YSRCP terms Union Budget 'disappointing'

Amaravati, Feb 1:  Andhra Pradesh's ruling YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) has termed the Union Budget 2022-23 "disappointing".

The party said they had expected a booster dose but it appeared like all style but no substance.

YSRCP Parliamentary Party leader V. Vijayasai Reddy said the allocation of Rs 1 lakh crore for capital expenditure seems huge but when it comes to the state's share as per the set formula, Andhra Pradesh gets just 4.047 per cent which works out to only Rs 4,000 crore.

In case of the FRBM as well, while the set norm is not more than 3 per cent of the GSDP for states, there is no parity with respect to Centre on the borrowings. The state is still bearing the brunt of wrong decisions of the previous government, he said.

Citing the statistics, he said while the fiscal deficit of Union Budget was 9.3 per cent for 2020-21, 6.9 per cent for 2021-22, and is estimated at 6.4 per cent this year, Andhra Pradesh registered a deficit of 5.48 per cent and 3.94 percent during the past two years and yet there are restrictions on FRBM.

Reddy said that the proposed budget for 2022-23 is nearly Rs 40 lakh crore, with an increase of Rs 4.5 lakh crore than that of the last fiscal and the Country's growth rate for 2021-22 is at 9.2 percent. He said this is much better than any other country, especially while fighting Covid. Further, he appreciated the increase in capital expenditure by 35 per cent than the previous allocations, where Rs 7.5 lakh crores has been allocated in the current budget which is 20 per cent of the budgetary allocations.

On interlinking of rivers Krishna-Godavari, Krishna-Penna, and Penna-Cauveri, he said that the state government had already interlinked Godavari-Krishna Rivers with its own funds and thus, appealed to compensate the state.

The state government has been pushing for three development projects which include a dedicated freight corridor from Kharagpur to Vijayawada, freight corridor connectivity to ports in Andhra Pradesh andthe Bhogapuram National Highway, but no announcements were made in this regard, he said.

Similarly, he mentioned that no announcements were made towards the development in healthcare sectors and no attention was paid towards research and completely ignored health insurance for the middle class people.

In regard to agriculture, he said that the Centre had completely ignored increasing the allocations of PM Kisan and failed to include tenant farmers under the scheme and also ignored paddy procurement policy and MSP for crops. The YSRCP leader stated that the shortfall in GST compensation of states was not addressed in the budget and appeals to extend the compensation period were ignored.

He welcomed an increase of the tax deduction limit of state employees to 14 percent, and duties' reduction on shrimp production and aquaculture.

The YSRCP, however, opposed the privatisation of profit-making public sector units like the LIC, HPCL, VSP and the like. He said there was no encouraging mention of MGNREGS. The budget also has no mention of health insurance to the middle income group which forms over 56 per cent.