The Telangana government has withdrawn its proposal to introduce separate agriculture budget for 2018-19 citing procedural and technical issues. It will, however, accord top priority in allocation of funds to the agriculture sector and programmes or schemes meant for the welfare of farmers.
A meeting convened by Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao with his Cabinet colleagues, Chief Whips in the Assembly and Council, Chief Adviser and senior officials of Finance, Agriculture and Legislative Assembly Secretary here on Monday, reviewed the guidelines and legislative procedure pertaining to the introduction of the State Budget and a separate agriculture budget for 2018-19. When a discussion took place on the feasibility of a separate budget for agriculture, Mr. Rao was informed by the officials that the entire budget should be one and the Constitution guidelines would not allow separate budget proposals for different departments.
Under Rule 150 of the Legislative Guidelines, receipts and expenditure were only treated as budget. Other plans, programmes and schemes would come under the Bills and as such they could not be treated as separate budget, the officials explained. Mr. Rao also concurred with the officials’ view. Sources said that the government felt it was not worth giving a handle to the Opposition to disrupt the proceedings and divert the discussion by picking on the procedural lapses related to a separate agricultural budget.
Barring a separate budget, all the programmes and schemes for helping farmers would figure in the budget. The meeting was attended by Ministers T. Harish Rao, P. Srinivas Reddy, Eatala Rajendar, Tummala Nageswara Rao, Chief Whips in Assembly and Council Koppula Eswar and P. Sudhakar Reddy respectively, Chief Advisor to Government Rajiv Sharma, Economic Advisor G.R. Reddy, Principal Secretaries S. Narsing Rao, Ramakrishna Rao, Parthasarathy and officials.
