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A number of lapses in governance and budgetary spending has come to the fore as chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy’s government has come under close scrutiny for the first time in the last two years of his tenure,
The standing committees, constituted by the Assembly speaker for the first time ever on the performance and budgetary allocations of each of the government departments, have taken the government to task on several parameters, including the Budget preparation.
For instance, the standing committee constituted on matters pertaining to the irrigation department said the department had indirectly deprived other equally important infrastructure development and socio-economic projects of resources by getting huge allocations and surrendering most of these allocations at the end of the financial year.
The committee said the department had surrendered Rs 12,175 crore back to the government in the last three financial years, which was more than the Plan outlay for irrigation during the year 2013-14. The department had given reasons such as delay in land acquisition, non-availability of a minimum working season of six months and even non-availability of sand for a certain period.
This is in complete contrast to a situation where about 28 major and medium ongoing irrigation projects remained unfinished even after nearing completion (75 per cent) for want of just Rs 2,143 crore. On completion, these projects are expected to create an additional irrigation potential for over 2.2 million acre apart from stabilising 1.46 million acre of existing ayacut, according to the report.
In an equally serious observation, the standing committee on the energy department claimed that the state power utilities had been showing higher power consumption by the agriculture sector, supply to which was unmetered as it was given free, to camouflage the actual transmission and distribution losses in the state.
According to the report tabled in the Assembly, the committee estimated that the department has inflated the consumption by close to 2,000 units per active pump set while showing the T&D (transmission and distribution) losses at 17 per cent. Even as the state had under gone the worst-ever power crisis in the past couple of years, the government has not set its priorities right, according to the report. “By deploying about Rs 7,400 crore for revenue expenditure and allocating a paltry Rs 700 crore for plan purposes, no credible steps are being taken to improve the health of the energy sector,” the report said.
PHCs with no thermometer
In a serious observation citing the dire state of public health infrastructure in the state, the committee on health said that even common and simple ailments like fevers and diarrhoea wee not appropriately treated in the primary health centres (PHCs) as most of these centres lack doctors, medicines and simple clinical test equipment such as thermometer, weighing scales, stethoscope, glucometer, pregnancy test kits among other things. The salaries are not given promptly to the paramedical staff, contract/outsourcing staff and contract doctors, according to the report.
Anti-drinking campaign funds unspent
In another instance of inaction, a committee on excise revenue matters said while the revenue from liquor sales in the state grew at an impressive rate to touch Rs 18,000 crore in 2012-13, the department on the government, on the other hand, was not even able to spend a meagre amount on the anti-alcohol campaign.
In 2007, the government had constituted an anti-liquor campaign committee to create awareness among public on the ill effects of consumption of alcoholic products. In 2012, the state government had constituted another committee headed by commissioner of prohibition and excise while allocating Rs 10 crore for this purpose.
The committee has found that of this only Rs 5 crore was released by the government out of which the department could show an expenditure of just Rs 3.55 crore. The state government has presented a Rs 1.61 lakh-crore annual Budget for the year 2013-14 in March this year.
