Revenue expenditure increased by 10.3%

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Comptroller and Auditor General, lending credence to Finance Minister K M Mani's observation that the state finances under the LDF rule were not in good shape, has pulled up the state for shoddy fiscal discipline.
It notes that revenue receipts during the year increased only by 6.5 per cent over the previous fiscal. This, the report observes, is low in comparison with the 16.5 per cent growth achieved last year. Revenue expenditure which mainly includes salary, pension and interest outgo constituted 91 per cent of the total expenditure and increased by 10.3 per cent over the last fiscal. ''The ratio of salaries and wages, pension liabilities, interest payments and subsidies to revenue receipts was 78 per cent, an increase of one percentage point from the previous year,'' the report notes. The TFC target of limiting interest payments to 15 per cent of revenue receipts has not been adhered to. It ranged between 1925 per cent during the TFC period. Capital expenditure, money invested to create assets such as roads, bridges, dams, buildings and factories, has increased by 21.5 per cent over the previous fiscal but it constituted only six per cent of the total expenditure.