Global meltdown to impact state revenue collection

The Orissa government today admitted that the economic slowdown is a global phenomenon and the state’s economy cannot be insulated from its impact. Though the government will be able to achieve the revenue collection target fixed for the current fiscal, the next fiscal will pose tough challenges.

While the revenue collection is likely to be hit in the coming months, the government will have to foot a larger salary bill on account of the implementation of the revised pay scales for the state government employees.

“We have not faced the impact in the state so far but it is bound to affect Orissa as the manufacturing units are either reducing or stopping production entirely”, finance minister Prafulla Chandra Ghadai said. He said, the export of goods including minerals have come to a standstill with the transport sector and sales being worst hit.

Expressing satisfaction over the collection of tax and non-tax revenue during the first seven months of the current fiscal, the finance minister said, the total collections till the end of October 2008 was Rs 5289.64 crore which is 56.23 percent of the budget estimates for 2008-09.This collection is 23.26 percent higher compared to the achievement in the same period in the previous fiscal.

The collection of tax revenue surged by 23.77 percent by October 2008 and the non-tax revenue went up by 21.55 percent. While the collection of sales tax went up by 31.48 percent, the land revenue collection increased by 47.37 percent between Apr-Oct. The collections of state excise also recorded an increase of 26.64 percent. In the non-tax revenue segment, the collections of mineral revenue increased by 40.59 percent and user charges collected from medium irrigation surged by 56.81 percent.

The revenue expenditure of all the departments was 36.63 percent by end of October which conforms to the guidelines of the state government. According to the guidelines, 15 percent of the budgetary allocation is spent in each of the first and second quarter with 30 percent spending in the third quarter of the fiscal. The remaining 40 percent of the plan outlay is normally spent in the fourth quarter.