Fiscal deficit till Sept falls to 65% of Budget target

Non-plan expenditure witnessed some reduction in its pace of rise as a percentage of BE over the period

The government’s fiscal deficit till September fell marginally to 65.6 per cent of the Budget Estimate (BE) for 2012-13, compared with 65.7 per cent till August.

If the finance minister’s revised target of reining in fiscal deficit at 5.3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) is taken into account, the gap between the Centre’s expenditure and revenue declined to 62.55 per cent of the target, against 62.68 per cent till August.

Advance collections in September helped the Centre maintain the growth in revenue collected during the month, as percentage of BE, compared to the corresponding period last year. However, year-on-year, the growth slowed. Rise in non-Plan expenditure, as percentage of BE, saw a fall over the same period.

For the April-September period, in absolute terms, the fiscal deficit stood at Rs 3.36 lakh crore, compared with Rs 3.37 lakh crore in the April-August period.

That the fiscal deficit (in absolute terms) till a particular month is less than that till the previous month is a rarity. In the previous financial year, the fiscal deficit till September stood at Rs 2.80 lakh crore, more than the Rs 2.73 lakh crore till August. Till September 2011, the fiscal deficit had touched 68 per cent of BE, against 66.3 per cent till August.

The break-up of the fiscal deficit showed till September this financial year, tax revenues (net of devolution of the share to states), rose to Rs 2.93 lakh crore, 38.1 per cent of the BE of Rs 7.71 lakh crore. Till August, tax collections stood at just Rs 1.75 lakh crore, 22.7 per cent of the BE.

The huge jump in tax collections in September, however, doesn’t come as a surprise, as the exchequer received second quarterly advance taxes. Last financial year, too, tax collections rose from Rs 1.44 lakh crore (21.8 per cent of BE) till August to Rs 2.54 lakh crore (38.3 per cent of BE) till September.

On the expenditure side, both non-Plan and Plan expenditure rose, though the rise in non-Plan expenditure declined moderately.