The budget document which the FM himself described as ’Pachayum Chuvappum’ or ’Red and Green’ (Red for social justice and green for environment) also has a slew of welfare measures including Rs2/kg rice for workers in the unorganised sector, a scheme for guaranteeing urban jobs and a Green Fund with a corpus of Rs. 1000 crore.
There was no shortage for grandiose green ideas including use of green technology for all future government buildings, incentives for peole who consume less power. The FM himself was dressed in a green kurta and his speech was suffused with liberal doses of egalitatrian and eco-romantic poetry by Vyloppilly Sreedhara Menon.
As an economic and political document Isaac’s 5th budget stands in a spectrum that is diammetrically opposed to the one presented by Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. Pro-reform critics and the opposition was quick to dismiss the budget as a please-all excercise with an eye on the civic body polls. The budget did not have a single creative proposal to generate jobs or new investments.
The budget with a cumulative deficit of Rs.577.09 crore also envisages revenue receipts of Rs 31,180 crores and an expenditure of Rs 314,180 crores.
Isaac who had declared in his 2009-10 Budget speech that the revenue deficit would be done away with next year tried hard to explain why the revenue deficit went up. The new estimate of revenue deficit is 1.9 per cent which is 35 per cent more than the budget estimate. As per the revised estmate, the current year will end with a deficit of Rs. 169.51 crore.
Blaming the centre for sharp reduction in central assistance and income from stamp duty, Isaac said surplus budget would have been possible if the state got a favourable treatment from the 13th Financial Commission.
Isaac said if the state followed the advice of the Finance Commission to get rid of revenue deficit in the next two years, Kerala would have to forego pay revision for employees, give up UGC scale for teachers and reduce welfare pensions.
Stating unequivocally that Kerala is not prepared to do this, Isaac said erala would not accept any Fiscal Responsibility
Legislation to that effect. To get rid of the deficit, it is absolutely
necessary that the Central Government devolves more resources, he added.
The allocation for Information Technology was enhanced to Rs.153 crore from Rs.86 crore. An increase of, 77% increase. The outlay for Tourism sector has been enhanced to Rs.100 crore from Rs.90 crore.
Source - Manorama News
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