Thrust And Impact

EVEN as the National Assembly Tuesday unanimously approved the Appropriation Bill 2058 (Budget estimates of Fiscal Year 2058-59), Finance Minister Dr. Ram Sharan Mahat sought to address various queries raised by elders over the past days. One of the thrusts of the budget for this fiscal year is to plug the leakage in governmental financial transactions, which makes a mockery of financial discipline and optimum utilisation of what little resources we have. When the hard-earned resources at the disposal of the national exchequer gets squandered away for various reasons through seemingly endless pores, development projects and programmes falter and have little impact. The Finance Minister told the National Assembly members that the government was going to release soon a set of reform-oriented financial regulations to check irregularities and leakage in the development projects, tenders, allotment of rations for police and army. It is imperative that strict implementation of stringent financial regulations become the order of the day in the coming months, so that funds are not frittered away through corruption, mismanagement or financial indiscipline. That the budget does not include those projects which were thought to be unsustainable is a well-placed measure as white elephants in the form of unsustainable projects only drain the resources which could be otherwise spent on priority projects. The government’s policy, as mentioned in the budget proposals, of promoting involvement of private sector in the weak public enterprises also has to be seen in the light of utilising the taxpayers’ money in the best possible way.

One of the contentions of the elders during their debate on the Appropriation Bill was that the budget did not include programmes that generated the opportunities for employment and helped alleviate poverty. Dr. Mahat tried to deflect that criticism by saying that the budget encompassed measures to ensure industrial security, improve environment for investment, increase agriculture production and productivity and promote additional investment in the sector of information and technology, thereby increasing employment and minimizing slackening in the economy. The focus of the budget on employment generation and poverty alleviation cannot be faulted with. But it remains to be seen how the proposed budget fares on the level of implementation. There is no gainsaying that for the proposed budgetary plans and programmes to succeed, implementation has to proceed without hitch. Only then will the budget for the current Fiscal Year could make some impact.