Small savings, big burden

The Centre has to bear the maximum burden of borrowing NSSF loans to the tune of Rs 1 lakh crore

Government securities against the collections in the National Small Savings Fund (NSSF) will probably trump the budget estimate of Rs 1 lakh crore this fiscal year on account of an increased public preference for safe and long-term investments.

This has been demonstrated by an almost three-fold jump in the NSSF collections in the first half of FY18 (April-September), at Rs 30,400 crore, from Rs 11,000 crore in the same period of the previous financial year.

This figure does not include contributions to the public provident fund (PPF) through nationalised and other commercial banks. Those have been accounted for by the