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Tripura heading for fiscal crisis

By Prabir sil

AGARTALA, Jan 3 � Tripura is currently passing through severe financial crisis with the BJP-led Government at the Centre denying to grant sufficient funds to the State Government, even those which were previously sanctioned.

Speaking to media at the Civil Secretariat here on Saturday, Chief Secretary G Kameshwara Rao said that the State Government had been requesting the Centre to release approved and sanctioned funds for months without any tangible result.

�Our Ministers, officials took up the issue on several occasions with the Union Government. But they keep on deferring the issue saying there were deficit issues with the Central Budget itself�, he said.

�Tripura was sanctioned Rs 475 crore as Special Plan Assistance (SPA) in the current financial year. The State has not received a single rupee in the segment till date�, he pointed out.

The State suffered severe setback in fund release from different Central schemes including development of the police academy, infrastructure development of the Maharaja Bir Bikram (MBB) College and headquarters of three Tripura State Rifles (TSR) battalions.

Tripura was sanctioned Rs 550 crore in the sector. Barely Rs 250 crore was released till date. The fund flow stopped suddenly and didn�t resume despite phases of pursuits in the line.

In one of the strongest shocks, the State Government was learnt to have received Rs 2,500 crore out of Rs 5,500 crore � less than 50 per cent from the Central allocation in budgetary provisions.

�We have received share of Central taxes properly. That�s all we got properly�, Rao added. The State Government earlier voiced anguish over the alleged deprivation by the 13th Finance Commission.

A source in the Department recently said that as the BCR in the scheme of financing for 2014-2015 was estimated to be Rs 1709.96 crore, the State was expecting Special Plan Assistance and Special Central Assistance amounting to Rs 1,500 crore at the minimum during 2014-2015 to take care of resource gap in the non-plan sector. With the SPA entirely crashed, the government is reported to have found itself in a precarious financial position.

Earlier, the Centre has substantially reduced the MGNREGA outlay creating a havoc in the State. Besides, the BJP- led Government has scaled down approved outlay under another national flagship programme � PMGSY � stalling several ongoing road works in the Marxist-ruled State.

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