Rs 2,000 cr funds unutlised by Tamil Nadu govt depts identified: State FM

The money, identified under three categories, can be remitted back to treasury, says Palanivel Thiaga Rajan

A special task force appointed by the government of Tamil Nadu has identified funds amounting to about Rs 2,000 crore lying unutilised by various departments and agencies that can be remitted back to the treasury, Tamil Nadu Finance Minister Palanivel Thiaga Rajan said on Monday.

The Special Task Force has collected and collated information broadly under the categories of 'available balances', 'liabilities' and 'to be remitted into government account', separately under each of the closed schemes, ongoing schemes and receipts of the department. “By this process, from the data so far collected, the Special Task Force has tracked a sum of Rs 1,946.31 crore that can be immediately remitted back to the Government Account,” Thiaga Rajan said addressing the media.

In his budget speech early this year, the finance minister had said that Government funds are often shifted to accounts outside the view of the Treasury system and the government will establish a special task group under the senior officers of the Finance Department to fully reconcile the accounts and identify funds which have lapsed and which still be utilized

Accordingly, a Special Task Force was constituted to reconcile, identify and access the funds of the government departments, government-run societies, statutory institutions, local bodies kept outside the treasury, within a particular timeframe. “It is important to put in place a mechanism to prevent the recurrence of such instances of idle non-utilisation of funds in the future. Towards this end, the direct disbursal of funds from the Government treasury to the ultimate beneficiaries – pensioners, Government servants receiving salaries, Old Age pensioners, recipients of scholarships and of final payments for works and supply of goods and services through the Integrated Financial and Human Resources Management System (IFHRMS) - will ensure that there is no idling of funds of a substantial portion of the budget,” he said.

However, some schemes will continue to be implemented through intermediate agencies of government like companies, societies and local bodies. For such schemes, a state level public financial management system (PFMS) will be implemented in association with the agency banks. Under this system, the bank balances available with the agencies for scheme implementation, after drawal from the Government treasury, will be kept in line of sight of the Finance Department, he said. The further flow of funds will be tracked till they reach the final beneficiary.

The minister said that a similar analysis of crop loan and jewel loan data of co-operative banks has led to the unearthing of several irregularities. “For instance, the same person has taken multiple loans from multiple societies for the same small piece of agricultural land. At some places jewel loans have been given without any jewels being pledged.All such issues will be effectively addressed by this new approach,” he added