Babus to put budget proposals under microscope

Hyderabad: The government will review the budget proposals in December this year and make suitable amendments if required after examining the revenue trends in the next two months.

The officials have not ruled out the possibility of raising the taxes if it is necessary to improve the revenue. At the same time the budget allocations may be cut to some departments.

Speaking to the media informally, after presentation of budget by the Chief Minister in the Assembly on Monday, the officials of Finance Department said the economic recession prevailing in the country had impacted all the sectors in the State leading to fall in revenues.

They, however, maintained that the real estate sector is doing well in Hyderabad and due to this revenue from Stamps and Registration Departments may rise.

They said the government is proposing to mop up revenue of Rs 10,000 crore through sale of lands in Hyderabad.

The officials said that the allocations to irrigation projects, Mission Bhagiratha and double bedroom programme had been slashed by half as it was decided to provide funds to them through market loans.

They said that the Chief Minister had instructed the officials to clear all the pending bills and the bills of KCR Kits would also be cleared. They said that no allocations had been made to unemployment allowance.

Funds had been provided to Constituency Development Fund. There was no dearth of funds to Kalyana Laxmi scheme. The delay in payments to beneficiaries is taking place due to procedural hurdles.

The officials said the State budget was prepared based on the allocations to be made by the Centre. However, the grants from the Centre would go down and this was the reason to reduce the size of the budget.

They made it clear that new recruitments would be delayed and the unemployed have to wait. They said that the performance of State GDP was good as it was 9 per cent when compared to the Centre's 5 per cent.