President to arrive on a three-day visit to Bengal

President Pranab Mukherjee will arrive here on August 22 on a three-day visit during which he will attend a number of programmes in Kolkata and Murshidabad.
"The President would attend the CII special plenary session on the first day of his visit," state secretariat officials said today.
In the evening, he would attend another programme to mark 150 years of homoeopathy, organised by the Dr Prasanta Banerjee Homoeopathic Research Foundation.
On August 23, the President would launch Moitree Service of the All India Radio (AIR) at the Raj Bhavan, besides taking part in two other programmes organised by Bangiya Sahitya Parishad and Bharat Chamber of Commerce.

The President further said that public expenditure has
increased manifold and the scope and range of governmental activities has risen exponentially.

At the time of independence in 1946-47, the receipts of government stood at Rs 3,706 crore and its expenditure at Rs 3,443 crore. In 2014-15, receipts and expenditure had both increased to around Rs 17 lakh crore.
This unprecedented growth has obviously led to newer paradigms in public financial management, Mukherjee said.
"The concept of governance is rapidly changing and leveraging technology would enable the government to effectively reach out to the poorest of the poor.
"Increased use of technology platforms would help to ensure that benefits of government schemes and programmes effectively reach the disadvantaged and financially excluded sections of the society," he said.

Mukherjee stated that Albert Einstein had once observed, "It is important not to stop questioning" and he was happy to be present in the precincts of an institution whose job is to question.
Speaking on the occasion, Lok Sabha Speaker Mahajan said Goods and Services Tax (GST) is the biggest and most important tax reform to have taken place in the country after independence.
This, she said, is expected to completely transform India's tax administration.
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Mahajan further said that a technology revolution is taking place in today's world and it is shaping every aspect of life.
Massive transformation is taking place in the way commercial enterprises are using a new emerging technologies and now conducting their businesses, for example e-commerce, e-procurement or e-tendering, she added.

"Governance and administrative machinery cannot remain isolated from the effects of changes taking place around the globe. Technology also enables us to bring greater transparency and integrity to the system. This also calls for CAG to change accordingly," she said.
CAG needs to impart training and skills to their officials to keep abreast of the technological and other developments taking place in the world, the Speaker added.
PAC Chairman Thomas said though the mandate and access of CAG appear sweeping, the audit findings are mostly ignored and the government officers often delay or just do not reply to its questions.

"The non-cooperation by the executive in a large number of cases is too acute that I had to suggest to CAG to consider a fresh audit, if the records not available for scrutiny is too large to arrive at a meaningful finding," he said.
Another concern, he said, is that thousands of audit findings remain without any positive response from the Ministries and hundreds of such pending paragraphs are getting repeated every year in the audit reports of the same Ministry.
Thomas further said public private partnerships (PPPs) have become major stakeholders in the process of development and this has introduced complexities in fund flows, expenditure, accounting and evaluation.

"It is high time that all PPP projects, irrespective of source of funding, are brought under the purview of CAG," he said.
He said that officers of the CAG's establishment, except those from the Indian Audit and Accounts Service, are appointed by the executive. The CAG, although appointed by the Executive, is not removable except as provided for in the Constitution.
"All other officers remain under the influence of the executive. This poses an institutional conflict. I suggest that the appointment of the CAG may remain with the executive as at present, but the officers and staff of the CAG should be appointed by the CAG from amongst personnel of impeccable integrity," Thomas added.

He also said each flagship programme must be brought under audit in the lines of action research with monitoring and evaluation, with fixation of goal-posts in the base-line, midline and end-line and concurrent monitoring.
He also said some methodology has to be defined to ensure that the Cabinet decisions get implemented within the time prescribed.