The Central Government’s fiscal deficit touched 39.3
per cent of the full-year target in the first half of the current financial
year, slightly higher than 37.3 per cent recorded in the year-ago period.
In actual terms, the fiscal deficit, or the gap
between expenditure and revenue, worked out at ₹ 7.02 lakh crore at the end of
September, as per data released by the Controller General of Accounts (CGA).
In the Union Budget, the government projected to bring
down the fiscal deficit to 5.9 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in
the 2023-24 financial year.
The fiscal deficit was 6.4 per cent of the GDP in
2022-23, against the earlier estimate of 6.71 per cent.
The tax revenue was at ₹ 11.60 lakh crore or 49.8 per
cent of the annual target. During April-September 2022-23, the net tax
collection was 52.3 per cent of that year’s annual Budget Estimate (BE).
The Centre’s total expenditure was ₹ 21.19 lakh crore,
or 47.1 per cent of BE for 2023-24, marginally higher than 46.2 per cent of BE
for 2022-23.
The Union Government has transferred ₹ 4,55,444 crore
to state governments as devolution of share of taxes till September, which is ₹
79,338 crore higher than the previous year.
Of the total revenue expenditure, ₹ 4.84 lakh crore
was on account of interest payments and ₹ 2.06 lakh crore towards major
subsidies.
Commenting on the CGA data, ICRA Chief Economist Aditi
Nayar said higher than budgeted dividend surplus transfer of ₹ 8,742 crore from
the RBI is likely to provide some cushion to meet any undershooting in other
revenue streams, including disinvestment or potential overshooting in expenses,
relative to respective BE, such as MGNREGA and LPG subsidy.
PTI
