THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Finance minister Dr T M Thomas Isaac has termed as "gobsmacking boast" BJP national president Amit Shah's claim that the 14th Finance Commission had increased the state's share to Rs 1.35 lakh crore. The state was expected nothing more than Rs 62,773.46 crore from the Centre, Dr Isaac said. Mr Shah, during the conclusion of the Janaraksha Yatra on Tuesday, had claimed that the 14th FC had increased the state's share by over Rs 89,000 crore to Rs 1.35 lakh crore.
In a Facebook post gave a periodic flow of the 14th FC funds to the state. In 2015-16, it was Rs 12,690 crore. In 2016-17, it is Rs 15,225 crore. And in 2017-18, the expected flow is Rs 16,891 crore. A total of Rs 44,806 crore. "Even if one adds the allocation to panchayats for five years (' 7681.96 crore), the revenue deficit grant of Rs 9519 crore and the disaster relief fund of Rs 766.5 crore, it would be just Rs 62,773.46 crore," Dr Isaac said.
He said that the state has to receive Rs 72,074.54 crore in the next two years if the central assistance had to touch Amit Shah's make-believe of figure of Rs 1.35 lakh crore. "Was he trying to say that we are going to get more than what we have already got in the next two years," he asked. "I can only call it a gobsmacking boast," the minister said.
Further, Dr Isaac said that the FC award was not anyone's favour. "It is a Constitutional entitlement," he said. What's more, the 14th FC award was not decided by the Narendra Modi government. "The FC was appointed by the UPA government. The decision was also taken during the UPA tenure," he said.
Isaac argued that instead of increasing the state's share, the Modi goverment had been imposing more burden on the states by slashing the Centre's share in centrally-sponsored schemes. For instance, he said that the state's share in Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan was only 30 per cent earlier. Modi raised it to 50 per cent. The state's share in National Rural health Mission was increased from 10 per cent to 40 per cent.
