Odisha govt hikes contingency fund size to Rs 1,400 crore

Odisha government today decided to hikes its Contingency Fund size to Rs 1,400 crore from Rs 400 crore, a top official said.

A proposal in this regard was approved at the cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik here today.

"The Corpus of the OCF was enhanced to Rs 1,400 crore by amending the Odisha Contingency Fund Act," said chief secretary A P Padhi adding that accordingly it was decided to issue of ordinance to raise the corpus of the fund.

He said the corpus amount was raised to meet the emergent expenditure.

The state has recently received Central Assistance of Rs 1052.26 crore towards 60 per cent Central Share of Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS) Swachh Bharat Mission - Gramin (SBM-G).

As per Government of India guidelines, the Central share along-with the 40 per cent matching state share is required to be released to the implementing agency within 15 days from the date of receipt of the sanction order from Government of India.

Therefore, the total amount (including 40 per cent state share) required to be released against the Central Assistance for SBM-G is Rs 1756.91 crore.

The budget provision is, however, Rs 1000 crore under the unit in 2018-19, which is inadequate to meet the requirement, the official said.

The Panchayati Raj & Drinking Water Department had requested for sanction of advance amounting to Rs 756.91 crore from Odisha Contingency Fund (OCF) to meet the emergent expenditure.

Besides, Padhi said there is need to maintain some balance in the contingency fund to meet the emergent nature of expenditure till formulation of Supplementary Statement of Expenditure, 2018-19.

Therefore, it is imperative in the interest of public service to increase the corpus of the Contingency Fund from Rs 400 (Rupees Four Hundred) crore to Rs 1,400 crore temporarily, he said.

Since the Odisha Legislative Assembly is not in session and to meet the urgent and emergent need, the corpus of the fund is to be enhanced by an Ordinance, the chief secretary said.