‘₹91L cr developmental expenditure in 8 years’
FINANCE MINISTRY SAID THE TOTAL DEVELOPMENTAL EXPENDITURE INCURRED IS FAR HIGHER THAN WHAT IS BEING QUOTED BY OPPN
NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi-led government has spent about ₹91 lakh crore in developmental expenditure such as food, fuel and fertiliser subsidies to the poor in under eight years, which is about 85% higher than the ₹49.2 lakh crore spent during the decade-long rule of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, the finance ministry said on Saturday.
Quoting expenditure data of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), it said the total developmental expenditure incurred by the Modi government in 2014-22 was ₹90.9 lakh crore, far higher than what is being publicised by some sections of the Opposition. “In contrast, only ₹49.2 lakh crore was spent on this [head] during 2004-14 [during the UPA regime],” finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s office tweeted. The finance ministry was rebutting a tweet of Congress leader and former finance minister P Chidambaram that the government burdened the people with huge fuel tax.
On April 3, Chidambaram said in a tweet: “In the 8 years of Modi Government, the central government collected ₹26,51,919 crore as fuel taxes There are approximately 26 crore families in India That means from every family the central government has collected, on average, ₹100,000 as fuel tax!”
“Ask yourself, what did an average family get in return for paying this huge amount as fuel tax?” he said in another tweet, attacking the Union government’s levying of taxes on petrol and diesel at a time when fuel rates are soaring due to supply uncertainty because of geopolitical developments.
A finance ministry official said on condition of anonymity that the tax was being spent on providing food, fuel and fertiliser subsidies as well as driving the world’s largest free vaccination drive to check the spread of Covid-19. The government is continuously making public expenditure on creation of capital assets to boost the economy at a time when private investors are wary of Covid-19 and other geopolitical developments, the official added. “The expenditure incurred by the Modi Govt includes ₹24.85 lakh crore spent so far on food, fuel and fertiliser subsidies and ₹26.3 lakh crore on capital creation. Over the 10 years of UPA, only ₹13.9 lakh crore was spent on subsidies,” Sitharaman’s office tweeted.
The official quoted above said the policy of the UPA government was to defer the liabilities of rising fuel prices for the future government to handle rather than tackling the issue upfront. “In fact, we [the Modi government] are also paying for huge amount of oil bonds issued by the UPA regime and this burden on the exchequer would continue till 2026,” he said.
“The developmental expenditure incurred by the Modi Govt of ₹90.9 lakh cr so far is over and above the ₹93,685.68 crore already spent between 2014-22 on repaying the Upaera oil bonds. Further, an additional ₹1.48 lakh crore will be paid by 2026,” the FM’S office said in a tweet.
The official quoted above said: “According to Chidambaram, the Modi government has earned ₹26.5 lakh crore from fuel tax collections between 2014-2021. He said that the total outgo on free food grain, cash allowances to women, PM-KISAN and other cash transfers is no more than ₹225,000 crore, which is less than the annual fuel taxes collected by the Centre alone.”