appearance in her new job, after the 12th Finance Commission presented its report, Vas was low key, and contented herself with just passing papers to Swarup, who briefed the press and was on top of all details. |
| Indeed, the Budget division, which co-ordinates the exercise, is now under expenditure secretary D Swarup's charge, making Vas' job that much more tough, or easy, depending on how you look at it "" Swarup was the Centre's Budget officer till 2003. |
| Vas also needs to co-ordinate with Economic Affairs Secretary Rakesh Mohan since it is his department that prepares the draft for Part A of the Budget speech, Part B being looked after by the revenue department. |
| Vas' job involved co-ordinating the proposals of each Central department and shepharding them as they moved back and forth between ministries "" each proposal is entered into the confidential Blue Book, and part of Vas' job is to know all details of various proposals, why certain amounts have been asked for from the Budget, how such programmes have done in the past, and so on. |
| Vas' job was tougher this year given the pressure of higher allocation to states due to the Twelfth Finance Commission recommendations along with the National Common Minimum Programme's focus on increasing the social sector spending on the one hand, and balancing them with the objectives of the Fiscal Reforms and Budget Management Act on the other. |
| As a result, matters like the Gross Budgetary Support for the Plan, which are usually finalised by mid-December were only finalised in early February. |
| With Vas out of bounds for the media, it was difficult to find out how she coped with the pressure of settling down in her new assignment. But former colleagues say that the post-graduate in economics would not have much difficulty given her willingness to spend time on issues. |
| "She is forward looking and very positive. She may not have a background on certain issues but is willing to spend time understanding economic concepts," said a government official. |
| Between 1995 and 2000, Vas had a stint in the commerce ministry first in the Directorate General of Foreign Trade as export commissioner, and was involved with the preparation of the Exim Policy "" it was during this time that the policy on removal of quantitative restrictions began and around 6,100 items were removed from this list in 1996. |
| Following her promotion as joint secretary, Vas handled Saarc when the groundwork for improving economic ties was being done. She then went back to her parent cadre and was posted as additional CEO Greater Noida, then moved to the Ghaziabad Development Authority, and has also been the state's resident commissioner in Delhi. |
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