Members from both the treasury and the opposition bench held discussion on the budget 2021-22, presented by chief minister Neiphiu Rio, on Friday.
Initiating the discussion on general budget, opposition MLA, Imkong L Imchen appreciated the unanimous adoption of the resolution on Naga political issue, which he said will benefit in the ongoing peace talk to arrive at an early solution. Imchen further suggested that the resolution should be taken into practical steps and bring it to the notice of the Prime Minister of India and the stakeholders especially the participants in the negotiations parties.
Also commenting on the budget 2021-2022, Imchen said that in all the successive terms, the government had presented deficit budget but not as alarming as this year’s budget. He stated that Naga people have every right to expect better financing, disciplining and management. However, he lamented that the budgetary and financial management were never as per exception of the people which needs serious introspection.
On the sectoral allocations he said that the allocations are mostly spent on construction activities adding that the department have not proposed any developmental initiatives but on assets and constructions. Imchen also highlighted on Kelhoshe Polytechnic Atoizu and pointed out that it was the first Polytechnic institution the government established and therefore he reiterated that it should be made a full-fledged Engineering college of the State. Imchen also drawing the attention of Health department said that cost of COVID testing was on the higher side and called on the department to clarify on the high cost of the test. He also highlighted on various issues of state finance and power sectors.
NPF legislator, Dr. Chumben Murry pointed out that the State faced unprecedented hardship due to the COVID-19 pandemic and therefore urged the government to be prepared for any such crisis. He opined that the presentation of State’s financial statement or budget should have been based on the State’s our own economic parameters, however, it was on the contrary and that the opening paragraphs sounded more like a beginning of Union Finance Minister’s budget speech.
Dr Murry also suggested that the government should review the liquor prohibition issue and exploration of the State’s natural resources in order to improve its own tax and non-tax revenue since Centre had expressed it plans to rationalize and bring down centrally sponsored schemes (CSS) in line with the 15th Finance Commission as was evident from the Union Budget 2021-2022.
NPF legislator, Amenba Yaden, participating in the session appreciated the initiative taken by the government on an innovative model of cluster Agri development called ‘Naga integrated settled farming’ and stated that Nagaland farming holding is entirely different from mainland area, therefore requested the Department to properly research and validated in considerable area before applying in mass scale.
IT&C, Science & Technology, NRE, Mmhonlumo Kikon, participating in the discussion, stated that the government has shown the leadership by safeguarding the interest of the citizen of all during the pandemic. He said that good governance has come back despite facing the pandemic and economic challenges. He stated that the government of the day is willing to discuss on good and constructive suggestions and take it positively.
On the Foothill Road issue, Mmhonlumo pointed out that although work order for Doyang bridge was issued to the contractor in 2014, the work was far from completion till now. He said he had personally inspected the progress of the work found that the contractor’s claim of more than 70 percent of the work being completed was untrue.
When more than 75 percent of fund had been released for the work, Mmhonlumo questioned why there was so much delay in completing the work. He asked the minister in-charge to initiate an investigation into the issue and take appropriate disciplinary actions.
Opposition member, Y.M. Yollow Konyak called upon the government to give equal importance to the development of all districts and not just concentrate on few.
NPF legislator, Dr. Imtiwapang Aier expressed his view that underdeveloped areas of all districts should also be included under Department of Under Developed Areas so that parity is maintained.
Moatoshi Longkumer of the NPF also raised concern on State’s dependence on import of important commodities from outside the State and frequent economic blockades imposed by neighbouring States from time to time.
He also pointed out about the ban in transport of live pigs, from registered farms of Punjab and Haryana, imposed by Assam government along its road. He said that such move was a sinister designed to capture Nagaland pig market under the pretext of African swine flu pandemic.
In this connection, he said that the Centre had issued a memo to all the principal secretaries of Haryana, Punjab and the eight Northeastern states on July 22, 2020 to allow movement of pigs from Haryana and Punjab to North Eastern states. He further informed the House that Guwahati High Court had also passed a judgment that necessary transit pass be granted within 72 hours on receipt of the application on the condition not to unload pigs in Assam and should produce upto-date vaccination certificate.
Despite fulfilling the entire SOP required by the court, he said Assam failed to neither issue transit pass nor allow the pig consignment to pass through the state while it sold pork on large scale.
He said the rising cost of pork since the lockdown was understandable, however, even after lockdown has been lifted, the cost of pork could not come down due to such sinister designs applied by Assam government in the form of economic blockade.
Yitachu, participating in the budget discussion, called on the need for industrialization in the State so as to improve the economic state and solve the unemployment problem in the State. He also suggested for opening of the State to other regions of the country and even other countries for the trading purpose, with special reference to the South East Asian countries in line with the Act East Policy. Yitachu suggested for proper planning while constructing roads in rural areas so that they do not create problems to the existing National Highways and State Highways.
He stated that governance is for all and called for balancing of the government’s exchequer as it was needed for the State to progress.
On the Naga Political issue, Yitachu opined that there was no ruling and opposition party. He said that his party will give full cooperation towards the final solution.
NPF MLA, Dr. Chotisuh Sazo, while appreciating the government for providing various machineries to the farmers, called for equal distribution of machineries to all the districts. Appreciating the department of Information Technology & Communication and the IT sector, Sazo also requested the service providers to provide better services as their services has drastically increased due to the restrictive measures of the Covid-19 pandemic. While pushing for outsourcing of various services, Sazo suggested for improvements in the revenue earning departments of the State.
Participating in the discussion on the budget for the year 2021-2022 Toshi Wungtung, Advisor IP&R, SCERT and Village Guards highlighted the success story of the State in many aspects under the leadership of chief minister Neiphiu Rio and how the state has successfully sailed through one of the toughest times during the Covid 19 pandemic. He stated that although Nagaland was dependent on Centre with little or no revenue sources of its own, the budget has clearly covered all available avenues that has potential especially the Agri and allied sector. He also acknowledged the austerity measures adopted by the government for the good of the State as a whole.
In his concluding remarks, chief minister Neiphiu Rio stated that the House discussed the needs to bring reforms in the Power, Transport, Water and Mining sectors so as to reduce recurring expenditure of the government. He said that the government will also focus on right sizing and rationalize the large manpower in the government sector. “The time has come to curtail Government expenditure and give more importance to revenue generation so that resource are available for development”, he added.
He appreciated all members for their participation in the discussion and for their valuable inputs.