BHUBANESWAR: Finance Minister Pradip Amat on Monday said Central assistance for different schemes has decreased during the last two years which is likely to affect its implementation.
Replying to a question from Prafulla Samal (BJD), the Minister said the Centre provided `38 crore for Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme (AIBP) in 2012-13 against an outlay of `1088.62 crore. The Central assistance under the scheme decreased to `15.23 crore in 2013-14 against an outlay of `967.57 crore, he said.
Responding to supplementaries, the Minister said though Central share in Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was estimated at `1,363.5 crore in 2013-14, only `757.52 crore was provided.
The Minister said as against a projection of `8,533.01 crore Central assistance in 2012-13 under different schemes, `5,760.85 crore was provided to the State. The gap between estimated assistance and sanction of funds was `2,772.16 crore in 2012-13 while the difference increased to `3,065.13 crore in 2013-14 and as against `8,756.43 crore estimated assistance, only `5691.3 crore was released, he said.
Amat said besides decreasing assistance, delay in sanction of funds has also affected implementation of different schemes. The State Government has requested the Centre to release funds under different schemes in time for their proper implementation, he said.
Stating that reduction in the Central Sales tax (CST) rate for introduction of Goods and Services Tax (GST) also affected the State’s finances, he said the Government demanded compensation of `3,843.03 crore from the Centre for loss incurred by it from 2007-08 to 2012-13 due to slashing of the CST rate. However, the Centre has provided only `1,303.08 crore in this regard so far.
He said the Government has demanded payment of rest of the compensation amount through the empowered committee of the Finance Ministers.
The Chief Minister has also raised the issue with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Amat said and added that increase of CST rate to earlier 4 per cent has also been demanded.