Oppn flays govt over supplementary budget

RANCHI: Accusing the Arjun Munda-led coalition government of preparing ground for "March loot", opposition leaders flayed the government on presenting the third supplementary budget at the Assembly here on Monday.
Pradeep Yadav of JVM raised objection as soon as deputy chief minister Hemant Soren tabled the third supplementary demand of grants worth Rs 1,515 crore. Yadav said the ruling alliance has failed to utilize the plan budget and is seeking yet another supplementary budget."The basic plan budget was somewhere around Rs 9,500 crore of which the government has been successful in showing expenditure of just Rs 5,400 crore till date which could again be an inflated figure," Yadav charged.
He asked the government to ensure that the pending budget is utilized instead of seeking new demands under new heads.
K N Tripathy of Congress also expressed surprise on the government coming up with another supplementary budget. "Only last month the government sought the second supplementary budget and it has come up with yet another when the financial year is to close in just another month," he ridiculed, adding that the government needs calculation experts. "To avoid embarrassment, they could have come up with an amount of second supplementary that sufficed the needs till the end of his fiscal, instead of tabling monthly budgets," he said.
Intervening, Speaker C P Singh asked the opposition to place their arguments during cut motion, adding that even the treasury bench would have full opportunity to explain what necessitated another supplementary budget before end of this financial year.