Bengal budget raises farm sector outlays

West Bengal finance minister Asim Dasgupta today rolled out a budget intended to woo voters ahead of the May 2008 panchayat elections across the state, promising creation of new 11,000 teaching jobs, raising outlays for farming and irrigation sectors, extending the irrigation area target for the state to 73 per cent of cropped area and setting aside more funds for land reforms and minority community projects.

The Rs 2 crore deficit budget imposed new taxes to raise Rs 75 crore and set the state domestic product growth target at 9 per cent on the back of higher industrial and agricultural output.

Claiming farm sector growth had been satisfactory, the finance minister raised the foodgrains output target to 1.72 crore ton and set aside Rs 100 crore for procurement of rice and wheat from farmers.

It promised distribution of more than 10,000 acres of land to the landless to further extend cropping area and raised the outlay for the farm sector to Rs 100 crore, promised workers of closed tea gardens Rs 750 per month for a year even the gardens reopened and promised a structure of incentives starting from Rs 100 per month for below poverty line families and girl children to persuade parents to send their offspring to schools and for computer education classes at state centres.

A sum of Rs 150 crore was set aside to sponsor self-help groups (SHGs) while the outlay for irrigation and water management schemes was raised from Rs 340 crore to Rs 420 crore, while the fisheries and forests departments also got more funds for rural schemes.

The state's bidi workers, mostly in the backward central districts, were promised 15,000 housing units while families who lost chickens because of the recent bird flu outbreak would get Rs 39 crore more as compensation.

The latter was important as rural household-based chicken rearing was one of the most important anti-poverty schemes in the state.

For the Sunderbans area and backward districts, a sum of Rs 190 crore was set aside, and backward classes development department was promised Rs 224 crore for the year's programmes.

Over 500 new schools would be built in one year for the minority community while more than a thousand existing schools would be upgraded.

The total outlay for programmes relating to the minority community was raised to Rs 1000 crore for the year.

The outlay for the primary education was raised from Rs 670 crore and Rs 800 crore, that for technical education from Rs 55 crore to Rs 135 crore and higher education from Rs 92 crore to Rs 118 crore.

Outlays for safe water schemes and primary health programmes were raised as well, with mother and child schemes promised support of Rs 365 crore against Rs 261 crore in the previous budget. To keep workers happy, it doubled the outlay for labour welfare measures to Rs 80 crore while employers gained from a 8.5 per cent cut in state duties on some raw materials, biscuits, shoes below Rs 700 a pair and equipment like road building machinery.

To silence criticism on acquisition of premium farmland for industry, he promised payment of premium of upto 15 per cent over market price for land taken over, and increased the support for the land reforms department by Rs 20 crore for this purpose. Fresh taxes were levied on new cars and Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL) but the luxury tax on premium hotel services was brought down from 10 per cent to 5 per cent as was the state tax on imported liquor.

A special outlay of Rs 150 crore was set aside for development on ancillary units, and at first glance this was done to assist the Tata Motors Rs 1 lakh car plant at Singur, industry sources here said.

A sum of Rs 122 crore was promised for development of SME clusters and units while an additional funding of Rs 15 crore was promised to the state information technology department and Rs 56 crore more for the urban development arm of the government.