Kolkata, Feb 8 The state excise component, as expected, will dominate West Bengal government's revenue generation in FY 2024-25, just like the last few years, as indicated in the documents of the state budget which was presented by Minister of State for Finance, Chandrima Bhattacharya, on the floor of the Assembly on Thursday.
While the state’s own projected tax revenue in the budget estimates for 2024-25 over that of the revised estimates for 2023-24 has been pegged at just 9 per cent, the corresponding growth in the state excise component is as high as 16 per cent.
State excise is just one of the 12 components of the state’s own tax revenue column.
The state’s own tax revenue generation, as per the budget estimates for 2024-25, has been pegged at Rs 1,02,348.92 crore, as against Rs 92,742.17 crore in the revised estimate figures for 2023-24.
On the other hand, the state excise component as per the budget estimates for 2024-25 has been pegged at Rs 21,846.36 crore, as against Rs 18,851.06 crore in the revised estimate figures for 2023-24.
According to economists, while West Bengal is not the only state that depends on state excise to a substantial extent for its own tax revenue generation, such over-dependence on this particular component is not a healthy economic parameter for any state.
Another factor that is evident from the budget documents is the increased dependence on grants-in-aid from the Union government, which is pegged at Rs 34,684.41 crore as per the budget estimates for 2024-24, as against Rs 29,575.97 in the revised estimates for 2023-34.
Previously, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) too had cautioned about the high dependence of the West Bengal government on grants-in-aid from the Centre to improve the revenue receipts of the state.
The CAG had also cautioned about other important indices of economic parameters in case of West Bengal like the decline in the state’s expenditure behind asset creation or capital expenditure as against a sharp increase in the revenue expenditure, above-the-target outstanding liabilities and huge excess expenditure in several grants.
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