Crisil says fiscal deficit to touch 5.2 in FY14

The Centre can reduce its fiscal deficit by as much as Rs 20,000 crore this fiscal by using cash reserves of public sector units, its said in the note. It said the top 20 public sector undertakings will have a cash reserve of Rs 1,60,000 crore by March 2014 and are comfortably placed to pay a special dividend. We estimate these companies are well placed to distribute 40 per cent of the corpus Rs 64,000 crore as dividend without impacting growth plans, it said.

On the fiscal deficit front,it flagged concerns over the flagging revenue collections that may lead to targets being missed.