FE Editorial : State of the deficit
The Financial Express: Jan 21 2013, 01:09 IST
Though state governments are routinely pilloried for being fiscally irresponsible, there has been a steady turnaround in their finances, as the latest RBI report on state finances shows. The turnaround is especially important in the context of implementing goods & services tax (GST) since the changed finances have largely been driven by the value added tax (a third on petroleum products), another tax the states were hesitant about implementing—VAT revenues in FY12 exceeded the budget target by R7,960 crore and are budgeted to grow by a whopping Rs 61,420 crore in FY 13 (that’s 18% above FY12). As a result, most states have already met the deficit targets set for them by the 13th Finance Commission, and handsomely.
From an average of 2.7% in much of the 1990s to 4.1% in the 1998-2004 period, the fiscal deficit to GDP ratio for states fell to 2.3% in the 2004-08 boom years, then rose to 2.7% in the next two years, and is projected to fall to 2.1% in the current financial year. The progress across states, needless to say, is not uniform but the important thing to keep in mind is that in FY11, 3 non-special category states saw a deterioration in their fiscal deficit, as did 4 special category states; in FY12, this rose to 10 non-special category states and 8 special category ones. In FY13, this is budgeted to fall to 8 non-special category states and 2 special category ones.
While there’s little doubt the buoyancy of central taxes has played
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