Naidu holds Pre-Budget conference in Vijayawada

Hyderabad, Jan 7 (INN): As a first of its kind meeting, the Andhra Pradesh Government held Pre-Budget State Level Conference in Vijayawada on Wednesday.

Before beginning the session, the Chief Minister, principal secretaries, heads of departments, commissioners and other officials observed 2-munite silence, paying respects to the young lives lost in a tragic road accident in Anantapur district.

Chief Secretary IYR Krishna Rao introduced the session while Finance Minister Yanamala Ramakrishnudu briefed about the state's finances in the last six months.

The Finance Minister said that the meeting's focus is to manage finances efficiently in the state. 'Keeping a vigil on financial constraints, we need to ensure that allocations for public welfare schemes are not brought down,' the finance minister said.

The Government of Andhra Pradesh is planning to introduce zero-based Budget for financial year 2015-16, the finance minister said. 'This is to scrutinize every scheme and the results of each scheme will be analyzed. This means budget will be allocated based on the success rate.'

Stating that the government has to achieve fiscal prudence, we need to balance development and welfare of the state, he explained. Given that the government's coffers are falling empty, the finance minister said there is a need to set up mechanisms to generate revenues. 'The government wants to improve capital expenditure and bring down the revenue expenditure in order to reduce the burden on the state exchequer,' the finance minister said.

Pitching in, Deputy Chief Minister K.E. Krishna Murthy pointed out the laudable efforts of the Chief Minister in putting land records online and giving a push to services sector.

Introducing the session with a review on 6 months into the new government, the Chief Minister said that this is the second time that ministers, top bureaucrats and other officials are meeting after the Collectors' Conference held on August 7th in Vijayawada.

"During our earlier meet, we had discussed about the state's goals and gave a direction to them. Now, we need to review our performance and plan ahead in this New Year,' he added.

Stating that the government had started off with a fiscal deficit of nearly Rs16,000 crore, the Chief Minister said the new government is attempting to balance welfare, development and finances. 'We need to re-orient our Budget assessing the needs of people. One way could be by taking immediate steps to meet people's needs and the other way could be to increase revenues,' he added.

Stating that officials are accountable for every work they take up, the Chief Minister said that every unit of work should be measured and linked to development. He also suggested that officials should mark their priorities rightly and balance welfare and development in order to create a sustainable economy. Growth percentage of AP in the Q1 and Q2 is 6.94%.

Thanking land owners and farmers for giving their lands for the capital city, the Chief Minister said that farmers have been very cooperative because of the land pooling package offer from the government.

'In the last 10 years, farming was hit badly. A whopping 93% of farmers in the state were reeling under the debt-burden due to policy paralysis and weak administration in the last 10 years. With my poll promise, I have initiated debt redemption which will relieve them of debts and enhance productivity,' he said, adding in the next four years, the debt redemption program will be completed, eventually making farming sustainable and profitable.

The Chief Minister directed officials to complete distribution of Sankranti Gifts to people by January 11th afternoon. Further, the Chief Minister said that three days are being declared as holidays for Sankranti. For efficient administration, he said that land would be provided for offices for shifting. 'Only skeleton offices could be based in Hyderabad. But, we need to operate from the capital,' he said.

The Chief Minister also suggested integration of sub-sectors into one department. For instance: Marine industry, aquaculture, canals, water usage could be integrated with 'water.' He urged district collectors to compete with each other in development propagating 'Smart Village' program. 'One village should compete with another, one mandal has to compete with another, one district should compete with another,' he added.

The Chief Minister told officials that AP is poised to become a logistics hub for South East Asia. 'We are the central point on the East Coast,' he explained. All the development activities in our state should be result-oriented, he said.

After, the Chief Minister's speech, Special Chief Secretary (Planning) S.P. Tucker made a presentation on the growth strategy, highlight the trends of state economy.

Tucker explained better strategies which the Government of Andhra Pradesh can adopt to increase its finances, adding that AP is the only state that does a quarter-by-quarter growth analysis.