CHANDIGARH – With the political leadership in Punjab busy in realpolitik unfolding in neighbouring Haryana, the state’s financial health has been hit yet again. Known for spending much more than it earns, Punjab has exhausted its advance limit of Rs 540 crore and gone into overdraft of over Rs 400 crore.
Bills worth hundreds of crores are pending with the treasury and the state is finding it difficult to meet its committed liabilities. Employees of the government-aided institutions have been awaiting their salaries for several months. Contractual employees hired under various Centre-sponsored schemes have also not received their dues.
RBI rules clearly state that any government getting into overdraft has to clear its overdraft limit within 15 working days. Sources in the Finance Department have told The Tribune that the state has been in overdraft for around five days now and it needs to clear it by next week.
Once the political leadership is back in the state, after the election din subsides in Haryana tomorrow, a decision on clearing the overdraft will have to be taken immediately. Officials in the Finance Department said they were hopeful that VAT collection (an average of Rs 1,200 crore per month) would be available by then to clear the overdraft and get the state out of the current fiscal mess.
Though 2.75 lakh state government employees are getting their salaries on time and two lakh pensioners are also getting their pensions regularly, the state government has been unable to clear DA arrears to be paid to employees since 2013. The total liability of all unpaid arrears is estimated to be around Rs 1,000 crore.
