Revenue not good spenders

By Vijay Kumar

The CBEC is perhaps good at collecting Revenue but is not really good in spending money. They are not able to spend the money allotted to them. Out of the total 1525 Crores given to them, for spending in 2004-05, they could spend only 1300 Crores leaving 224 Crores of unspent money. You get to any office, you will find officers with no chairs, stinking bathrooms, no place for visitors to sit, absence of books and CDs. What can the government do when the department cannot spend the money given to it? These are the figures given by the Principal Chief Controller of Accounts of CBEC for the year 2004 - 05.

Major Head	Budget Estimates	Expenditure	Excess (+) Saving (-)
2037-Customs	491.65	446.37	-45.28
2038-Union Excise Duties	834.07	825.90	-8.17
2216 - Housing	0.50	0.14	-0.36
Total-Revenue Section	1326.22	1272.41	-53.81
Capital Section
4047-Capital Outlay on other Fiscal Services	173.83	19.68	-154.15
4059-Capital Outlay on Public Works	10.00	3.42	-6.58
4216-Capital Outlay on Housing	15.00	4.83	-10.17
Total Capital Section	198.83	27.93	-170.90
Total Grant	1525.05	1300.34	-224.71

Obviously they could not spend 224 Crores!