KCR looks to stem revenue loss

Directs officials to come out with financial management plan as revenue takes a whopping Rs 52,750 crore hit

Hyderabad: Telangana is likely to suffer a severe dent in its revenues amounting to a whopping Rs 52,750 crore in the current financial year. With revision of the State budget estimates for 2020-21 becoming inevitable under these circumstances, Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao directed the officials to fix priorities and come up with a financial management plan in line with the decline in the State revenue.

Chief Minister Chandrasekhar Rao held an interim review meeting with Telangana State Planning Board vice-chairman B Vinod Kumar, Government Chief Advisor Rajiv Sharma, Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar and other officials at Pragathi Bhavan on Saturday. Officials briefed him on the financial condition of the State in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Telangana earned Rs 39,608 crore during the seven-month period from April to October in the 2019-20 financial year through tax and non-tax revenues. However, the State had received only Rs 33,704 crore for the corresponding period during the current financial year 2020-21. The State revenue growth rate was projected at 15 per cent in 2020-21, with total State revenues being estimated at Rs 67,608 crore. Due to the COVID epidemic, the State revenues have not only remained short of last year’s revenue, but also are likely to be reduced by Rs 33,904 crore.

The State’s share in the Central taxes also has reduced drastically. As per the Union Budget for 2020-2021 financial year, the Centre promised to allocate Rs 16,727 Crore to Telangana towards the State’s share in the Central taxes. As against Rs 8,363 crore to be disbursed to the State for the period of April-October 2020-2021, Telangana received only Rs 6,339 crore from the Centre so far and resulted in shortfall of Rs 2,025 crore. By the end of financial year 2020-2021, the State is estimated to get Rs 11,898 crore instead of Rs 16,727 crore, which was its actual due. Thus, the State would lose another Rs 4,829 crore in its revenues.

Further, the Centre was expected to release Rs 9,725 crore to the State towards several Centrally sponsored schemes for 2020-2021 financial year. Though the State was due to get Rs 5,673 crore by end of October, only Rs 4,592 crore have been released so far which resulted in loss of another Rs 1,081 crore from the Central funds. Officials indicated that by end of this financial year, the State is likely to get total Rs 8,923 crore under the Centrally sponsored schemes instead of Rs 9,725 crore promised earlier. Thus, there will be Rs 802 crore cut in the central schemes funds.

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