THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board (KIIFB) helps the government overcome the limitations of the budget, Finance Minister Thomas Isaac has said. “Revenue income has to be increased if budgetary provisioning is to be increased significantly. So we had to look for options other than the budget,” he said in the assembly during the discussion on the Kerala Finance Bill, 2021.
He was replying to K N A Khader’s criticism that KIIFB has sidelined the state budget and government departments. Khader likened the role of KIIFB to that of ‘Bengalis’ being employed by Keralites for various jobs. “The weighty box is not the one brought by the minister on the budget day but the KIIFB. The KIIFB has sidelined departments like the PWD, KWA and Minor Irrigation and their able staff,” Khader said. The legislator also complained that KIIFB projects are not evenly distributed in the state.
The minister said the government was ready to increase the allocation for Travancore Devaswom Board. “No temple will have to be closed due to finance constraints,” he said in reply to V S Sivakumar. “Of the `100 crore sanctioned in the previous budget, `75 crore was granted,” he said.The minister said the second phase land acquisition for the phase II development of the national highway will be funded by KIIFB. He, however, did not respond to Sivakumar’s demand for government intervention to make the Ustad Amjad Ali Khan music school project a reality.
Sivakumar listed several budget proposals of the Pinarayi Vijayan government which remained on paper. Also, the Attukal township project made little headway. The Smart City project was delayed as the government defaulted on payment of its share of `500 crore. The second medical college project in the capital district launched by the previous UDF government was dropped by the present government.Mons Joseph, in his address, asked the finance minister to give administrative sanction to a certain number of projects in the present budget without delay.