The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has prepared budget proposals worth a whopping ₹13,150 crore for the financial year 2018-19, notwithstanding the fact that it could not spend even a tenth of its revised budget estimates during the first half of the current year.
The budget proposals will be placed for discussion at the Standing Committee meeting on Thursday.
Proposing to spend more than ₹10,000 crore on asset creation (capital expenditure), the civic body has shown over 60 % of it under Housing, in obvious reference to the ongoing double bedroom housing project in the city.
At over ₹2000 crore proposed allocations for the roads and pavements are the next biggest component, followed by proposed expenditure on creation of water supply and sewerage network in the peripheral municipalities at close to ₹630 crore.
Low spending
Rosy projections aside, fact is that the civic body could not spend more than ₹313 crore during the current financial year up to September-end. It is not even 10 % of the revised budget estimates for the year which are pegged at over ₹5,000 crore.
Housing has added substantially to the revised estimates too. Originally pegged at ₹400 crore, the budget under the head has been revised to over ₹2,300 crore, apparently in anticipation of funding from the State government as promised by Municipal Administration Minister and Urban Development K.T. Rama Rao in the Legislative Council on Tuesday. A revised figure of close to ₹ 4,000 crore under the head ‘Plan Grants’ in ‘Capital Receipts’ substantiates the anticipation. During the original budgetary estimates, the figure was mere ₹413 crore.
Upon enquiry, officials from GHMC have told, under the condition of anonymity, that the government has not sanctioned even a penny from the original estimate too, leave alone the revised one.
Same remains true of the expenditure on laying of roads and pavements. While the budget for the current year proposed a handsome ₹1611 crore under the head, the revised estimates capped it at ₹1445 crore and the sanctions for the first half amount to ₹1323 crore. However, the expenditure so far remains a little over ₹100 crore. Of over ₹300 crore revised estimates for capital expenditure on storm water drains, the amount spent during the first six months remains at ₹13 crore.
On the income front too, projections belie the actual receipts. The revised budgetary estimates for the revenue income stand at over ₹2,900 crore, of which only about ₹1000 crore have been realised so far.
Nevertheless, the revenue receipts for the next year are projected to cross ₹3,300 crore.
