The >budget available with the Council of Ministers for travel has more than doubled in 2015-16, at a time when the Finance Ministry has issued strict advisories restricting foreign travels undertaken by government officials.
“It has been the policy of this government to reach out to as many countries as possible, and send its ministers to countries that have not been visited, sometimes for decades,” a senior government official said, explaining the possible reasons why the travel budget for the ministers has seen such an increase.
>Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made a point of travelling to many countries not previously on the radar, and the Ministry of External Affairs listed the fact that over 100 countries had been visited over the last few years as one of the government’s achievements, the official added.
The > Budget announced by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Monday saw the allocation for the Ministry of External Affairs fall by Rs. 43 crore to Rs 15,041.08 crore in the Revised Estimates for 2015-16. The Budget Estimates for 2016-17 saw this figure falling even further to Rs. 14,662.7 crore.
