Visakhapatnam
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The Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation has pegged its estimated budget at ₹4,544.07 crore (including the opening balance of ₹480.58 crore) for the 2023-24 financial year. It is an increase of around ₹223 crore compared to the approved budget of ₹4,319 crore with an opening balance of ₹434 crore in the previous fiscal 2022-23.
The proposed expenses under all heads will be about ₹4,063.49 crore in the new fiscal compared to ₹4,061 crore approved expenditure in 2022-23. In the new fiscal budget, the estimated deposits from all heads will be around ₹3,823 crore.
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“This will be a surplus budget of ₹480.58 crore. There will be changes including add-ons in the budget after the draft will be presented in the council meet scheduled to be held on February 15,” the GVMC officials said.
Some estimates of the 2023-2024 budget expenditure include ₹315.40 crore in the Planning wing, ₹520 crores in the Urban Community Development, ₹20 crore for parks, ₹118.11 crore for public health and ₹431.60 crore for drinking water supply.
On the other hand, even though Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy is ready to shift his base to Visakhapatnam as per his latest statement in New Delhi during the road map meeting of the Global Investors Summit, there is no `special mention’ of the estimates in the budget for improvement of the city’s infrastructure like roads to bring `Capital look’ to Visakhapatnam. Sources said that there will be a special allocation from the State Government, only after the official launch of the capital from Visakhapatnam. Until then, there will be no special mention about the estimates in the GVMC’s annual budget, the GVMC sources said.
‘No Capital-related works’
Speaking to The Hindu, GVMC Commissioner P. Rajababu said, “The draft budget to be presented in the council meeting on February 15 has no ‘Capital-related’ works till now.”