Telangana Govt prods department to keep tight leash on funds

​Hyderabad: As part of maintaining strict fiscal discipline, the State Finance department has enforced new norms in release funds to departments from the second quarter of 2018-19 financial year that begins from July 1.

From now onwards, funds will be released to the departments based on their performance. It is mandatory that all the departments will have to furnish details of the expenditure incurred in the previous quarter before seeking funds for the fresh quarter in the financial year. The department will analyse the data before releasing funds to each sector. Earlier, the departments submitted the details of expenditure to the government in the last quarter of the financial year.    

Government has taken the decision to scrutinise the utilisation of funds every quarter in the wake of reports that many departments were not spending allocated funds in given time. As a result, the development works are not completed in a scheduled time. 

The officials said that all welfare departments – BC, SC, ST and minority and state Municipal Administration, Panchayat Raj and Rural Development, Education and Health and Medical departments failed to spend the funds in time for the last four years. While in some cases, funds allocated for a particular scheme have been diverted for other purposes in many wings, in other cases, the departments transferred funds to their own accounts and drew interest on funds for personal use. 

Funds allocated to the universities that are not utilised too came to the notice of the government recently. Officials said that Finance department would directly monitor the expenditure incurred from the funds earmarked to every department and government institutions, including the universities, every quarter.   

Officials said that the Finance department would also monitor the fund flow to each department every month and allocate funds based on the priority accorded to the schemes by the government.