Govt agencies seek Rs 50b additional budget

PRABHAKAR GHIMIRE

 KATHMANDU, March 21: Given the insufficient budget allocation through ordinance budget, more than three dozen government agencies, including key ministries, have demanded additional budget amounting to over Rs 50 million for different programs.

More than two-thirds of the total amount has been sought for regular expenditure.

However, finance ministry officials said it would be impossible to release additional budget as demanded given the resources constraints.

“We have received demand for over Rs 50 billion from different government agencies. But it would very difficult, if not impossible, for us to arrange fund given the limited resources at our disposal,” Lok Darshan Regmi, joint secretary at the finance ministry, told Republica on Wednesday.

Mid-term review of budget made public recently by the finance ministry also shows that different government agencies demanded Rs 38.67 billion for recurrent expenditure, Rs 2.66 billion for capital expenditure and Rs 7.20 billion for financial management until mid-January.

The peace ministry, which has been overseeing the ongoing peace process, has demanded the highest amount (Rs 13.76 billion) followed by education ministry (Rs 6.08 billion) and home ministry (Rs 5.87 billion).

Ten ministries demanded additional budget of more than one billion rupees each during the first six months of current fiscal year. Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport has demanded Rs 2.66 billion while Irrigation Ministry has asked for Rs 1.61 billion.

Similarly, finance ministry commerce and supplies ministry have demanded Rs 1.8 billion and Rs 2.86 billion, respectively. Federal affair ministry, tourism ministry and defense ministry have asked for Rs 1.01 billion, Rs 3.29 billion and Rs 3 billion, respectively.

Some of the ministries have increased the budget demand compared to the amount recorded until mid-January, according to the officials.

Election Commission has demanded additional budget of Rs 7 billion for the proposed general election. The government has allocated Rs 3 billion for the purpose
“As the budget for different ministries has been reduced by an average of 15 percent compared to last year´s actual allocation, most of the government agencies have demanded additional budget mainly for recurrent expenditures,” Finance Secretary Shanta Raj Subedi told Republica.

“Some ministries such as home, defense and education have demanded additional budget as they have been facing fund crunch even to pay salary. Some demand for additional budget has come for less priority projects,” added Subedi.

Though the ordinance budget has set spending cap on Rs 351 billion on par with last year´s allocation, reduction in allocation by around 15 percent and additional out flow of fund for pensioners and grade amount for employees forced the ministries and other agencies to ask for additional resources.

“As we are not in a position to release additional budget as demanded by different agencies, we are preparing to announce a full-fledged budget for current fiscal year,” Subedi said.

Tulasi Prasad Sitaula, secretary at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport, said the demand for additional budget was made on the ground of urgency and in response to the demand for different development programs from people´s level.

“Though we have been demanding additional budget for various programs, allocation of budget as per our demand has remained nominal,” added Sitaula.