Goa bans foreign tours of ministers, officers till Budget

In an austerity measure, the Goa government today banned foreign tours of all its ministers and officers till Budget and instead asked all the departments to concentrate on revenue-generating activities.
A circular in this regard was issued by by State Finance Secretary Sharat Chauhan. The Laxmikant Parsekar government has also set a limit to the departments to hold state-funded workshops and seminars till new Budget is in place.
According to the circular, there is a complete ban on all foreign visits for study, tours, seminars, conferences, workshops and others including promotion of industry, trade, tourism and others till the Budget.

However, Chauhan said those tours which are already approved (by the government) are exempted from this circular.
"All the department has to follow the economic measures and rationalisation of expenditures, in order to achieve the targets set in the Goa Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, 2006," it said.
"The measures for rationalisation of expenditure are intended to curb necessary revenue expenditure and provide funds for development activities under capital account," it added.

According to the circular, not more than 12.5 per cent of budgetary estimates shall be spend in the month of January, February and March.
The government has also asked the departments to reduce the non-planned expenditure by 40 per cent till March end, while during the month of February and March , the expenditure of each department should be limited to 8.3 per cent of the Budget estimate.

In a bid to control bulk purchases, the circular has said the departments have a tendency of indulging in bulk purchases at the fag end of the Financial Year in order to spend the unspent budgetary provisions allotted for the current fiscal.
Till the end of current fiscal, the government has also banned purchase of office infrastructures like furniture, computers, printers, telephones, office vehicles or cars or any other items.