CESTAT going to be starved for funds in 2014 -15
THE Departments priorities are clear - they spend least amounts on most important items like training and Tribunal. If you take training seriously and produce excellent officers and take care of your litigation properly, everything else will fall in place. What will DRI and DGCEI do with all the money if they don't get properly trained officers and if their cases are going to be stuck in Tribunal for ten years? All because you don't like to spend money on training and you don't like the courts anyway.
Last year the budget allocation for CESTAT was 17 crores which went up to 18.7 crores in the revised estimates and this year you give the Tribunal 24 crores, just 5 crores more and you want to start six more benches. Out of the 24 crores given to CESTAT, 17 crores go for salaries alone and what you are left with is 7 crores to run this great Tribunal. In the first two months of this year, the Tribunal is already on a deficit of 92 lakhs. Out of the 24 crores, they are to spend 4 crores in the first two months and they have spent nearly 5 crores leaving a deficit of nearly a crore of rupees. How will they manage six more benches? Where will they get money for cars, air-conditioning, telephone, postage - for all of these, the administration will have to beg the service providers.
The Finance Minister was an eminent lawyer - he should understand that CESTAT cannot and should not be run on such shoe-string budget.