by Masood Hussain

JAMMU: J&K is anticipated to spend Rs 80313 crore in fiscal 2018-19 which is around Rs 9000 crore more in comparison to the spending for the current fiscal, budget papers revealed.

Dr Haseeb A Drabu presenting his fourth budget in Assembly (Image: DIPR)

Details placed before the state assembly suggest that only Rs 16044 crore of the spending is debt creation and the rest of it – Rs 64269 crore income is plain and pure revenue, coming from state’s own resources and the central devolutions. Of this Rs 47314 crore will be devolutions from central government as state’s own tax and non tax rescues would be at Rs 16955 crore.

On basis of where the money comes and where it goes, it is 59 percent of the resource coming from the centre, 21 percent is state’s own resource and 20 percent are borrowings. On the expenditure front, 36 percent goes to pensions and salaries, 36 percent to capital expenditure, six percent goes to debt servicing, nice percent to power purchases and balance 13 percent to other expenditures.

Revenue expenditure has gone up to Rs 51185 crore which was Rs 43882 crore in current fiscal, as per revised estimates. Revenue expenditure envisages all expenditures of the state government. Details suggest that Rs 23863 crore will go as salaries, Rs 5100 crore as pension, and Rs 17332 crore as “other” expenditure, besides Rs 4725 crore as interest on debts, Rs 7400 crore as power bill, Rs 1626 crore as grant in aid and Rs 3000 crore as state share in central sponsored schemes. There is an element of Rs 755 crore that is being spent on mainanatce of assets and material supplies. The surge is salary bill is because of the seventh pay commission and party because of the requirements for funding regularisation of more than 60 thousand daily-wagers.

On the Capital side, the expenditure suggests that Rs 13800 crore will go as routine and regular capes – developmental activities and the rest of it will be in debt repayment, equity and investment and other expenditures.

But there are certain interesting things that the documents placed on record suggest.

Firstly, the revenue expenditure was more than the revenue receipts till 2013-14 and has now started showing a reversal trend. That means the revenue expenditures are less than the resources that the state government is getting.

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Secondly, capital expenditure was more than the capital receipts which means debts lifted for development were not entirely going to the developmental activities. That graph has also started exhibiting a reverse shift suggesting that more money from capital receipts is getting into capital expenditure. In the 2018-19 budget, capital expenditure is almost double the capital receipts. This suggests that part of the revenue saving from revenue expenditure are adding up to the capital receipts and helping widening the gap, positively.

Thirdly, this situation has created a situation in which the outgo on implementing a developmental activity has reduced costs now. For sending a Re 1 on development would cost J&K government Rs 3.8 in 2011-12 which the budget anticipates to reach Rs 1.8, almost half, the documents read.

A detailed sectoral allocation on capital expenditure suggest that infrastructure will take 46.63 percent (Rs 9895.36 crore), economic sector will get 19.91 percent (4226.08 crore), social sector will get 13.38 percent (2839.76 crore), and balance 1263 percent (Rs 2680.65 crore) will go to the finance sector including planning.

On the revenue expenditure side, power is the biggest money guzzler taking 16.18 percent of the entire revenue budget followed by 12.87 percent that goes to education, and 9.93 percent that goes to police, read Home, followed by Health with 5.46 percent. As many as 18 department have a share of less than one percent in the state’s revenue expenditure indicating their small size and modest operations and activity. Then eight departments have a share of more than one percent but less than two percent of the overall revenue spend in the next fiscal. Only two departments spend more than two percent of the overall revenue budget but can not cross three percent.

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