At Rs 5.91 trn, India's April-Aug fiscal deficit at 94.7% of annual target

India's budgetary fiscal deficit for April-August at Rs 5.91 trillion accounted for 94.7 per cent of the full year's target of Rs 6.24 trillion, official data showed on Tuesday.

The data furnished by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) showed that the fiscal deficit during the corresponding five months of the previous fiscal was 96.1 per cent.

Till August this year, the government's total expenditure stood at Rs 10.70 trillion (43.85 per cent of the budget estimates) while the total receipts were Rs 0.0479 billion (26.38 per cent of the budget estimates).

"Rs 2673. 02 billion has been transferred to state governments as devolution of share of taxes by the government up to this period which is Rs 263.90 billion higher than the corresponding period of last year," the Finance Ministry said in a statement.

Out of the total expenditure, Rs 9.38 trillion was on revenue account and Rs 1.32 trillion on capital account.

"Out of the total revenue expenditure, Rs 2191.11 billion is on account of interest payments and Rs 1706.17 billion is on account of major subsidies," the statement said.

On the other hand, total receipts comprised Rs 3.66 trillion of tax revenue, Rs 983.32 billion of non-tax revenue and Rs 150.20 billion of non-debt capital receipts, the government said.

Non-debt capital receipts consisted of loan recovery worth Rs 55.96 billion and disinvestment of public sector undertakings amounting to Rs 94.24 billion.