Tax-free, deficit budget for Andhra

hyderabad: after demystifying the budgetary exercise by throwing open the draft proposals for public debate, the andhra pradesh government presented a tax-free budget for 2002-03 projecting a deficit of rs 85.68 crore. promising to make the budget ''interactive'', finance minister y ramakrishnudu, while presenting the budget in the assembly, said allocations of some vital departments had been ''modified'' based on feedback received from various quarters since ''draft budget'' was placed for public debate last month. the annual plan outlay for 2002-03 has been pegged at rs 10,082.70 crores, reflecting an increase of 12.14 per cent over last year. a rs 75-crore agricultural development fund and a market intervention fund, with an initial token contribution of rs 10 crores were unveiled to help farmers face the challenges of wto regime. the budget projected a plan expenditure of rs 11,299.50 crores and non-plan expenditure of rs 28,120.50 crores, resulting in a revenue deficit of rs 2,481.83 crores, accounting for 1.5 per cent of the gross state domestic product. the fiscal deficit was estimated to be rs 7,499.31 crores, which would be 4.5 per cent of the gsdp, ramakrishnudu said adding, "after taking into account the overall transactions of the year, we will have a net deficit of rs 67.30 crores. with the negative balance of rs 18.38 crores, financial year is expected to end with a negative balance of rs 85.68 crores." the increase in the plan outlay was 21 per cent compared to the revised estimate of rs 8,329.44 crore for 2001-02. during his 90-minute budget presentation, occasionally jeered by opposition benches, ramakrishnudu also announced that a cabinet sub-committee would be constituted to design and oversee new programmes in agriculture and its allied areas while the proposed agricultural development fund would be utilised for improving productivity. in tune with tdp government''s target of 100 per cent literacy by 2005, school education department was provided the highest budgetary allocation with rs 3,482.37 crores being earmarked for the year while higher education was allocated rs 967.06 crores. among the sectors whose allocations were enhanced based on the feedback from public were irrigation (rs 2,091.65 crores) and agriculture (rs 446.87 crores) while power, another key sector where aggressive reforms are being pursued, was earmarked rs 2,564 crores, a major chunk of which would go towards power subsidy. touching upon it-related initiatives, which have been one of the key focus areas of tdp government, the minister announced that the ''apnet'' project, aimed at taking the benefits of it to rural masses in areas like telemedicine, e-governance and self-help groups, was ready for launch on a pilot basis. the project uses the ku band transponder and technical assistance of the indian space research organisation. the ''e-seva'', a one-stop computerised facility offering a wide variety of citizen services, would be extended to 50 more centres during the year, the minister said. at present, ''e-seva'' is available at 16 centres in the twin cities. another networking project skims (secretariat knowledge and information management system) would be launched during this year for creating a generic solution for easy and effective decision-making, ramakrishnudu said, adding the system could be extended to other offices in the state. an e-governance road map was also being drawn up for a more systematic and sustained development of e-governance projects in the state. the draft budget, released on january 29 outlining critical priorities and medium term fiscal framework for 2002-03 to 2006-07, had evoked good response from people of all walks of life, he said. "we will further improve the format of budget presentation and interactive process and make it a regular feature in future." the finance minister also spoke about government''s willingness to "share with public the actual budget performance" on a periodic basis during the course of the year. referring to budgetary reforms undertaken by the government, he said an integrated finance information system would be put in place soon to integrate different existing computer applications in various wings of the finance department.