April-November fiscal deficit over 115% of target on revenue lag

India's budgetary fiscal deficit for the April-November period at Rs 7.17 lakh crore has exceeded the target for the full fiscal, accounting for 114.8 per cent of the budgeted target of Rs 6.24 lakh crore, mainly owing to slow revenue growth during the period under consideration, official data showed on Thursday.

The data furnished by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA) showed that the fiscal deficit during the corresponding eight months of the previous fiscal was 112 per cent.

Till November, the government's total expenditure stood at Rs 16.13 lakh crore (66.1 per cent of the budget estimates) while the total receipts were Rs 8.97 lakh crore (49.3 per cent of the budget estimates). This is as compared to 54.2 per cent of budget estimates received in the same period of 2017-18.

"Rs 4,31,963 crore has been transferred to state governments as devolution of share of taxes by the government up to this period, which is Rs 46,677 crore higher than the corresponding period of last year," the Finance Ministry said in a statement.

Of the total expenditure in this period, Rs 14.22 lakh crore was on revenue account and Rs 1.91 lakh crore on capital account.

"Out of the total revenue expenditure, Rs 3,48,233 crore is on account of interest payments and Rs 2,19,046 crore is on account of major subsidies," the statement said.

On the other hand, total receipts comprised Rs 7.32 lakh crore of tax revenue, Rs 1.38 lakh crore of non-tax revenue and Rs 26,277 crore of non-debt capital receipts.

While the government's tax revenue during the period in question stood at 49.4 per cent of the budgeted amount, compared to 57 per cent in the same period last year, its non-debt capital receipts at 28.5 per cent registered a much sharper fall on the 73.3 per cent of the target received on this account last year

Non-debt capital receipts during the period in question consisted of loan recovery worth Rs 10,467 crore and disinvestment of public sector undertakings amounting to Rs 15,810 crore.

--IANS

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