State bans pvt hotel meetings; officials to travel in economy

Arteev Sharma

Tribune News Service

Jammu, February 19

The cash-strapped Jammu and Kashmir today unveiled a slew of austerity measures “to promote fiscal discipline” and cut extravagant expenditure on official meetings, conferences, air travel of bureaucrats and purchase of new vehicles.

The state government, administrated by Governor NN Vohra, has barred officers and officials from holding of meetings and conferences at private hotels and travelling first class on domestic and international visits regardless of entitlement.

It has also discouraged the holding of exhibitions, fairs, seminars and conferences outside the state, except exhibition for tourism or handicraft promotion.

Furthermore, bureaucrats have also been asked to use video-conferencing as much as possible to avoid the travel for the purpose of attending meetings, while the government would allow only 15 per cent expenditure of the Budget Estimates in the last month of financial year, March.

The government has described the austerity move as “expenditure management-economy measures and rationalisation of expenditure”, saying it would ensure “balanced pace of expenditure”.

Jammu and Kashmir is currently under the Governor’s rule following the death of incumbent Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed on January 7. Last year, it was disclosed that the state’s liabilities had grown from Rs 16,790 crore to a whopping Rs 44,646 crore during the past nine years, pushing Jammu and Kashmir into a “debt trap.” It was mainly because of successive governments’ failure to chalk out a long-term policy to boost financial resources and ensure fiscal discipline.

“Utmost economy will be observed in organising conferences, seminars and workshops. Only such conferences, workshops, seminars, etc, which are absolutely essential, should be held. The holding of exhibitions, fairs, seminars and conferences outside the state is strongly discouraged and there will be a ban on holding of meetings and conferences at private hotels. Government buildings should be utilised instead,” an order of the state Finance Department said.

It said travel expenditure of officers should be regulated so as to ensure that each department remained within the allocated budget for it.

“Re-appropriation or augmentation proposals on this account will not be entertained. Within the country, the officers should travel only by economy class regardless of entitlement. The facility of video conferencing may be used effectively and travel for the purpose of attending meetings should be avoided to the extent possible,” it said, adding that the lowest air fare ticket available for entitled class is to be procured in all cases of air travel.

The Finance Department said the purchase of new vehicles to meet the operational requirement was permitted, but only against condemnation as a replacement measure.

About the expenditure of various government departments, the order said, “Expenditure should be limited to 33 per cent of budget allocation during the last quarter of the year and in the month of March, the expenditure should be limited to 15 per cent of the Budget Estimates”.

It said any department exceeding this limit would submit a detailed explanatory note to the Finance Department by April 10 this year. “In the last month of the financial year, payments may be made only for the goods and services actually procured and for reimbursement of expenditure already incurred. Hence, no amount should be released in advance (in the last month), except in a few cases,” it said.

The department said administrative secretaries would be responsible for ensuring compliance of the “economy measures” outlined by it.