Eyeing PM post,Narendra Modi slammed by CAG for being fiscally imprudent

The report,alongside the one in which CAG raps Modi over his govt showing undue favours to Reliance Industries,Adani and Essar,will dent his assiduously-built image of being the social and economic saviour of Gujarat and in future,if gets to be PM,of India too.

The report points out that government’s expenditure for 2011-12 stood at Rs 80,222.83 crore against the approval of Rs 85,743.21 crore,resulting in non-utilisation of funds worth Rs 5,520.38 crore.

The CAG report stated that during 2011-12,the government raised excess market loans than required for financing its deficit,showing non-application of prudent fiscal management.

“As a result,the cash balance of the state as on March 31,2012 stood at Rs 18,632 crore,which was 24 per cent higher than that of previous year. The cost of holding surplus cash balances is high. Since maintaining huge idle cash balance is not prudent cash management,appropriate steps should be taken for spending on capital projects for creation of assets,” it said in the report.

It has also highlighted the steady increase of the outstanding fiscal liabilities.

“The outstanding fiscal liabilities have shown steady increase over the years,from Rs 96,452 crore at the end of 2007-08 to Rs 1,50,785 crore at the end of 2011-12,” it said.

The report has also taken a critical view of government’s financial accountability and budget management for non-spending and non-utilisation of allocated funds.

Pointing out the savings in grant amount of Rs 501.70 crore pertaining to non-residential buildings of roads and buildings department,the report says,”it was on account of higher provision for new works,time consuming tender procedures,delay in preparation of estimates and non allotment of land.”

The report stated that there were instances where funds allocated for backward classes were not utilised.

Delay in administrative approvals,technical sanction and tendering among others resulted in non-utilisation of funds

worth Rs 28.66 crore out of Rs 44.98 crore provided in the budget estimates for the welfare of backward classes,it said.

Similarly,referring to the grant for legal department,it pointed out that of the total savings of Rs 160.50 crore,savings of Rs 53.63 crore were due to non-approval of action plan and posts by the state,Rs 7.60 crore due to non-filing of vacant posts and Rs 6.48 crore due to non-releasing of payments against the claims which were under scrutiny.

The CAG has also pointed out instances of expenditure incurred without any budgetary provisions.

“As per the Gujarat Budget Manual,expenditure should not be incurred on a scheme/service without provisions of funds.

It was,however,noticed that expenditure of Rs 42.27 crore were incurred in two cases under two grants without any provisions and reasons for it were not intimated,” it stated.

The government auditor has pointed out instances of improvements in state government’s fiscal management,particularly in revenue expenditure.

“The overall revenue expenditure of the state increased by 78 per cent from Rs 33,539 crore in 2007-08 to Rs 59,744 crore in 2011-12 though its share in total expenditure declined from 82.27 per cent 2007-08 to 80.56 per cent in 2011-12 indicating improvement in quality of expenditure,” it said.

The report also took a positive note of the profits made by 41 PSUs of the state saying there was an improvement in their functioning during 2011-12 as compared to 2006-07 and accumulative profit have increased from Rs 1,826 crore in 2006-07 to Rs 3,929 crore in 2011-12.