Futuristic Approach Needed for State Financial Planning: Chhattisgarh Finance Minister at Pune Policy Festival
Pune, 10th January 2025: “Even while doing the financial planning on the personal front we are futuristic and consider the majority of our financial needs of the future. Similarly, we must adopt the futuristic approach while making the financial planning for the state rather than looking at just the 5-year term”, opined O. P. Choudhary, Finance Minister of the state of Chattisgarh during his keynote address at the second edition of the Pune Public Policy Festival (PPPF) at the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics.
An IAS officer turned politician, Choudhary touched upon many aspects of state finance during his speech. Shekhar Singh, Municipal Commissioner of PCMC, Siddharth Desai, Indranil Chitale, Sahil Deo, and Rugwed Deshpande from the organizing team of PPPF were also present on the occasion. During this two-day event, various experts will deliberate various aspects of economics and public policy making.
“Welfare schemes or freebies are not wrong every time. We have seen that if the money from various welfare schemes goes to the women, it is utilized better and put to the right use. However, some parties announce unrealistic welfare schemes like every woman in the country will get Rs.8000/- per month in a Khatakhat format. The estimated number of women in India’s population is 70 Crore then people should understand that in a country like India which has an annual budget of Rs.48 Lakh Cr, is it really possible to give Rs.8000/- per month to every woman the cost of which comes to about Rs.70 Lakh Cr”, said O. P. Choudhary.
“So, people should demand and the political parties must also financially explain the scheme before promising it”, he underlined.
Praising GST as one of the most important financial reforms, which reduced multiple taxation, Choudhary questioned the opposition’s intent of criticizing GST when all decisions at the GST Council to date are taken with consensus, with states having more weightage in the decision-making.
He advised the state governments to go for reforms for the taxes that are still under the purview of states by sighting an example of Odisha which managed to increase its revenue with the mining reforms from Rs.15000 Cr to Rs.45000/- in the past few years.
“States need to keep tabs on debt to GDP ratio and income to committed expenses ratio, else they will get trapped into their own decisions. States should focus on reforms and increasing capex for facilitating the development of the state”, said O. P. Chaudhary.
He praised PM Narendra Modi for taking the reforms rising above the political compulsions and for taking the appropriate steps to get the economy back on track after being disturbed due to the pandemic with campaigns like ‘Aapada Me Avsar’ and by introducing schemes like PLI for giving a boost to the manufacturing sector.
