Jharkhand Finance Minister Slams Union Budget 2024: 'Grossly Neglected' State Demands Ignored

Ranchi: State finance minister Radha Krishana Kishore on Sunday expressed huge disappointment over this year’s Union budget presented by Nirmala Sitaraman. Kishore said that despite submitting specific demands by Jharkhand to the Centre during the pre-budget meeting attended by finance ministers of all states in Delhi, the Centre ignored their demands.He said, “When the finance minister in her speech said that the govt’s three duties at the Centre were — accelerating the pace of development, building capacities, and ensuring that development reaches every section of society, I turned optimistic. But as she continued, it turned out to be highly disappointing. There is no clear and concrete indication anywhere in this budget of what roadmap will be adopted to achieve these three duties.”The provisions made for important sectors, such as agriculture, industry, MSMEs, education, health, infrastructure, tourism, and the environment, not only appear inadequate but are also far from achieving the goal of a developed India by 2047, Kishore claimed.“The country’s Investment-GDP ratio has remained consistently low for several years. Without increasing this ratio, it is not possible to achieve the country’s desired growth rate. However, the budget is completely silent on what strategy will be adopted to increase this ratio,” the state finance minister argued.Additionally, the budget makes no mention of any effort to stabilise the foreign exchange rate or control the prices of precious metals — especially gold and silver. The Indian currency has been continuously weakening over the past few years. While one US dollar was worth approximately Rs 47 before 2014, it has now exceeded Rs 90. “Similarly, in recent months, not only have gold and silver prices increased excessively, but they have also seen sharp fluctuations. Despite this, the budget does not even mention these serious circumstances, let alone any initiative to address them,” he rued.On initiatives for Jharkhand in the budget, he said, “The state has been grossly neglected. There are neither new railway lines nor new passenger trains announced, nor has any place been given to agriculture, irrigation, or social sectors. On January 10, while representing Jharkhand, I reminded the finance minister that the Centre should provide the state approximately Rs 5000 crore annually to offset the additional burden on Jharkhand due to the 60% and 40% expenditure sharing between the Centre and the state under the MGNREGA scheme.“Moreover, I demanded Rs 2000 crore annually for the next four years to increase the state’s irrigation capacity. We also demanded that the Centre compensate for the Rs 4000 crore annual loss due to GST rationalisation. Most importantly, we sought the Rs 1. 36 lakh crore outstanding dues with various coal companies. All our demands were disregarded,” he lamented.