Kerala spends more funds

“Even this speculative figure is way below the 60 percent utilisation target fixed by the Planning Board for the third quarter,” a top Planning Board official said. Still, the improvement is commendable coming as it does during a fiscal that witnessed the local body polls, when economic activity tends to slow down.

This minor achievement has come about as a result of two factors. One, an increase in the rate of growth of tax revenue.

If in the last fiscal it was 12 percent, this time it is close to 15 percent. But this is nowhere near the 24 percent growth targeted by the department.

Two, the easing of treasury restrictions had a bigger impact on utilisation. Last fiscal, in a desperate attempt to avoid a treasury shut down, the finance department had imposed severe curbs on treasury funds; it had even restricted the flow of funds to local bodies.

This cannot be called a turnaround, not yet. There are 18 departments, out of the 40, that have a utilisation of below 30 percent. In agriculture, supposed to be a priority for the government, the utilisation is a paltry 21.54 percent.

“During a meeting held today, the agricultural production commissioner has promised that the department would achieve at least 95 percent utilisation by the end of the fiscal,” a source in the chief minister’s office said.

The slim figures for food and civil supplies (19.26 percent) indicate poor state intervention in the market to hold down prices. Strangely, tourism, which had traditionally shown high utilisation, has fallen behind. General education and higher education are the other departments showing poor activity.

The overwork imposed on government secretaries is one reason why plan implementation is delayed. For instance, finance secretary K.M. Abraham is in charge of four other crucial departments, including social justice and higher education.