Terming ‘disappointing’ the budget for the year 2015-16, child rights and disabled rights activists said it had reduced allocations for both the sectors.
Not only has budgetary allocations been reduced for child welfare schemes, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has also not specified on some schemes which were announced last year, a release by NGO Child Rights and You (CRY) stated.
“The total child budget in 2015-16 has declined substantially both in absolute amount and as proportion of the total Union budget. In absolute terms, child budget has decreased from Rs. 81,075.26 crore in 2014-15 to Rs. 57,918.51 crore in 2015-16, which is a sharp decline. As proportion of the total expenditure, the total child budget has declined from 4.52 per cent in 2014-15 to 3.26 per cent in 2015-16,” CRY director of policy research and advocacy Komal Ganotra said in a release. About 0.41 per cent of the GDP has been earmarked for children as compared to 0.63 per cent in 2014-15, Ms. Ganotra said, adding that cuts were also made in allocations for the Mid Day Meal and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan schemes.
While allocations for the disabled have been raised, cuts were made in a rehabilitation scheme for the disabled, disabled rights activist Shampa Sengupta said.
