Hyderabad: Bhatti finds fault with govt for showing high projections

Hyderabad: CLP leader Bhatti Vikramarka Mallu on Tuesday found fault with the government for showing high projects in the non-tax revenues and grant-in-aid from the Centre and alleged that the Budget was not as per estimates.

Participating in discussion on the Appropriation Bill in the Assembly, he targeted both the State and the Centre. Targeting the State on excess loans, Vikramarka said the excessive loans taken by the government is a cause of concern. "The lesser the loans it is better for the State. If more loans are taken and if they are not taken for capital expenditure, they would turn into a big burden in future", he said.

He said, "the Finance Minister states that 90 per cent loans were spent on capital investment. The fiscal deficit- this year is Rs 52,000 crore and capital expenditure Rs 29,000 crore only. How can this be 90 per cent? This is not new, it has been happening every year. We are expecting non-tax revenue to be very high. During 2021-22 the non-tax revenue was Rs 30,000 crore, but the State got only Rs 6,000 crore." There is no scope for such huge revenue. This will help in increasing the budget numbers, but targets will not be achieved, he added.

The CLP leader said the government was showing grant-in-aid as Rs 41,000 crore. The State had got a maximum of Rs 15,000 crore, but there is a big gap between the projections and actual figures. He said along with Rythu Bandhu, the government should provide other subsidies to farmers. Farmers should be given interest-free loans, as they used to get earlier.

He alleged that the Centre was giving nothing to Telangana since the last eight years. The Centre gave 157 medical colleges for the entire country, but not a single college to Telangana. What has the State done, he asked. He questioned why the Centre doesn't give national project status to a project. He lashed out at the Centre for selling public sector units. He urged the government to provide dole to unemployed, re-open the Nizam Sugar Factory, as promised in the election manifesto.