As per the figures of the state planning board, government’s spending on Life Mission, which the government considers as one of the flagship initiatives to claim its commitment towards the homeless, is just 2.69%.The government had earmarked Rs 717 crore for Life Mission this year, including Rs 525 crore for rural housing and Rs 192 crore for urban. Similar is the case of the Rebuild Kerala initiative (RKI), which was launched after the floods of 2018 to reconstruct high-quality and durable roads. Though Rs 904.83 crore has been earmarked for 2023-24, the expenditure is just 15.37% of the total funds earmarked under the scheme.
Though there are eight other schemes under the RKI other than reconstruction of roads including transport, water supply, disaster preparedness, maintenance of public buildings and livelihood support, except for reconstruction of roads, no funds have been earmarked for the rest. Coming to social security schemes, there are 19 various schemes, for which as much as Rs 152.33 crore has been earmarked. Despite this, the expenditure is as low as 33.67%, indicating that the fund disbursements under the various welfare schemes are delayed.
These include the Vayomithram scheme for the elderly, for which Rs 27.5 crore has been earmarked, but only 39.16% is utilised. In the Ashwasa Kiranam project, for which Rs 54 crore was set aside, only 27.76% is spent.
It is amid these low utilisation that the finance department has now instructed bills that are more than Rs one lakh can be cleared only with permission of the finance department. Till now, the restrictions were for the bills above Rs five lakh. Bringing down the limit would mean that the financial crunch is acute, and the Plan fund expenditure under which the maximum utilisation would be in the last three months of the financial year, will bear the brunt.
Since the pension payments along with salaries and interest payments together constitute more than 80% of its revenue earnings, the government is trying to raise resources from all possible avenues to ensure that these committed expenditures are met. “The claims that the financial crisis is the result of discriminatory approach of the Centre are largely political. Even though there is an element of merit in it, the state’s approach of extravagant spending to hide its financial crisis is making the situation worse,” a senior finance department official said.