Etela to present people-friendly State Budget

Hyderabad: Minister for Finance Etela Rajender will be presenting the State’s last full-fledged annual estimation for the year 2018-19 with a note of assurance of priority spending on key sectors. This being an election year, liberal allocations is expected to large segments of the electorate such as the peasant community, backward classes, SCs, STs and minorities, who constitute nearly 90 per cent of the State population.

The main focus of the budget will be the farmer-friendly initiatives which includes Farmers Investment Support Scheme (Rythu Laxmi), round the clock power supply, Rs 5 lakh insurance coverage to all farmers, construction of Rythu Vedikas, farm mechanisation with provision of transplantation machines and subsidy on tractors.

The budget which is expected to entail upto 30 per cent increase over the previous year outlay of Rs 1.49 lakh crore will have substantial allocations for irrigation, energy, health, industry and education sectors. Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao is keen on decentralisation of local self-administration by increasing the number of Gram Panchayats (GPs) based on the population and this is expected to reflect in the allocations. The government had planned to make direct allocations to GPs ranging from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 25 lakh depending on the size of population.

The Health Department will get substantial allocations in order to support the government’s new plans such as the proposed Telangana State Health Profile scheme and construction of 300-bed hospitals in all the new district headquarters among other programmes.

Construction cost escalation on account of inflationary trends as well as the GST impact would require additional allocations over and above the original estimates for the implementation of flagship programmes such as Mission Kakatiya, Mission Bhagiratha and major irrigation projects including Kaleshwaram.

Hike in allocations for the 2BHK programme is also on the top of the agenda as the government set a target to construct around 2 lakh houses during the first phase. Reaching out to the BC communities in a big way, the government had already promised Rs 1,000 crore for Most Backward Classes besides allocating funds for eleven BC federations.