Odisha: Budget Expenditure Goes Up To Over 34% In 1st Half Of 2023-24 Fiscal

Bhubaneswar: The Odisha government has achieved substantial growth in Budget expenditure in the first half of 2023-24 financial year.

This was revealed at a meeting of all secretaries, chaired by chief secretary Pradeep Kumar Jena in Bhubaneswar on Wednesday. The total expenditure of Budget provision increased to 34.87% compared to 25.61% during the same period previous year.

Fiscal performance of the state and individual departments including progress of expenditures of DMF & OMBADC Fund were discussed.

The review of sector wise programme expenditure revealed that Fisheries & ARD Department achieved a growth of 158% over the previous year expenditure during the same period. In Infrastructure sector, Energy department achieved highest growth of 2400% over the previous year.

Own Tax revenue also registered significant growth of 14.59% over the previous year mainly due to good performance by GST and ED.

As the Appropriation Bill for the Supplementary Budget, 2023-24 has been passed by the Assembly, all the departments were instructed to take expeditious steps to utilise the additional provisions without resorting to unnecessary parking outside State Exchequer.

Disposal of pension cases was also discussed in detail and the secretaries were advised to expedite the process.

Development Commissioner Anu Garg, all additional chief secretaries, principal secretaries and secretaries of different departments were present in the meeting held at Kharavela Bhawan in the city.