Secys want raise in their budget ceiling

Citing the need of additional budget for ongoing and new projects under their jurisdiction secretaries of various ministries Wednesday demanded increase in the ceiling of the budget they received from the National Planning Commission (NPC).

Speaking at the Legislature-Parliament’s Development Committee meeting, the secretaries sought help of Committee chairman Rabindra Adhikari to persuading the central planning body in raising the ceiling of the budget given to the line ministries.

Arjun Karki, secretary at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport (MoPIT) demanded Rs. 15 billion should be augmented to his ministry’s budget ceiling.

“We have got the ceiling of Rs. 55 billion for the coming fiscal year 2016/17 which is not enough for the MoPIT as about 90 per cent budget goes to the development of roads. This year we want to expedite Dharan-Chatara road and Syaphrunbeshi-Rasuwagadhi road,” he stated.

The MoPIT has Rs. 48 billion budget for the current fiscal.

Mahendra Man Gurung, secretary of the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MoFALD), complained that although the ministry asked Rs. 90 billion for the coming fiscal year, the NPC sent the ceiling of only Rs. 73 billion.

Likewise, Shankar Prasad Adhikari, secretary of Ministry of Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation, asked additional budget other than the NPC provided ceiling of Rs. 1.09 billion for restructuring the Department of Cooperatives.

Similarly, Bishwa Prakash Pandit, secretary of Ministry of Education said that the government should give even more priority to the education sector. “Even the developed countries treat education as the priority sector. We need to construct more schools this year,” he said.

He also said that the current ceiling of Rs. 101 billion for the next fiscal year’s budget was insufficient for the ministry.

Secretary of Ministry of Livestock Development, Krishna Chandra Paudel said that the country should be self-reliant on milk, egg and meat within three years. “Therefore, we need more budget to develop these sectors.”

Chief secretary Dr. Som Lal Subedi said that there was scattering of and low accountability while handling the budget. He criticized the bureaucracy for lack of professionalism while developing plans and allocating budget.

He urged the ministries to give priority to the incomplete projects being implemented since years.

Geeta Bhakta Joshi, NPC member directed the secretaries to develop programmes with special focus on reconstruction, food security and upcoming 14^th periodic plan.

The government is able to utilise only 32 per cent of the Rs. 817 billion budget of this fiscal so far.

A recent UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN-ESCAP)'s Economic and Social Survey of Asia and Pacific 2016 had raised the issue of poor budget expenditure and pointed that poor project management and bureaucratic hurdles caused the under-disbursement of the allocated budgets.

The UN-ESCAP asked to strengthen the role of fiscal policy in supporting social and economic development, there was a need to address persistent under disbursement.

Meanwhile, the Development Committee called another meeting of NPC and Ministry of Finance to develop the modality for the selection of district level development projects and standards for budget allocation.